The Big Answer

Soccer Dad has a round-up of blogging on the convention of MSM journalists in Jerusalem. One after the other, in widely differing fashion, we all note that the MSM is pushing a particular "narrative." You could fit it on a bumper sticker: Anybody but Israel.

The media would rather focus on the perspective of anyone else, be they Lebanese, Hezbollah, Palestinian or Fwench. Anyone else will do, it doesn't matter if they're liars, kidnappers, terrorists, anarchists, or wannabe suicide bombers. It is Israel that is anathema.

Melanie Phillips takes it a step further: "The western media are no longer merely producing questionable professional practices in reporting a war. They are now active participants in it ..."

The plain fact is that western journalists were sent to cover the war being waged against Israel from Lebanon as a war being waged by Israel against Lebanon.... the big answer is that the western media transmit the lies of Hezbollah because they want to believe them.

That's why Gd gave us the blogosphere... and just in the nick of time. We have yet to realize the full extent of its power. For the most part, we bloggers are still stuck in responding to the established media. That's absolutely necessary and I have no argument against it. There's a next step, however, and it's not too early to start thinking about it.

Back in the days when I was limited to writing letters to the editor, Esther Sarah taught me something very important. She told me that you don't want to spend your precious space restating your adversary's point of view; that only gives them another go at the public. Instead, you must refer to them only in passing, utilize them only as a flashpoint for getting your own perspective out to readers. We need to apply this logic to our blogs.

For instance, how many people read Steven Erlanger's anti-Israel statements in the original YNet report on the MSM convention? Let's say "x" number of people. Now, though, how many more people have read his thoughts at this blog, at Soccer Dad, at Mere Rhetoric, Deja Vu, Daled Amos, In Context, LGF and the rest? We have to look at the fact that we have multiplied his audience ... and consider the implicatons.

Remember the cliche that every knock's a boost? Or the one that says it doesn't matter as long as they spell your name right? Those of us who knock the MSM all day long need to realize that we are simultaneously giving them a boost. By incessantly repeating them, we are in effect recognizing, even reinforcing, their position as Authority.

We need to nudge and nurture the trend to the contrary: the ambitious efforts of Pajamas Media, the Blogger Conference Calls being offered by the generous and creative fellows over at One Jerusalem, the Atlas Vlogs... and I'm sure there's much more that I'm not even aware of yet.

If, as Melanie Phillips asserts, western (mainstream) media have become "active participants" in war, believing and transmitting the lies of Hezbollah, then we blogs must take care not to act only as their echo chambers. Somehow we have to move beyond that, and fast.

We have to engage in our own war ... for Independence.

Comments

[RR]

Brilliant.