Unable to stand the heat, French jouranlism has closed the kitchen.
FRENCH TV BOSS ADMITS CENSORING RIOT COVERAGE*
November 12, 2005 (Guardian) - One of France's leading TV news executives has admitted censoring his coverage of the riots in the country for fear of encouraging support for far-right politicians.Jean-Claude Dassier, the director general of the rolling news service LCI, said the prominence given to the rioters on international news networks had been "excessive" and could even be fanning the flames of the violence.
Hhmmm, let's see, since the rest of the world was seeing so much of France in flames, for balance, for proportion, the French public should see less. We are a little at sea as to how France in flames broadcast to, say, Topeka, Kansas managed to fan the flames of violence in France. Were Kansans telephoning the rioters with bulletins?
M. Dassier's ginned-up paternalism, protecting an impressionable French public from the amplitude of the rioting, no doubt contributed to French outrage in some quarters at the government's actions:
"[T]he Green Party rejected [curfews] as "totally disproportionate."
Indeed, why such drastic measures when news reports had no urgency? But M. Dassier is not really much concerned about proportion, his main objective is to ensure that his rump-journalism produces desired political ends.
Mr Dassier denied he was guilty of "complicity" with the French authorities ... but he admitted his decision was partly motivated by a desire to avoid encouraging the resurgence of extreme rightwing views in France."Politics in France is heading to the right and I don't want rightwing politicians back in second, or even first place because we showed burning cars on television," Mr Dassier told an audience of broadcasters at the News Xchange conference in Amsterdam today.
And M.Dassier is not alone in his rump journalism.
FRANCE 3 REFUSING TO PUBLICIZE CAR-BEQUE FIGURES
November 9, 2005 - To discourage more violence, France 3 will no longer publish or present any more figures on vehicle arson.
Elsewhere, Canal+ conscientiously tidies up rough language from some "youths" so that not all émeutiers will be unfairly tarred as ant-Semitic.
CANAL+ EDITS "SARKOZY, DIRTY JEW!" TO "SARKOZY, FASCIST!"
November 10, 2005 - «a subtitle strategically placed says "Sarkozy, fasciste!", but according to many French forum listeners (including me), the "youths" actually shout "Sarkozy, sale juif" [dirty Jew], this is clearly audible, Sarko effectively being part-jewish.»
Yes, not much rioting to report, instead, stay tuned for French reports on the latest disasters from Iraq: Imminent defeat, American atrocities, car bombings, American deaths, disappointing elections with less than historic 101% turnouts, American cultural abuses, Abu Graibh follow-on reports, and picnic albums of friendly mujahadeen. No flame fanning here.
And, we recall, not much factually true.
JOURNALIST IS FIRED FOR ATTACK ON FRENCH WAR COVERAGE
PARIS January 1, 2004 (Telegraph) - In the book [La Guerre a Outrances - Comment la presse nous a desinformé sur l'Irak (The War of Outrages - How the press disinformed us on Iraq)], M Hertoghe, 44, a Belgian, examined articles and editorials from his own paper, La Croix [M Hertoghe was fired on 12.15.03 for a "loss of confidence" following the book's release.], as well as the conservative Le Figaro, centre-Left Le Monde, Left-wing Liberation and the regional paper Ouest-France.He charges all of them with "collective misdemeanours" resulting from a mixture of journalistic and French arrogance. ... M Hertoghe said: "French readers simply cannot understand how British and American forces won the war so fast."
Despite rave reviews in Belgium, the book hardly raised an eyebrow in France. Daniel Schneidermann, recently fired by Le Monde for criticising the paper's management, lamented the lack of debate over the book. In a column in Liberation, he described the French national press as being "in crisis" over its ability to honestly inform the public.
UPDATE 11.13.05:
November 13, 2005 (Guardian) - Images of Paris's suburbs on fire shocked the world - but not the French, because France's media took it upon themselves to censor them...'Do you [scil., the French public] want to see images of violence, of cars or buildings burning in the night?' the [Le Nouvel Observateur] asked. 'Well, turn to the foreign channels like CNN or Deutsche Welle.'
From Monday, state-owned France 3 no longer gave the total [of torched cars] at all. ... On Tuesday LCI followed suit, not least, Libération reported, because two cars had apparently been burnt specifically for their cameras.
De Villepin himself chose TF1, the French privatised national channel that owns LCI, to make his critical address to the nation announcing the new curfew. ... It was preceded by several 'good news' items about successful government initiatives in deprived suburbs. There was no specific request from the Prime Minister's office, sources said, but, according to one TF1 journalist, 'the order of the day' was 'we must be positive'.
'Having satellites trained on towns across France 24 hours a day showing the violence would have been wrong and totally disproportionate,' Dassier said.
TF1: [Brightly.] The weather in Paris was very nice today, 11°C and mostly sunny between vertical columns of black rank clouds. [Gravely.] And now for our nightly investigative report on Abu Graibh...
* Absolutely no Muslims sighted during the writing of this report.
PFFT (What is this?): Il n'y a rien à voir 4 | Rayonnement français 0
For at least sixty years now the French have been indoctrinated that they are nothing but racist Jew-killers and that any immigrant is a good immigrant, and that they can never again let French minorities be discriminated against for any reason.
And you guys are now surprised that the social and media elite want to keep the average Frenchman from seeing the racial connection? Why? They have been taught that the peasant of France is an evil racist Jew killer and only wants to kill minorities. Of COURSE they are keeping the news from these supposed small town monsters.
If you disagree with this assesment of the vast majority of Frenchmen, why not tell them?
Tell them that they aren't evil for wanting France to be French.
Tell them that they have a moral right to maintain their racial and ethnic dominance in France.
Tell them that God gave them France and they are entitled to keep anyone out who will not fit in.
Tell them that the minorities do not get to decide who "fits in", only the French do.
Tell them that previous "good" minorities can get restive, demanding, and wear out their welcome, and tell them that they can take targetted measures against the newly restive as well.
Not killing, mind you, but revoking of their rights as Frenchmen and applying focused economic and social pressure to leave France and return to their homelands.
But complaining about the news media for thinking what they have been trained to think from birth is just not productive.
