Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby mōdgethanc » 2013-04-20, 0:50

One problem with Israeli politics is that it's very easy for minor parties to gain seats in the Knesset, and they tend to be extreme right-wing parties that support settling the West Bank, making Israel even more of a theocracy than it already, and other such lunacy. They definitely don't want any more Arabs living in Israel than there have to be.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby md0 » 2013-04-20, 1:03

To be fair, the most vocal criticism of Israeli Army (Defence Force?) comes from within Israel.
And I think that over here it happens because of the anti-Islam feelings more than anything (some people aren't extremely fond of "Jews", you must heard some of the conspiracy theories).
Now, I don't know how we came talking about that. In any case, I believe that Israel need to lay off the attacks and the settlements, so that Palestinians can turn to their moderate leaders. Fear does lead to extremism, it's seen as the only way to protect yourself really. Anyway, that's offtopic.

On topic: I see your points guys, and most of them are fair. There's a tactful way of doing that though. Not all news must be a bloody nationalism booster article. The Greek surgeon in Boston for one. I bet there are dozens of surgeon in Boston doing the best they can to help the injured people and they are true heroes. All of them. Not only the Greek one.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Johanna » 2013-04-20, 1:18

meidei, you are definitely right. I just wasn't able to express it as well.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Babelfish » 2013-04-20, 14:59

So, still no idea what has this gotta do with what I wrote, just lash out at Israel across several posts, ignore naturally the Arab and Muslim states and terrorist organizations which openly aim for Israel's destruction and bombard it with rockets and whatnot, then get back to topic :roll: Nice. I certainly do agree with meidei that "Fear does lead to extremism", it happens to be true for Israel as well and not only its enemies...

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby md0 » 2013-04-20, 15:39

Yeah, it seems totally offtopic to me. We could discuss it, but not hear.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby mōdgethanc » 2013-04-20, 15:55

So, still no idea what has this gotta do with what I wrote, just lash out at Israel across several posts, ignore naturally the Arab and Muslim states and terrorist organizations which openly aim for Israel's destruction and bombard it with rockets and whatnot, then get back to topic Nice.
I'm mostly on Israel's side, minus the whole West Bank fiasco, but this is a good starter for discussing bias in the media (which is what this thread is about). In the United States, especially among right-wingers and many Jewish people, anything less than unconditional support of Israel is seen as anti-Semitic. Among the left wing in Europe, support of Israel is seen as racist and oppressive towards Arabs. Funnily enough, both somehow equate Israel with all Jewish people, even though there are more Jews living outside of Israel than in it.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Sol Invictus » 2013-04-20, 19:02

I started watching Boston bomber chase on CNN the other day. I was pretty annoyed by this congressman they asked opinions to. CNN had this interview with bombers' mother, who, of course, says they're innocent and something along the lines that authorities were watching them. So how does this guy react to that? OMG, it is so wrong of her to say such things of country that has given them everything and how dare the parents seek medical care in Russia when Boston has best hospitals in the world. :dunno:

Also, BTW, I am more pissed that at least our coverage is focused on certain countries (although I know full well that there is almost zero information in foreign languages from some countries) e.g. we get almost no information on Africa, much of Asia and South America, than somebody telling me that people from my country were hurt - I think it is common ethical thing to assume that each person's life is important and suffering immeasurable, not to statistically evaluate who was most affected

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Levike » 2013-05-03, 17:55

Here in Transylvania it's the same:

Whenever the Syrian war is mentioned
the Romanian news somehow feel the need to talk
about the Romanian citizens that must be brought back home.

With the Hungarian news it's even worse.

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby IpseDixit » 2013-06-23, 23:08

I haven't noticed this phenomenon here, though I've noticed that, when talking about crime news, many media always outline the nationality/ethnicity of the person who commited the crime, of course just in case he or she is a foreigner.

I'm quite torn on the ethics of this practice... because on the one hand I think it's our right to know what kind of foreign people live in our country, on the other hand, it is very likely to create an unjust bias against foreigners...

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Rivaldo » 2013-06-27, 4:03

News coverage in Brazil isn't ethnocentric with brazillians, it's ethnocentric with usa/europe.

Basically, all world news take an usa/europe point of view, which is very weird. More sincerely, Brazil seems to not have a world news coverage...

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby mōdgethanc » 2013-06-27, 16:31

I think it's our right to know what kind of foreign people live in our country
Problem solved.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby johnklepac » 2013-07-05, 21:52

Sol Invictus wrote:Might I offer a diffrent perspective? Perhaps in some countries they make a bit of a overkill, here though we usually get "this and this.happened" first and then "oh, and about people from Latvia" sometimes followed by "a person from Latvia tells about their expierience". I think this is fine - first of all it lets people whose friends or family might be in affected country know, if they should worry and secondly it gives more realism to news - people care more about fellow countrymen, than somebody living on otherside of the world and first hand accounts of one person's expierience will always evoke more emotion than statistics on how many people have been killed

This.

Also, I look at my local newspaper for local news (and news related to the locals). I'm fine with heading to a source with a wider scope if that's what I want to see, but frankly I'm glad it wasn't just Boston-centric Boston Marathon news 24/7 from every source.

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Set » 2013-07-05, 22:49

mōdgethanc wrote:Among the left wing in Europe, support of Israel is seen as racist and oppressive towards Arabs. Funnily enough, both somehow equate Israel with all Jewish people, even though there are more Jews living outside of Israel than in it.

I've never come across pro-Palestinians in Europe equating Israel with all Jewish people. Considering how ridiculously often you get called anti-semitic for being pro-Palestine, I really don't think this is the case.
And supporting Israel is racist and oppressive since it is a racist and oppressive country - I find it funny how Israel supporters try to position themselves as moderates considering how the vast majority of the world and the UN condemns Israel's acts.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby IpseDixit » 2013-07-06, 10:56

mōdgethanc wrote:Among the left wing in Europe, support of Israel is seen as racist and oppressive towards Arabs. Funnily enough, both somehow equate Israel with all Jewish people, even though there are more Jews living outside of Israel than in it.


Not true at all. Usually they make a very sharp distinction between the two lest they could be accused of anti-Semitism, I'm pretty sure there are also dumb people who fail to do that, but they are not mainstream. Furthermore I have heard some Arabs too say they have nothing against Judaism and the Jews per se.

Who do not really distinguish the two are actually the sides involved. See for example Black September's terrorist attack to the Synagogue of Rome (did it really have anything to do with the conflict?)... or read the Hamas charter where they speak of annihilating the Jewish people. Also Israel, by default, is somehow unable to separate the two since it defines itself as the State of the Jews.

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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Babelfish » 2013-07-12, 21:20

Set wrote:And supporting Israel is racist and oppressive since it is a racist and oppressive country - I find it funny how Israel supporters try to position themselves as moderates considering how the vast majority of the world and the UN condemns Israel's acts.

:pff: Not really surprising, with about 400 million Arabs and more than a billion Muslims, with 22 Arab countries and 57 Muslim countries, all against Israel in everything and dragging behind them a bunch of oil-thirsty other countries. Do you really find it plausible that more than half of the decisions by the UN "council on human rights" denounce Israel, as if there's more suffering here than in all other places in the world put together? Heck, more people have been already killed in the Syrian civil war than in the entire history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but guess where the media focuses.
Israel is oppressive towards the Palestinians mainly because they and their brethren have been trying to destroy it since before its inception. As for racism, Israeli citizens are equal before the law, and there's no more racism here than in the majority of other countries, including your dear Europe.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby mōdgethanc » 2013-07-12, 21:27

Babelfish wrote::pff: Not really surprising, with about 400 million Arabs and more than a billion Muslims, with 22 Arab countries
All of which I'm willing to bet are more oppressive than Israel, even taking the Palestinians into account. Israel is, among other things, the only country out of its neighbours where gender equality is taken seriously, the only country where LGBT rights are respected at all, the only country where immigrants are welcomed and encouraged to integrate, and the only one that's a stable democracy, except maybe Turkey. The situation in the West Bank is bad, but it can't be compared to the rest of Israel where Arabs are full citizens and have the same rights as everyone else.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Set » 2013-07-13, 1:13

Babelfish wrote:
Set wrote:And supporting Israel is racist and oppressive since it is a racist and oppressive country - I find it funny how Israel supporters try to position themselves as moderates considering how the vast majority of the world and the UN condemns Israel's acts.

:pff: Not really surprising, with about 400 million Arabs and more than a billion Muslims, with 22 Arab countries and 57 Muslim countries, all against Israel in everything and dragging behind them a bunch of oil-thirsty other countries. Do you really find it plausible that more than half of the decisions by the UN "council on human rights" denounce Israel, as if there's more suffering here than in all other places in the world put together? Heck, more people have been already killed in the Syrian civil war than in the entire history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but guess where the media focuses.
Israel is oppressive towards the Palestinians mainly because they and their brethren have been trying to destroy it since before its inception. As for racism, Israeli citizens are equal before the law, and there's no more racism here than in the majority of other countries, including your dear Europe.

Muslims still aren't the majority in the UN, and not all Muslims are strongly anti-Israel (and a lot of Arab countries much prefer Americans to Palestinians).
Denouncing Israel doesn't mean that there is more suffering in Israel than in other countries, although it is one of the longer running oppressive states.
For one a Muslim protester and a Jewish protester will not be treated the same, no matter what the law says. Secondly, many Palestinians aren't Israeli but are still subject to Israeli decisions such as forced movement and loss of land. And just look at the illegal settlements, then tell me that Israeli law is equal.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby Johanna » 2013-07-13, 2:22

When it comes to Israel, one of the problems is that if you don't like some of the stuff the Israeli government does or allows, you're automatically labelled anti-Semitic :?

Not saying that most Israelis think that way, I honestly don't know how it's seen over there in general. What I do know is that the Israeli government doesn't like criticism on the issue, and that people calling themselves friends of Israel are very keen on playing that anti-Semitic card, even if all you want is a peaceful solution in a modern fashion and dislike both terror attacks and illegal settlements etc...
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby mōdgethanc » 2013-07-13, 4:50

Tell them Arabs are Semites too and by not favouring either party, you can't be anti-Semitic.
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Re: Ethnocentrism in foreign news coverage

Postby IpseDixit » 2013-07-13, 10:39

Babelfish wrote:Heck, more people have been already killed in the Syrian civil war than in the entire history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but guess where the media focuses.


On Syria, at least here... We never ever hear of Israel unless there are major operations in Gaza.


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