Newspapers & our 2A Rights

[Linda]

Why is it that journalists seem to think they know better than anyone else, how we should handle our gun rights? They scream bloody murder if someone wants to stifle their 1st Amendment rights, but the rest of us are too stupid to properly handle ourselves around guns.

On the tails of the Sandusky Register publishing 2700 names of CHL's last month, the editor of the Port Clinton Herald, (which just happens to be a neighboring community to Sandusky) has decided that our gun rights should be dictated to us thru "clubs" AKA restricted access to our guns and ammo.

Please read this article on our website. The red printing is our response to this editor's comments. Since his email address is at the bottom of the page, hopefully he'll be hearing from a lot of people.

http://www.buckeyefirearms.org/article3863.html

Please pass me the duct tape.:banghead:

 

[Tommygunn]

Journalists no longer just want to inform. Since the 1960's there's been a marked increase in "proactive journalism," where not only is the purpose to inform but to promote some sort of increased social consciousness or justice.
A friend of mine expounded on this about 15 or 16 years ago; to many students entering journalist school (such as Syracuse University's renowned Newhouse School of Journalism, for example -- but others, too) if these students are questioned they will inevitably reveal at some point a desire to change the world in some way. Not "JUST" provide the standard journalists' who-what-when-why-where one normally finds tucked into the first paragraph, but provide social context.
Then, of course, there's the old journalist's bromide; "If it bleeds, it leads." Bleeding (violence) is newsworthy; it upsets people, it gets their interest. Therefor it sells papers. It gets TV news rating points at 6PM ... or 10PM. Think of it another way: Dog bites man.> Ho-hum, big deal, it happens all the time...B O R I N G...move along.
Man bites dog> Gee, THAT doesn't happen everyday! Wow! What happened? Where??? Tell me more!!!!!
Journalists usually are completly ignorant about guns. Not unlike Carl Kolchak of "NIGHT STALKER" they drive around with cars equiped with police radio scanners and see a lot of the horrors resulting from the gunplay of the underclass and very little, if any, of the people who defend themselves with guns...or who go trap shooting. There are no worthy news events taking place at any of the hundreds or rifle ranges anywhere. People punching holes in paper is boring.
And ... of course, most -- not all, but certainly most, journalists in today's world, the valiant knights of the fourth estate -- are liberals.
Well, that last says a lot. Right there.

 

[Robert Hairless]

The major reason for the Bill of Rights is the people who repudiate one or another of those amendments and want to repeal them. A very good case can be made for repealing the First Amendment, for example, but I doubt that the press would support it. What the press is doing, however, is a self-correcting error. Should the Second Amendment actually be repealed, the First Amendment would go down that same drain very quickly and others would eventually follow. Journalism schools don't teach their students to think real good no more.

 

[RPCVYemen]

Journalists no longer just want to inform. Since the 1960's there's been a marked increase in "proactive journalism," where not only is the purpose to inform but to promote some sort of increased social consciousness or justice.

Balderdash!

If you change the "9" to a "7", you'd be approximately correct. The long and colorful history of the press in the US has nearly always been partisan! That's why the founders felt that freedom of the press was so important.

If you really believe this twaddle about "objective journalism", start at Benjamin Franklin and read forward. Every political faction during the formation of this republic had its own broadsheet.

In 1828, John Quincy Adams was nicknamed "The Pimp" by Andrew Jackson, and Adams's followers printed up a pamphlet: "General Jackson's mother was a common prostitute brought to this country by British solders! She afterwards married a mulatto man with whom she had several children of which number General Jackson is one!!"

The editor who claimed that John Quincy Adams slept with his wife before they were married was made governor of Florida by the triumphant Andrew Jackson. Another who spread the story that Adams had been a pimp for the czar of Russia was made a senator and a member of Jackson's "Kitchen Cabinet." It's hardly surprising that most editors were ready, willing, and able to print any scandal about an opposition candidate that they could find or manufacture. Accuracy was not regarded as an important quality, anyhow.

The neutered namby-pamby press you are seeking either never existed, or existed for a very short period of time in the US (maybe WWII to Vietnam).

Mike

 

[Tommygunn]

Quote:
Journalists no longer just want to inform. Since the 1960's there's been a marked increase in "proactive journalism," where not only is the purpose to inform but to promote some sort of increased social consciousness or justice.

Balderdash!

If you change the "9" to a "7", you'd be approximately correct. The long and colorful history of the press in the US has nearly always been partisan! That's why the founders felt that freedom of the press was so important.

If you really believe this twaddle about "objective journalism", start at Benjamin Franklin and read forward. Every political faction during the formation of this republic had its own broadsheet.

In 1828, John Quincy Adams was nicknamed "The Pimp" by Andrew Jackson, and Adams's followers printed up a pamphlet: "General Jackson's mother was a common prostitute brought to this country by British solders! She afterwards married a mulatto man with whom she had several children of which number General Jackson is one!!"

Wow. I think you have completly misconstrued what I said. I never did say the press was ever neutral, or unbiased. I merely said from about 1960 forward "proaction" was a driving force behind some of the slanted journalism.
I wasn't about to write an entire essay on yellow journalism of the 19th-early 20th century. Or any of the reasons that drove journalists in the 18th century to favour one candidate or another. Or why the Chicago Herald Sun ran a headline on April 15th, 1912 that read "All Saved From Titanic Disaster."
You are right about one thing -- the press has never been namby-pamby, or "neutered."

 

[RPCVYemen]

I think you have completly misconstrued what I said.

My point was that since the 1760s, journlists in the US have always tried to persuade as much or more than they have tried ot "inform". They were "proactive" in the 18th century, 19th century, and 20th century. I wouldn't expect them to be any different in the 21st century!

My sense of your statement

Since the 1960's there's been a marked increase

is that before the 1960s, journalists were much less proactive. I think that's just not historically accurate. It's all yellow journalism.

Mike

 

[strat81]

Hmmm... if these clubs exist to establish and enforce standards of safety and gun handling, what does that say about police academies and basic training? Oh yes, cops and soldiers have never EVER shot someone negligently.

 

[Prince Yamato]

I think journalists have always gossiped. I think it's just since the 1960s that people have been buying into it more. My personal feeling is that the actual physical medium of the newspaper has a life expectancy of about 10 more years in it. It's an old, dead, medium. It can't be updated like the web can, it's hours old when it hits the presses. The opinion columns are days old and only contain 10 or so opinions most of the time. Compare that to a blog. Just keep pointing these idiots out. Keep abreast of anything they publish. 12 years ago, we didn't have the internet to mobilize against these people. They were not held accountable for what they printed. Today, they are.

 

[BBQJOE]

I couldn't help myself. I had to send him a letter.

 

[Black Adder LXX]

It is true that journalism has pushed political agendas here since "Common Sense" got folks seriously thinking about revolution against the British Crown.

I think the point behind the then vs now comparison is that the use of this influence now is pushing us into a radically socialist direction. I agree with the OP that this is the height of hypocrisy. In the name of the first amendment, let's act in a way to curtail the second? It's ludicrous. A house divided against itself cannot stand.

 

[Mannlicher]

Newspapers and the rest of the main stream media are now functioning as the Propaganda Ministry for the Socialists and DhimmiCrats. Their shared agenda is to destroy America as we have know it, and that includes taking away the Second Amendment.
That they print lies, is just part of their agenda.

 

[ArfinGreebly]

Robert

Journalism schools don't teach their students to think real good no more.

Yeah.

That may be, but they's purty good at that "indoctrination" thing.

Ever since my attention was drawn to the issue in the mid-seventies, I have observed that the press (in all its forms) has very little truck with reality as witnessed by us mere citizens.

My wife's various projects (couple of blogs and a wiki) where she routinely catches the press with its pants down bring this out in high relief.

The rise of the Internet and the ability of everyman to publish to the world, while it has certainly generated its share of noise, has given voice to quite a lot of useful signal.

The press really can't any longer escape scrutiny in the manner to which their traditions have accustomed them.

We could have a new reality show, just for journalists, called "Thinking Your Way Out Of A Paper Bag." Could be hilarious.

 

[Mr White]

Hmm. Turns out that I just might be in Port Clinton, Ohio in a few weeks. Maybe I'll stop by and tell Mr Foreman what a total crock of horses#l+ his plan really is.

It really makes me sick that this comes from the hometown newspaper of Camp Perry.

 

[Dr. Dickie]

My point was that since the 1760s, journlists in the US have always tried to persuade as much or more than they have tried ot "inform". They were "proactive" in the 18th century, 19th century, and 20th century. I wouldn't expect them to be any different in the 21st century!

While that is quite true, I doubt that the newspapers back then CLAIMED be as pure as the driven snow like they do today. In 1700s there is no way, they were openly OWNED by the political parties. In the early 1900s the muckrakers, yellow journalism, etc. was transprently biased weren't they? Certainly nobody would have ever believed them back then. Wasn't it Mark Twain that said something along the lines of: If you don't read the newpapers you are uninformed; if you, do you are misinformed.
The fact that the media is so biased today is nothing new; however, it is their sanctimonious, elitist, BS that they are so fair and objective that is infuriating. Course, I think more and more today nobody believes them:
http://www.starpulse.com/news/index.php/2007/07/17/diane_sawyer_offended_for_dismissal_from
TV anchor Diane Sawyer was left redfaced when she was dismissed from jury duty recently after the court decided she couldn't tell the truth. The Good Morning America hostess has been in journalism for over 35 years - but a judge was less than impressed with her occupation.

She says, "The judge said to me, 'Can you tell the truth and be fair?' And I said, 'That's what journalists do.' And everybody in the courtroom laughed. It was the most hurtful moment I think I've ever had."

 

[Sage of Seattle]

The fact that the media is so biased today is nothing new; however, it is their sanctimonious, elitist, BS that they are so fair and objective that is infuriating.

+1

"Fox News: We report. You decide."

BWWWAAHAHAHAHAHA!

 

[RPCVYemen]

... that they are so fair and objective that is infuriating ...

I guess everyone gets to choose what infuriates them.

When someone tells me that they are unbiased, I expect that they are either working from unexamined biases, or attempting to deceive me. As I have gotten older, I am more and more skeptical of the possibility that there is objective truth out there.

Mike

 

[Standing Wolf]

[sarcasm] We need laws to control assault presses. [/sarcasm]