Yesterday in the post In Defense of Ryan Napoli, In Contra False Outrage, I had originally included two paragraphs criticizing Fox News’ fabricated reporting on No Go Zones in Europe as further examples of how the press uses trumped up outrage to serve a political agenda.
I have since decided to reedit In Defense of Ryan Napoli, In Contra False Outrage to remove the Fox News related comments and include them here. My sole purpose in doing so is to keep the original post’s focus on the specific events relating to Ryan Napoli and the Bronx Defenders.
There is a growing phenomenon – an epidemic even — of false outrage that consumes our public discourse and is destroying the very fabric of the United States and our society. Whether it is trumped up panic over the imminent threats of Ebola, Shari’a law in the heartland, crypto-Muslim socialist presidents, vaccines gone bad, or the never-ending treasure trove of ludicrous conspiracy theories, our mainstream media, pundits and politicians are increasingly insulting our basic intelligence – while we all seem so willing to play along – to slight opponents and foes in a childish gotcha battle to gain the political upper hand in this new culture war.
When we snub our noses at the backward sectarian and tribal violence in places like Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan, maybe we should stop for a minute and a look in the mirror. Isn’t that where we’re headed at home by spewing the most absurd accusations and attacks based on shoddy, half-truths, partial evidence, and an all-or-nothing my team vs. your team mentality?
A fantastic example of this was when in the wake of the brutal Charlie attacks in Paris, Fox News went on a rampage, yelling at the top of their lungs on air that the sky was falling: certain European cities had become “No Go Zones” run exclusively by Islamic courts where access for non-Muslims (even the police) was strictly forbidden. One has to question why Fox News had an interest in knowingly feeding the American public with blatantly false information.
To prove the absurdity and duplicity of Fox News’ claims and to highlight the disingenuous nature of the reporting, the French TV show Le Petit Journal (watch the first 10 minutes of this and this) poked so much fun at Fox News that Fox News was forced to make on-air apologies. Of course as is the case for almost all these so-called Conservatives, the cry for personal responsibility stops at their own door. No one gets fired, no one is discredited, and most of their faithful viewers continue to believe that Europe is plagued with No Go Zones.
Grave Error 