;.l1,6,60,66,1,0,10,75,192,2,15,20,25,127,10,0,
;.l2,15,75,192,2,20,25,127,15,0,
;.l3,20,75,192,2,25,127,20,0,
MEDIA BIAS
TO:    David Bedein, Israel Resource, Bet Agron Press Center
       37 Hillel St., Jerusalem 94581
       Tel:  02--236-368;  FAX:  02--6255-119 Att: DB
       E-Mail:  media@actcom.co.il
FROM:  Steve Amdur, Kibbutz Haon, Jordan Valley, 15170 Israel.
       Telephone:  972-6-6656-572; FAX:  972-6-6656-554
DATE:  
RE:    
REF:   English Radio News 10/30/96, 07:00
------------------------------------------------------------------

Reporting briefly on the 10/29/96 pro-Hebron demonstration inParis Square (King George St. & Agron St.) , stated that "thousands" [or: "several thousand"? -- I forget which] ofdemonstrators etc.  In contrast to its coverage of the recentRabin/Peace demonstration, did not add the grandiose estimates ofthe demonstration organizers, and did not have interviews withparticipants.  Stated that several MKs addressed the crowd; didnot say who.

EVALUATION:  I see all that as correct [albeit, a slightly tiltedcorrectness], not biased.  Estimates by demonstration organizersare usually inaccurate and self-serving.  The Rabin demonstrationrepresented a national consensus of a pretense of nationalmourning.   
.p
MEDIA BIAS
TO:    David Bedein, Israel Resource, Bet Agron Press Center
       37 Hillel St., Jerusalem 94581
       Tel:  02--236-368;  FAX:  02--6255-119 Att: DB
       E-Mail:  media@actcom.co.il
FROM:  Steve Amdur, Kibbutz Haon, Jordan Valley, 15170 Israel.
       Telephone:  972-6-6656-572; FAX:  972-6-6656-554
DATE:  
RE:    
REF:   Newsweek 10/28/96 (Joseph Contreras)
------------------------------------------------------------------
                                           
TITLE/SUBTITLE:  "No, We Won't Go:  Isral has a new generation ofpeaceniks who are shirking army duty and fear a return to the olddays.  Their message to Bibi:  don't push us!"

COMMENT:   OK:  This is more than spin, it's a re-orientation ofseveral old and minor stories:  That motivation for militaryservice has declined, that many Israelis try to get out of reserveduty, and that a small number of left-wing soldiers have refusedto serve in the territories.
	Decline in motivation may be due as much to frustratedmilitarism:  eg that under Labour governments elite units inLebanon have been made sitting ducks by political constraints.
	That it is increasingly socially acceptable to try to get outof reserve duty stems from a perception that most reservists arevery under-utilized, particularly relative to the skills whichthey have acquired as civilians after completing compulsorymilitary service.   You don't take a computer entrepreneur out ofhis shop for a month to sort used nuts and bolts and expect him tobe gung ho about it.

	The title, evocating the anti-Vietnam war demonstration chant"Hell, No, / We Wont' Go", is tailored to the Big Bill Schoool ofDraft Dodging.       

	And incidentally:  if y'all keep calling our Prime MinisterBibi, maybe we call your Plastic Prez Big Willy (as ourPalestinian colleagues would tend to pronounce it).   Like, somenicknames are appropriate only within the family.

	"That's not what Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu likes tohear."
l2
ANALYSIS:  Speaking as an American (which is something Iordinarily do only from picket lines) I like that line. Slick trick.    

OK:  What's my reaction, as an average American reader, tothat line?  "Well, poo-poo on him."  Why is that my reaction? Us Americans don't like pretention and pomp and arrogance,that's what we threw King George the Nurd into Boston Harbourfor his Tea-Time for.
"Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu" -- constructructed tosound pompous; particularly after said Prime Minister hasbeen referenced in large type as 'Bibi'.  Usual locutionwould be simply 'Prime Minister Netanyahu'.  For one thing,because 'Benjamin' has too many syllables for an American. we like our names short, simple and honest:  Bill, Bob,George.
"That's not what Prime Minister Alphonse Thingamagummy  likesto hear".  
The echo of that phrase, for an American, is 'what the bosslikes to hear'  -- with the implicit and reasonableassumption that what the boss likes to hear is rarely thetruth -- and every normal American except a panty-waistreacts by saying, under his breath, 'well screw him'.  
l1

"He campaigned ... and often evoked the memories of Israelisoldiers, like his late brother Yonathan, who died defending thecountry."
l2
SUBTEXT:  Netanyahu, that politician, is hiding behind hisbrother; if he'd had any guts, he'd be dead by now.

OK:  I try not to make ellipses when doing media-analysis,because it's an easy way to distort the text to prove one'spoint.  But I think ellipses can bring out the subliminalstructure of text.  One must acknowlege that not all wordscarry equal "weight" or "persistence" to the reader,especially in a context where the reader is semi-skimming. [I argued this point with the "tore off to Laos with her as/did David Halberstam" illustration].  

One technique is to make like a very professional tougheditor -- which presumably is what all Newsmagazines have --and ask:  is this what I would regard as the best possiblephrasing?    If the answer is no, then look for an ulteriormotive in letting it through; dumb lazy editors takeaccordian lessons quick.

So in this example:  You don't quite say "He campaigned onthe memory of soldiers who died defending his country." Because that's an insipid statement; every politician doesthat.

Another possible echo here is the American slang expression,from the previous generation, "over my dead body".  Again,with the subliminal impression that Netanyahu exploited hisbrother's death to come to power.

The international media rarely recall that Netanyahu alsostormed a group of terrorists, and was shot, but notseriously wounded.
l1

"Despite the threat of stiff jail terms, only a third of thecountry's estimated 429,000 reservists fulfill their annual quotaof days in the military."
l2
OK:  That's an easy falsehood; practically all who don't doso don't do so for non-criminal reasons:  Not called, calledbut not needed, called but excused at their request, calledfor less than maximum time.

And as a matter of fact, Israel treats conscripts who refusecall-up far more leniently than the USA; a few weeks in jailrather than a few years.
l1

"The Israeli military machine won't be running out of eagerrecruits any time soon."
l2
COMMENT:  Run-of-the-mill.  Darth Vader builds our militarymachine, and teen-age killers staff it.  And in the USA? Just down-home non-whites who get bored sleeping on heatinggrates. 
Again:  the USA military has prided itself on a gung-hoethos, at least in the Marines.  (Who perhaps notcoincidentally pulled off some rather spectactular atrocitiesduring the Veetnam War Against the Gooks.)   The Israeliethos as always been virtually anti-militaristic;  theAthenian citizen-soldier model.
l1
"Some have a term for those who cntinue to log their four to sixweeks of resere duty every year:  frierim ...."
l2
COMMENT:  Nice to meet a Reporter thoroughly immersed in theculture which he reports, with a fine-tuned ear for itslanguage.
l3
George Burns et al. were charter members of the FriarsClub.

l1
Sidebar:  [Interview with Mordechai].  Title:  "A MalcontentedMinority"
l2
Again, that makes it sound as if there is substantialpolitical opposition to military service.  One thinks, maybemore than 20%.  And that's not what Mordechai said.  He spokeof a minority, eg Junior Berg, who fancy that Israel nolonger faces threats to its existence.  (As if no nationcould be disassembled incrementally.)
l1

METHODOLOGIC NOTE:  OK, what I'm doing is is an extension ofAustinian ordinary-language analysis -- spotting epistemologicallymisleading locutions -- to media-bias analysis -- spottingpolitically misleading locutions.   So it's subject to the samemethodologic challenges.  Here Cavell's classic (1958, I think)reply to Fodor & Katz is relevant.
	On the face of it, the methodology is pure distilled chutzpa: I read a passage, introspect my reactions, assume that myreactions are those of typical reader, assume that I have a fineear for what the most precise locution would be, introspectivelyanalyze the divergence of what the writer said with what I assumeshould have been said, and chalk the difference up to bias.
	In my analysis of media-bias, it ain't a plus that I've beenaway from the USA about 10 years, and usually now speak pigeonEnglish (or International English, as I prefer to call it.)  Like,Sphaghetti Epistemology [from:  Sphaghetti Westerns, eg SergeLeone, "For a Fistfull of Dollars" -- a typical Italian evocationof the Wild West.  Clear, coherent, and reasonably convincing, butwith no necessary relationship to the truth.  





       

