Shameful. Disgraceful. Unprofessional. Repellent. That’s my opinion of our media vultures.
A mob of idiots with cameras rushed into the apartment of the San Bernardino killers, and went on air vapidly commenting on the mundane crap they found. Oh, look: they have a calendar on the wall. The dullard back in the studio wants to know what kind of computer they have. Here’s an uncashed check for $7.98. Let’s go rifle through the child’s toy box.
Fucking christ. These are not journalists, or reporters, or even rational human beings. They are poison on the profession. Fire every single one of the people milling about in that apartment, the studio nitwits giving them advice, and the network executives who approved this mess. They should be embarrassed.
I have kept the cable and broadcast news off for the last few days, because this is what I expect from them.
Not only did they go through the home of those killers, they displayed Social Security Cards and Driver’s Licenses with ‘readily identifiable information-and not just of the deceased’.
I can’t understand how they were allowed into the apartment to begin with. The article claims that the landlord allowed reporters into the home, but even aside from the question of how in the hell he could do that (seriously, where were the cops? this is a place of interest in the ongoing investigation), the landlord said he didn’t let them in.
I watched two minutes and 21 seconds. I couldn’t get through more. The breathless tone of the reporter was sickening.
@Tony – if you know about how far through the video it was that they showed that information, I’d take a look at that, but I’m not looking at anything else. That they showed those things is reprehensible, but they earned their unemployment checks before they ever got that far.
PZ said:
And I wholeheartedly endorse that message.
I assume that the personal information displayed on TV that wasn’t the killers’ information included the information of the poor child? I hope that kid’s/those kids’ guardian ad litem sues the fuck out of them. Poor kid/s is/are going to need some serious resources to overcome this past, and would have even before MSNBC started showing their personal info to the whole world.
They went through a pile of photos of kids. I doubt they were involved in the terror plot, but fuck me, they’re news.
Where the fuck was the yellow/black CSI tape???? But I doubt if that would have stopped the ghouls calling themselves journalists.
There’s a scene in Spotlight in which the cardinal suggests to the new editor of the Boston Globe that “The city flourishes when its great institutions work together.” Martin Baron replies that he thinks it’s best if the journalists go it alone.
It’s a good scene.
Just saw a claim that the landlord didn’t let them in. He answered the door and they pushed past him, and pried open the door with a crowbar. If that’s true, it’s… interesting.
A few years back a couple of Muslims tried ramming a 4 wheel drive with gas bottles in the back through the doors of Glasgow Airport. The cousin of one of them was working as a doctor in an Australian hospital. He was immediately arrested and imprisoned without charge or trial using the vicious;y oppressive anti-terror laws passed by Bush Juniors partner in war crimes, the Australian Prime Monster John Howard. This was accompanied by a blaze pf publicity in the Meredog media. The doctor had no connection with the attackers other than being a relative of one of them but was naturally tarred as a terrorist by the media and the extreme right that sadly still passes for government in Australia.
Fortunately his work colleagues rallied to his support and a lawyer was able to get his detention ruled as illegal. Begfore he could be released however the Monster for Nomigration and abuse of refugees revoked his visa as an undesirable and he was taken into immigration detention. He was eventually released and allowed to leave Australia. The same swill is still governing Australia and are now stripping Australian with dual nationality of their citizenship and deporting them for minor infractions such as driving offenses or drug addiction.
While this man was illegally detained the federal police invited Meredog’s minions from a paper, referred to by the Muslims it targets as the Daily Terrocrap, to tour his apartment. They found nothing incriminating so they made prominant mention of a suspicious sounding book titled “Izhar ul Haq” with the implication that it was some sort of terrorist manual. It is a prayer manual used by millions of Muslims around the world and there are no doubt copies of it in thousands of Muslim homes both in Australia and America.
Thats Ruperts “journalists” for you. Can’t find a story so you spin one out of thin air.
While I agree that the actions of the journalists are ghoulish – and I mean to include the traditional sense of the word, of things that survive by devouring corpses – I don’t think it’s necessary or helpful to include a link to what they’ve done.
I know, it’s enraging. But you don’t want to feed the ghoul any more.
Maybe these clowns misunderstood Trump’s rant and tried to follow his orders by “‘talking up’ terrorists’ families”.
I was watching a BBC clip earlier, one of the reporters that went into the apartment, and they were amazed, utterly amazed at how strange it was that they had domestic things, kitchen stuff, in the kitchen. How amazing and unlikely! It is like they believe movies are real, and people that do awful things don’t live in houses, but lairs.
Isn’t what they did illegal?
Very possibly, if the landlord did not intend to give them access. As for the poor kids, I don’t know, but I’d love to work with an aggressive tort lawyer on persuading a court that they did. Clearly the kids don’t deserve to be associated with the adults’ infamous actions. The kids are not public figures in this situation. It’s fucking sick.
According to the CBC article I read about this
That it is turned over to the occupants does not absolve the behavior of these vultures, but they have evidentially taken all they think is relevant and are finished their investigation at that location.
My first thought at the media’s behaviour was a scene from “The Running Man”, where Maria Conchita Alonso’s character is imprisoned and thrown into the arena after being caught snooping for the truth. Suddenly her character is an “enemy of the state”, and every insignificant private detail of her life gets exposed and portrayed as scandalous and criminal.
The corporate media have gone from lap dogs to rabid dogs, from stenographers and war cheerleaders to active participants in the destruction of people’s lives. And they do it for the same reason cops shoot black people: there’s no accountability or consequences, and many see the victims of abuses as “deserving it”.
This is disgusting and it leaves me horrified and a bit shaken.
Yes, the past occupants of the house killeed, though we don’t know what led them to feel compelled to do what they did.
But these journalists.
They are the real state-sponsored terrorists here.
Well after all, they did the same thing with the Planned Parenthood killer, didn’t they?
Didn’t they?
Did the phrase “the public has the right to know” get trotted out yet? Those words have seen so much abuse and misuse that they have become almost meaningless.
The information I have read and seen says that the police and the FBI ceased treating it as an on-going crime scene and turned it over the owner to do what he wanted. He let the press in. It seems like a premature decision by the police and the FBI.
randay (#18) –
It’s not the first time the FBI illegally used the media to try someone and sway public opinion.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Jewell
@Travis #13:
You said: “That it is turned over to the occupants does not absolve the behavior of these vultures, but they have evidentially taken all they think is relevant and are finished their investigation at that location.”
This is absolutely crucial. The FBI will have taken anything relevant. In other words, what is left behind is irrelevant. As irrelevant to us as it is to the FBI.
How did they decide what is “relevant” before completing their investigation?
No surprises here. Americans have always been like that. Check out the way they (reporters and public) treated the Floyd Collins story in 1925.
Floyd got trapped in a deep cave and couldn’t be extracted. Reporters and cameramen descended on the site and recorded every horrible detail during the 14 days it took for Floyd to die. The area was turned into a giant carnival park with hot-dog sellers, doomsday preachers, reporters, newsreel cameramen and 50,000 sightseers!
You know the scene in the movie Zorba the Greek, when the old woman dies and the locals, who have been hanging out waiting, descend on her house and belongings like Harpies? That. The new journalism. Harpies.
One of the journalists that went in was Kim Brunhuber of the CBC. I expect a bit better from them than that.
I’m disappointed & embarrassed for MSNBC, which I regard as one of the better cable news channels (admittedly faint praise). I heard afterward that the network had apologized, but still…
Vile, vulturous behavior. It really is like a parody you’d see in a movie satirizing rabid media/news/reality tv culture. When he rifled through the crib and children’s toys it was particularly grotesque.
I must thank you for this post.
Last night I got into a conservation that did get a little heated about just this subject it did not close the door of my friendship though nor did either of us change our minds.
I have had very negative feelings about “the news media” in the way they cover all breaking stories but this one is truly remarkable. I am betting that the next time we will be treated to live footage of all the action with close ups of the collateral damage and as much of the gore as the FCC will allow.
I want to post the link to “Trouble every day” by Frank Zappa it is a little old but hardly dated
uncle frogy
Frankly, I’d have been surprised if the American media acted any other way. If the scumbags who did this had left a manifesto like every nut who shoots up a school I’m sure that would be printed on the front pages of every newspaper. Parasites.
I wonder how raw their tongues will be when they’re finally commanded to thank their FBI masters for this favour?
Even if they didn’t write a manifesto these purveyors of pulp-fiction would write one anyway.