An April 6 USA Today story by Nate Ryan reported that “Dateline NBC” is defending its actions after bringing Muslim men to Martinsville (Va.) Speedway to gauge the reaction of NASCAR fans.
According to the article, NBC defended its reporting tactics in a statement released last week. NBC said the news magazine is ”following up on a recent poll and other articles indicating an increase in anti-Muslim sentiment in the United States. … There is nothing new about the technique of witnessing the experience of someone who might be discriminated against in a public setting.”
NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston said the Muslim men walked around outside the track and that NASCAR fans had no reaction to the group. Poston said NBC was seeking “to create the news instead of reporting the news.”
What do you think? Did “Dateline NBC” justify their actions? Or was the news magazine attempting to sensationalize stereotypes that exist both for NASCAR fans and for Muslims?
(See http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2006-04-06-dateline_x.htm)
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7 comments:
I think it wasn't Dateline NBC's smartest news idea. Didn't they think it might cause a few problems?
Geez.
This move of NBC can be considered unethical journalism and just common insensitivity on so many levels. I did some research on it as soon as I read the blog and came up with some interesting news which puts this move of NBC into context and unfortunately there is nothing that supports them. I am a Muslim woman myself and just hearing how they are going about this makes me feel really insulted and misunderstood. I think so few people really know anything about Islam and judge it based on the most preposterous stereotypes. I say if they really want to do a piece on Muslims, then they should get to know what Islam is really about. Even those that consider themselves to be the most open minded individuals in America still instinctively connect Islam to terrorism forgetting that every Muslim is NOT a terrorist and every terrorist is most definitely NOT a Muslim. I read that NBC Dateline actually staged this event as one of many events which was eventually supposed to lead to a piece which was going to be aired this summer and was supposed to be documenting Muslims and anti-terrorism. Although the idea of showing America that the stereotypes are wrong is something which I support, the things they did to film this documentary actually supported those self-same stereotypes and showed their own ignorance. One of the other incidences which were supposed to be a part of this show included sending two Sikh men to a football game in Arizona. If the documentary is on Islam then incorporating Sikhism, which is a completely different religion originating in Punjab (northern India) is fueling ignorance. Sikh men usually wear turbans (as religious attire) and the show’s implication that the turban connects them to Islam is a huge misconception and something that is blatant ignorance. I remember hearing about a Sikh man getting shot in the immediate aftermath of 9-11 and I remember the report not showing any distinction regarding the difference between a Muslim and a Sikh man, much less the difference between any Muslim and terrorist. I have many Sikh friends and I remember wanting people to just open their eyes and instead of judging different religions, just understanding them and their fellow mankind better. If they were going to show the U.S. how we are wrong to associate Islam with terrorism then they should also show the U.S. that its wrong to assume religious affiliation based on skin color. The email that was allegedly used to recruit the Muslims (can be seen at http://michellemalkin.com/archives/004920.htm) said they wanted people that “looked Muslim.” I think it demeans any human’s relationship to God to imply that this relationship is shown in attire or in physical features. Islam is a wonderful religion with a lot of beautiful art, culture and history surrounding it. And whether you are Muslim or you aren’t, I think Islam like every other religion deserves to be treated with respect and not delved into with nothing other than ignorance. As a Muslim, any journalistic attempt to educate the world about Islam is obviously much appreciated by me, but in the end, even with the best of intentions, the methods NBC used should have been more responsible.
NBC was creating sensationalism with this story, it reminds me of the yellow journilism of the mid to late 1800's. NBC knew before hand that either result would create a story and could build a theory after the results, if an icedent occured or in this case not. This is a blatent case of creating the news, not reporting it.
I think Dateline NBC went overboard with this one, and its something that they should have never done. I think it was simply bad journalism and I think very few people truly know about the Muslim people. I think this programming offended alot of people, which Dateline should have thought about before airing it on National T.V. !
i think it was not a good journalism practice and i think they do not know much about Muslim and befor broadcasting these types of news they must have to make very good analysis about the news and bad effects of such bews.and i think this news hurts Muslim community a lot. this is just a preposterous stereotype of Americans to Muslim Community.
i think it was not a good journalism practice and i think they do not know much about Muslim and befor broadcasting these types of news they must have to make very good analysis about the news and bad effects of such bews.and i think this news hurts Muslim community a lot. this is just a preposterous stereotype of Americans to Muslim Community.
i think this is just a stereotype of American People to the Muslim Community. Muslim does not mean that all the Muslim are terrorist. and this is just an insult os a Muslim community and Muslim people. and this is an exapmle of and bad Journalism.
I don’t believe Dateling NBC did justify their actions, Poston had the right idea NBC was trying to create a news story where there were only rumors. I think whether or not NBC is practicing sound journalism is severely questioned because they were purposefully going off of stereotypes to try and make a story. The fact that they are intensifying stereotypes in order to create something for themselves is shady in itself. News reports should be about what is actually going on in itself rather than situations that newspapers create for themselves.
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