SNAPSHOTS-TOP.jpg

« On Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism | Main | Fighting a Slow Genocide with Balloons and Hearing Aids »

August 22, 2008

NY Times Defends Slur

New York Times Public Editor Clark Hoyt defends his paper's labeling of Brigitte Gabriel as a "radical Islamophobe." (Click here for CAMERA's earlier blog about this) He disingenuously writes that

"Solomon had gone over the edited transcript with Gabriel before it was published," and Gabriel "had no problems with the questions or the answers, as depicted in the piece."

However, the slur "radical Islamophobe" wasn't in the article itself, but in the Table of Contents blurb promoting the article. So saying that she agreed that the questions and answers in the article were accurate doesn't in the least mean that she accepted as true the label of "radical Islamophobe." And it also doesn't mean that she didn't think the questions were for the most part preposterous. It just means that the article reflected what was asked and answered.

Gabriel is accustomed to dealing from time to time with ignorant and arrogant reporters, so despite Solomon's obnoxious questions, the interview still turned out well and conveyed Gabriel's important message. But this is thanks to Gabriel's professionalism, and despite Solomon's apparent efforts to bait her.

The public is weighing in on Hoyt's lame response in the comments section that follows his column. Here are some excerpts:

Thank you for attempting to address the error made by Solomon but the ‘phobe’ does not fit. "Islam expert" perhaps, but no more ‘phobe’ than Paul Revere and his bunch warning that the British were coming. Soloman would, of course, interview Paul and write the next day of a Britophobe. Flight attendants giving instructions would be crashophobes, and so on. Should I interview Solomon I would, of course write of a truthophobe and your newspaper an apology-o-phobe.

— Posted by Paul, FL

...when we label someone phobic because they react to FACTS, we are the ones who are indeed phobic and inaccurate.

— Posted by William Buffton

We hope you will add your opinion in the comment section after Hoyt's column. Click here to go there.

Posted by LG at August 22, 2008 03:06 PM

Comments

I think the Public Editor of the NYT is misquoting. He seems to be referring to this post on Frenkel's blog at the AJN:

http://www.ajn.com.au/news/news.asp?pgID=3403

Her words that come closest to what he put in quotation marks comes at the end:

***FRENKEL: Practising Muslims are radical Muslims?

GABRIEL: Every practising Muslim is a radical Muslim... if he upholds the tenets of the Koran, if he goes to the Mosques, because they are being fed nothing other than the Koran.

Sounds like a better diet than the tripe on offer here...

FRENKEL: Do you agree with that statement: A practising Muslim is a radical Muslim?

GABRIEL: A practising Muslim who upholds the tenets of the Koran -- it's not that simple -- a practising Muslim who goes to mosque every Friday, prays five times a day, and who believes that the Koran is the word of god, and who believes that Mohammed is the perfect man and (four inaudible words) is a radical Muslim.

FRENKEL: Why do you put those qualifiers on at the end?

GABRIEL: They're not qualifiers because this is what a practising Muslim does…***

Posted by: Adam at August 23, 2008 04:40 PM

The only Islamaophobe that stands out in this article is the interviewer,
between the two of them only Ms Gabriel, grew up in that part of the world and understands the mentality.

A denial to face reality, is coming across in the fear base arrogant questions, any intellectual explanation to this attitude does not cover the fear factor, that result in a lack of respect by trying to mock the interviewed .
People that are living in this fearful state of mind, like the interviewer and her peers, are resorting to the tactics of offense, while trying to convince the world of
their " ILLOGICAL LOGIC".

1. The “illogical logic “ disregards the surroundings, the only reality they dare to look into, is their own perceptive of reality, where they feel safe, this skewed reality does not have a lot of merit, and deep inside those people know it , in this case she takes cover under intellectual arguments. and arrogantly attacks her "foes" ( i.e. the illusion breaker).

2. Another notion that comes across is the lack of flexibility that shows a fanatic tendency.
Phantasm is another manifestation of fearful state of mind, the ideology that it comes to promote is irrelevant, the mental state is the marker that guides people with whom to identify.

That’s why we find now a days that fanatic liberals identify with fanatic Muslim. Though logically it does not make sense, but subconsciously it is a perfect match.

I hope that with this understanding will give us the means to handle this bully behavior in a more effective way.

Posted by: varda at August 24, 2008 09:52 AM

Guidelines for posting

This is a moderated blog. We will not post comments that include racism, bigotry, threats, or factually inaccurate material.

Post a comment




Remember Me?

(you may use HTML tags for style)