Martin Fletcher’s “Dopey” Comments
August 11, 2005 AFP photo of Young Israelis playing the guitar on the beach in the Gush Katif settlement of Shirat Hayam, in Gaza Strip. Are these some of the same “radical” Israeli youngsters “playing guitar ” who Martin Fletcher from NBC considers “extremely violent” and “who probably smoke dope?”
On August 18, NBC’s Martin Fletcher reported as news his own unsupported conjecture about young protesters. Fletcher opined:
These young radicals are like anti-globalization protesters or any other protesters all over the world; they are extremely violent and aggressive.
These youngsters who are living by themselves in these small settlements playing the guitar, singing songs, half of them are probably smoking dope, praying, and they are violent. They are very hostile and aggressive toward the press, threatening us all the time.
What evidence does Fletcher have that these youngsters are “extremely violent” or that “half of them are probably smoking dope?” How can the NBC reporter speculate about the drug habits of a group he knows little about? Since Fletcher did not support any of these defamatory comments with proof, he should have refrained from passing his own opinion off as fact.
(Hat Tip: J. Harris)
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