See here: Deadline Iraq: Untold Stories of the Iraq War. It’s a good documentary, but my problem with it is that I don’t think this type of unnarrated exposition does enough to raise the important questions. We sort of flit from scene to scene: a firefight, a missile explosion, a hospital… but what is the connection? What message should we take from it all? A few of mine:
War seems so banal in the videos, unreal, just a bunch of guys yelling at each other. Bullets fly through the air with a muted buzz. These sounds and images can’t possibly capture the fear and terror and adrenaline flowing. How can we do this?
Are embeds soldiers or journalists? The big tragedy is that some journalists have been shot in the Palestine Hotel? Amid all the other shit going on in Iraq? The torture before the invasion, the murders after the invasion?
In every country, you can find any thousand people willing to say what you want. So photos of cheering, jeering, dead civilians, and so on, really don’t tell us anything. I think this still affects our coverage of the Middle East. I think what is most telling is Peter Mansbridge’s comment, that ideally you would be able to go anywhere you want on the battlefield, but that you cannot, so you make do. Sometimes this means accepting what the local authorities are willing, or want, to show.
Maher Abdullah: there is no such thing as an objective journalist. And if that’s the case, then what is the point? Presumably the point of reportage on these situations is to give the decision-makers, the public, all the information they need. But the people on the frontlines only send these stories to their editors, and then the editors make decisions about how those photos will sell papers. On top of that, there are Pentagon apologists who get paid to go on CNN/Fox/MSNBC and offer their ‘analysis’ of the war. One minute of their (unacknowledged) biased opinions can wreck any useful data coming out of the theatre of war. I’m sure the reason the Pentagon allowed embeds is because the staffers in Washington realize the average journalist isn’t a threat, so long as they can steer the distribution back home.
One of the journalists claims this was the best-covered war in history, but what is the coverage? If the public never sees dead Americans, or gets the meaningful, in depth analyses (monthly death tolls, economic ruin, etc), then what is the point? That we see some neat photos and videos, make some TV shows, and on we go?
Perhaps blogs are one way to address these problems. People like Michael Yon, who are freelance and self-publish, and most importantly, are very clear about their biases. He’s resolutely pro-military, but he still brings some important data points to the conflicts he covers.
Tags: iraq, journalism
Entries (RSS)