Suicide bomb the messenger

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

We know that most governments have a stated policy of not negotiating with terrorists. But should media have a policy of not reporting on terrorist attacks? Some people might think so after hearing about this, a study that links coverage of terrorism with increased incidences of terrorism. (I added the link.)

It's a macabre example of win-win in what economists call a "common-interest game," say Bruno S. Frey of the University of Zurich and Dominic Rohner of Cambridge University.

"Both the media and terrorists benefit from terrorist incidents," their study contends. Terrorists get free publicity for themselves and their cause. The media, meanwhile, make money "as reports of terror attacks increase newspaper sales and the number of television viewers."

The researchers counted direct references to terrorism between 1998 and 2005 in the New York Times and Neue Zuercher Zeitung, a respected Swiss newspaper. They also collected data on terrorist attacks around the world during that period. Using a statistical procedure called the Granger Causality Test, they attempted to determine whether more coverage directly led to more attacks.

The results, they said, were unequivocal: Coverage caused more attacks, and attacks caused more coverage -- a mutually beneficial spiral of death that they say has increased because of a heightened interest in terrorism since Sept. 11, 2001.

What's not clear is whether the correlation can also be found between with all media, including television and websites, or just newspapers. (And really, do terrorists read Swiss newspapers?) If it's just newspapers, is it because terrorists like having the actual pages to stick on their fridges?

There's nothing in the report on this study as to whether invading other countries might actually increase terrorism.

UPPITY DATE: Not surprisingly, some in the rightwingdingosphere are using this study to suggest that the MSM are causing terrorism.

Yeah, that's what they'd they like to believe, as opposed to agreeing with others who say that the war on terror is a failure for other reasons.

Washington is failing to make progress in the global war on terror and the next 9/11-style attack is not a question of if, but when. That is the scathing conclusion of a survey of 100 leading American foreign-policy analysts.

In its first "Terrorism Index," released yesterday, the influential journal Foreign Policy found surprising consensus among the bipartisan experts.

Some 86 per cent of them said the world has grown more, not less, dangerous, despite President George W. Bush's claims that the U.S. is winning the war on terror.

The main reasons for the decline in security, they said, were the war in Iraq, the detention of terror suspects in Guantanamo Bay, U.S. policy towards Iran and U.S. energy policy.

Perhaps in ''defending our freedoms,'' these Chairborne Rangers (wish I had come up with that) would prefer to take away the freedom of the press and the public's right to know. Besides, aren't they the ones constantly screaming about terrorists lurking everywhere?

By the way: 2,500 U.S. military dead in Iraq as of today.

Comments

[Robert McClelland]

"Not surprisingly, some in the rightwingdingosphere are using this study to suggest that the MSM are causing terrorism."

Considering the rightwingdingosphere always has more coverage of terrorist attacks and alleged plans to attack than the leftmoonbatosphere, I think it's safe to say that if there's any veracity to this study it means the former group is also guilty of causing terrorism.

[Antonia Z.]

Ooo. Leftmoonbatosphere! Can I use that? Can I?
Or maybe I should go with leftwinglooneymoonbatosphere or is looney and moonbat redundant?

[RossK]

I think, perhaps, the folks from Foreign Policy and their bevy of experts might have missed one factor.

Specifically, the stupid names of killing operations like, say, 'Operation Iron Saber' or 'Operation Phantom Fury', or even, more recently, 'Operation Mount And Thrust'.

Or maybe it's just those value-added extras like that really gets people worked up. For example, stuff like this:

"...(Fallujah's) main hospital was selected as the first target, the New York Times reported, "because the US military believed it was the source of rumours about heavy casualties".

Funny, though, how that didn't run at the top of every newscast in North America.

.

.

[Dana]

Y'know guys, I think it's time we recognize the fact that the game is over and the right has won.

The short years of supremacy of the notion of the greater good are over.

The corporate plutocracy is upon us and it's claws bite deep.

The consent of citizens, informed or otherwise, as a source of political authority or legitimacy is rapidly fading into a curious historical remnant, brief as the idea was.

Let's just take our prescriptions and submit.

Preserve what ideas you can for generations of a far future in whatever way seems best and prepare for a dark age.

[steve]

leftwinglattedrinkinglooneymoonbatosphere

rightwingwetpantsdingoborgosphere

[Antonia Z.]

LOL. Thank you Steve. I needed that.

[Jinoole]

It is interesting to note, though, that their point of study is from 1998 and upward, obviously after the American embassies at Nairobi and Dar-es-Salaam were attacked.

Terrorist attacks were as frequent in '70s and '80s as they do now [IRA of Nothern Ireland; Tamils of Sri Lanka; Carlos the Jackal, etc]. The only difference is the Western media is a lot hyperactive and hypertensive, overreporting every pin that drops.

The reason?

The terror attacks now are against the sole superpower and her allies, instead of obscure groups in far-flung, remote countries.

[Stephen Reeves]

Dana,
Can you just explain what you said in your last comment, a grade school drop out like me,who has worked since he was 16, cannot understand it.

[balbulican]

Regarding the 2,500 American casualties in Iraq - it's a bit horrifying to note that when you add the 300+ US military categories in Afghanistan, George Bush's "War on Terror" has now officially killed more Americans than Osama Bin Laden did.

[sooey]

ooh. eerie timing for that post. just yesterday, as i was fanning the cyber flames, it occurred to me: what if the americans started a war on terror and the media didn't report on it - would it fizzle? i mean, you mentioned winning hearts and minds re the singing marine, ms zerb, and i assumed you were referring to iraqi hearts and minds. but that got me thinking about how the politics of the war on terror is fought in the media to win hearts and minds here and i wondered if in reporting it, the media has given it legs.

[dave]

Madame Zed wrote:

"Ooo. Leftmoonbatosphere! Can I use that? Can I?
Or maybe I should go with leftwinglooneymoonbatosphere or is looney and moonbat redundant?"

As a derogatory epithet "moonbat", to me, is about as offensive as being called "male personage". I would think of craziness and unstable thinking, in terms of bats, if I saw them flying under the noonday sun.

[Bill-Muskoka]

RossK,

'Operation Mount And Thrust'? Is that happening on Brokeback Mountain? LMAO!

I thought it was called 'Operation Mountain Thrust'?

Well, I think that will get comments from the rightwrongmoralmajoritynotasphere! Likewise, the ifeelyourpainneedmoreofmyownsphere will come rushing to the defense.

What if, they took all the frontend loaders and just SQUASHED the shit out of every car?

BTW, congrats to York Regional Police. Now that is a message the punks will understand!

No more cars to drive IED's around in. How about this, and it seems they have caught on in the past couple of days. Anyone, not in an official uniform and with proper ID, caught with a weapon is arrested if possible, shot if not! Its called Martial Law.

I think we need more details on precisely what the ROE's are there. This Viet Nam has to be dealt with, and with total dedication, or get the Hell out! No more Rowandas with the hand wringing BS!

[Ti-Guy]

"Preserve what ideas you can for generations of a far future in whatever way seems best and prepare for a dark age."

Can you recommend an Irish monastery I can hold up in? I think my skills at copying and illuminating the sacred writings of the divine righty-tighties will be of some use. The notes in the margins will be a laff-riot for future generations, at the very least.

[allderblob]

This reminds me of the correlation between reporting of suicides and the incidence of suicides among the general public. Again, we have people making a strong argument about a correlation, to the extent that suicides are generally no longer reported in the media.

It seems irrational, but maybe there is something to the increased reporting of terror attacks and the increasing number of them. It certainly helps create a sense of crisis, a "climate of fear," when the reports are trumpeted and the "spectacle' is operatic in scope. This climate can only help the right wink, in my opinion. (I'm sorry, I meant "wing.")

[Sean Pelette]

Correlation is not causation.

Re: The Chairborne Rangers, smackdown is here; http://rocksandboulders.blogspot.com/2006/06/vacancy-at-baghdad-bureau.html

[Ti-Guy]

"Re: The Chairborne Rangers, smackdown is here"

Not much of a smack-down. I personally don't believe a soldier working in the confines of his platoon, operating in limited areas, acting in the service of his or her State and having his or her life threatened can provide objective coverage of conditions througout an entire country.

I respect the work of soldiers, but they're not the media and their credibility has to be taken for what it is.

And this is if I believe what the soldier is saying isn't part of Pentagon psy-ops...

I hope that's a lesson to the Empire, its Government, its Military and its Media...once you lie enough, no one will ever believe what you say, ever again.

[Dana]

Ti-Guy, the Irish have closed the monasteries and turned them into digital data depositories but you have to hold an Irish passport and sign a blood pledge of abstinence to work in one of them.

On the other hand, once the empire lies enough over a long enough period of time all alternate versions are presumed to be lies.

What's that thing they say about the ownership of history?

[Joe Clark]

"Greater incidence" of terrorism. Incidence means occurrence. Incidents are another matter. Incidences plural are hard to come by, but might be plausible if a statistician were evaluating several large populations (incidences of malaria in Sudan, Mali, Niger).

[sooey]

"(And really, do terrorists read Swiss newspapers?)"

i just assumed they all had swiss bank accounts.

but all the mandatory politically correct prefacing to the debate irks me. "support the troops" - check, "right of israel to exist" - check, "do not feed the terrorists" - check. all to appease some hysterical rightwinger "but of course you support the troops?!" gawd. it's really hard not to say sometimes "of course. of course i do. ... ... ...oh - you mean OUR troops? oh. no."

[sooey]

officious nitpicking bores.

[Bill-Muskoka]

Ti-Guy,

'I hope that's a lesson to the Empire, its Government, its Military and its Media...once you lie enough, no one will ever believe what you say, ever again.'

Do not they still tell the moral story of the 'Boy who cried wolf'? Seems they do not.

Maybe its because they tried to kill off all the wolves to protect the sheep? That would seem about right! No wolves; no need to cry wolf; therefore, no need to reprimand those who lie!

[Sean Pelette]

Ti-Guy,

I personally can't believe a pseudonymous commentator fecklessly and regularly regurgitating trite nonsense about 'empire' is really in a position to question anyone's credibility.

[Ti-Guy]

"I personally can't believe a pseudonymous commentator fecklessly and regularly regurgitating trite nonsense about 'empire' is really in a position to question anyone's credibility."

Are you for real?

[Ti-Guy]

You and me, Dana...We'll hunker down in St. Antonia of the Zerbisias monastery when the heavy shit starts going down. ;)

[Dana]

You bring the Irish Mist, I'll bring the Afghani blonde.