padraig (u.s.)
a monkey that will go ape
Skateboarding in Palestine doesn't make me feel more or less for the people of Gaza...
does regular news coverage make you, or the public at large, feel more or less for the people of Gaza (or wherever)? and if it does, which I doubt, is making people feel the point of journalism?
I never said Vice was a "trustworthy news source" (tho neither is CNN, if you followed the coverage of the Boston bombing). it ain't Bernard Fall in Vietnam, but it's also not Jackass. it's more like if the Jackass guys started caring about stuff and decided to start making documentaries about school privatization or immigration but had no idea how to actually do so. the Liberia doc I mentioned: it's just some dudes tooling around Monrovia talking to ex-warlords. it's amateur, lacks depth or insight, they repeatedly look like clueless 1st world assholes (esp compared the two real journalists - one Liberian, one Canadian freelancer who lives there - they get to guide them around). and surely one of the reasons Vice originally wrote about it during the civil war was the WTF factor of the Liberian Civil War, crossdressing cannibals and guys w/names like General Buttnaked. but it's legitimate, and totally unironic - they're def not covertly laughing at the people they're filming - and the style produces its own kind of insight that regular news coverage absolutely wouldn't. that's why I said they're more like a sub-sub-sub-sub Herozg/Errol Morris than 60 Minutes. but watch it for yourself. just understand the difference I'm making between the documentaries and whatever click bait is on Vice's front page.