Monday, November 21, 2005

To Jew or Not to Jew

I'm itching to do my typical (and cathartic) railing against journalism and it's unapologetic biases, but I'm going to hold off util Mike3000 weighs in. I have not been trained in journalism and so perhaps it is my ignorance that leads me to ask why a story about a very typical left-wing organization's opposition to a conservative court nominee would be written under the heading "Jewish Group Votes to Oppose Alito". Granted, the heading is technically correct, it is a Jewish group. But when one reads "Jewish Group Opposes..." it deliberately puts in your mind the idea that Alito has done something to offend Jews even bringing to mind possible anti-Semitism. Just as the title of a book is very carefully chosen, so is the "title" of an article. When I read this article I was surprised to find not a single Jewish reason for the opposition. The fact that it was a Jewish group had no bearing on their decision to oppose Alito, so why would the story be set up with an emphasis on the group's Jewishness? This story was so short that I'm confident as much time was spent on the headline as on the body, so "sloppiness" does not seem a reasonable defense.

3 comments:

The Unknown Blogger said...
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The Unknown Blogger said...

I know you asked for M3K for this one, but I have to say, I don't see anything to the article. It seemed like a random wire notice, it was a Jewish group, and they did decide to oppose Alito. If the largest Italian group decided the same, I would expect the title of the article to be "Italian group opposes Alito." If there were some fun adjectives, like "Jewish group angrily denounces Alito" then maybe. My question is, what should have been the title?

StalinMalone said...

"StalinMalone Voted Sexiest Blogger...Again"