The media pundit's pundit. Written by NYC insider Jeff Jarvis, BuzzMachine covers news, media, journalism, and politics.
Bravo
: American hostage Thomas Hamill escapes and is safe. Great news.
: Why he hell did the BBC feel compelled to put quotes around the word “escape” in its headline — US hostage ‘escapes’ in Iraq? Is he a ‘hostage’? Is he a ‘good guy’? Is he on ‘our side’?
Demanding rationality from the Middle East is an unrealistic expectation by the reasonable man standard. You should know better by now :-‘)
Perhaps its only becuase its too early to know if he actually escaped or was released. The article notes that he “apparently escaped.” I don’t think its fair to accuse the BBC of not considering him a “hostage” or a “good guy.”
BBC is also reporting that the other four have been found–mutiliated.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3624091.stm
Gee, I wonder why, Jeff? Maybe they are waiting to see if he actually did escape, or if the military is to going to prepare another made-for-TV dramatization that’s nowhere close to the actual events.
This article says he escaped, flagged down soldiers patrolling the pipeline and led them back to the house he escaped from. They arrested 2 Iraqis with machine guns at the building he led them to. http://www.halifaxlive.com/hostage_05022004_7344.php
It’s already Sweeps, someone call Ted Koppel, he can do a show on it! or ABC can do a made for tv movie, if they hurry, Sweeps is on, tell ABC, they never know when Sweeps is!
/..sarcasm mode off
Kat, your link was for a story than ran 2 weeks ago.
Ebb Tide–you are right–WND is running it as a breaking story and I never read the date of the BBC article. Apologies.
Escape? From the Iraqi Rebels?, whom the great writer and statesman Michael Moore calls “minutemen’?
Where would he be escaping to? Amerika? how can that be, that land is ruled by the Criminal Bush Regime. Hamil is clearly a no-necked man from the south, so you can’t say hes escaped when its clear that his conditions are better in Iraq under the ‘protection’ of the insurgent holy rebels, than they are in the Occupied ‘United’ States.
At least while Hamil was under ‘protection’ of the rebels, he wasnt able to attend klan meetings or brutalize black men as all men of the working class in amerika are likely to do. We now expect that mr. Hamil will have an understanding of the multicultural viewpoint on amerika and its eveil racist ways.
This parody/satire is brought to you by the BBC, the CBC, The Guardian and Der Speigel magazine
If asked, I suspect the BBC would contend that their staffers are directed to place quotes around words or phrases in headlines when the BBC has not been able to verify whatever it is that those words describe. Unless and until the Iraqi kidnappers call up the Beeb and tell it this guy really did escape, they’ll keep the quotes
Inconsistencies pop up, though, because the quoted headline word has been known to appear in the story without quotes.
Of course, the only people who interpret quotes in headlines like that are 96-year ol retired English teachers. The rest of us assume they mean the headline writer thinks someone is lieing.
The BBC is a “news” organization.
Latest story says he pried open the door and ran a quarter-mile down a road to the troops. Then he led them back to the house he escaped from. They arrested 2 Iraqis with machine guns at the building he led them to.
Given that sequence, it’s natural to ask how he got away alive, why the the troops risked going back to an armed house and why the armed Iraqis were still there when he came back, but were arrested rather than engaged.
Maybe the Iraqis slept through it all. Maybe he had made friends with his captors, he was going to be tortured in revenge for Abu Ghraib, but they arranged to let him go and he agreed to take them with him to they weren’t killed for letting him escape.
But until we hear his story, there are too many loose ends to report anything. Of course, his story may be designed to protect those involved, too. Easier to tout him as a model prisoner: One who escapes.
I don’t care how it comes out, but I’d like to hear the truth someday.
Anyway, quotes beats a correction tomorrow.
They used the quotes because they have no way of knowing whether he was an actual hostage in the first place. This could all be another Jessica Lynch hoax. We all know she was never really a rescued, or hurt, or a hostage, or in Iraq to begin with. She may have never even been born for all we know.
There is no Iraq! Take the red pill!
Frank Martin should get a blog.
The headline of the BBC story is now: “US hostage in Iraq gains freedom”
What was it before?
I think we have to give the Beeb credit for realising that the quotes suggest he didn’t escape.They don’t know all the facts, that’s all. It beats me why they allow this kind of lazy and chancy headline writing at all. As a acopy editor, I learnt early on that quotes excuse nothing if it comes to a libel suit, for example.
There is a precedent in the case of a reporter held hostage in Beirut during the epidemic of kidnapping in the 1980s. He was proclaimed to have escaped after he was found in the street, but it later transpired that his captors apparently left a convenient door open and let him make his own way out, perhaps because of orders from higher up.
The fact that two armed men were c aptured on the premises where Hamill was held suggests his ecape may be genuine, however.
How did he “gain” his freedom, I wonder. This story ends with “Mr Hamill’s freedom came as US marines began withdrawing from Falluja, handing over to an Iraqi military force.”
So, he either “gained” his freedom or it just “came”. Is is so hard for the BBC to just acknowledge a little heroism on the part of an American?
This is just what BBC [online headline writer(s)] does, they’re kind of unclear on the concept that putting quotation marks around something indicates it’s less credible. Maybe this is just a quirky Brits thing, I don’t know. But it makes for strange headlines, and irritates some.
I emailed them about it a year or so ago, got a “thanks for your feedback which we’ll ignore” response. Your turn.
Michael, in the second entry above, gets it right, and Jeff I’m surprised you didn’t yourself – the press routinely puts a word in quotes when info hasn’t been confirmed so they’re referencing what someone else said to err on the side of caution.
That seems obvious here. Perhaps seeing such things through your pro-war filter has had a deleterious affect on your judgment?
P.S. Frank Martin’s pro-war lenses appear to be even thicker! The decision to put “escapes” in quotes has nothing to do with the BBC’s attitude towards the war. It pertains to a desire for accuracy during the early stages of breaking news.
And, Anna, it’s a matter of nuance, not stupidity on the Beeb’s part. Of course, much of the American public isn’t fond of nuance. Faced with an intelligent man running against the current president, the Bush administration is currently even trying to give the word “nuance” a bad connotation. Which is kind of like trying to give a word like “robust” a bad connotation. Since we’ve got a president who likely can’t spell “nuance,” that may be an understandable route to take.