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Al-Jazeera Launching All-English Channel (now launched)

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DOHA, Qatar - Al-Jazeera is nothing if not bold. It has fought repeatedly with Washington, which says its exclusive broadcasts of Osama bin Laden speeches show an anti-American, pro-terrorist bias. Its freewheeling broadcasts have decimated state-run TV stations across much of the Arab world, leading some countries to close its bureaus down. So what does such a network do next? Plan a massive expansion.
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I have no big expectations for a terrorist network, even if it broadcasts in English.
One can't be slighlty pregrant, same goes for terrorist.
Hey, I don't support the network, but, hell, CNN, in some ways, is no different with their Pro-American mumbo jumbo.
leafsfan said:
Hey, I don't support the network, but, hell, CNN, in some ways, is no different with their Pro-American mumbo jumbo.
I think there is a HUGE difference between being patriotic and pro-terrorist.

I suppose you enjoy our Communist Broadcasting Corporation's news that shows you all the bleeding heart, its wrong to stand up for yourself, please vote Liberal kind of information.
I was actually quoting the "anti-American" statement, not the terrorism stuff.

Patriotism aside, if you think that CNN isn't biased towards the Arab world, then you are a fool.

Being from Canada, I can actually see both sides of the fence on the media and how they manipulate their viewers.

Have a nice day.
leafsfan said:
Being from Canada, I can actually see both sides of the fence on the media
HAHAHAHAHA, good one.

Go donate some money to the Liberal party and then complain about the nasty, bad bad bad Americans. When terrorism comes to your doorstep be really surprised and say "how could this be, I am Canadian with blinds on my eyes"
Sorry, pal -- you're the one with the blinders on.

Nice ignorant comments by the way. Go wrap yourself up in the American flag and move down to Texas.
You are obviously harbouring some anti-American sentiments. I urge you to not only look at Canada’s relationship with the US and how important it is, but also to look at history and try to learn something from it.

You don’t have to wrap yourself in the American flag nor move to Texas to realize the importance of the US to Canada and all Canadians.

I also urge you to re-read my earlier post and thing about it. I stated that there is a difference between being patriotic and pro-terrorist. You can’t blame CNN for being a bit patriotic. Calling it “mumbo jumbo” exactly proves my point about you.
Canadians in general (and it appears Leafsfan in particular) have been blinded by the anti-American and Liberal Party propaganda of the CBC, Toronto Star, and Globe and Mail. CNN is less biased than any of the aforementioned three "news sources". The three media outlets have shown that they are willing to sympathize with terrorist groups or skew the facts behind the news just to make Americans (as well as Israelis, Stephen Harper, or whoever else are their "bad guys of the day") look bad... unfortunately, this opinion rubs off on their viewers. To them, any opinion that doesn't agree with the extreme left opinions of the CBC and The Star are "biased right-wing lies", even when they are factually true.
So typical -- as soon as you don't tread the party line, you are outed as "anti-American."

I make a simple point that CNN has as much bias as Al Jazeera, and now you hint that I'm an "anti-American."

I have plenty of friends in the U.S. that would disagree.

TV stations (yes, your beloved CNN, too) have just as much of an agenda as newspapers do -- I know, because I work in the media -- and, guess what, not for a Liberal company.
leafsfan said:
So typical -- as soon as you don't tread the party line, you are outed as "anti-American."
Not arguing with you, but it's funny that you say that.... I would note that federal Liberals love to publicize the view that if you don't agree with their worldview on anything (not just foreign affairs, but items such as healthcare, federalism/the fiscal imbalance, French language etc. etc.), then you're "anti-Canadian".
Yeesh, I give up. You win.
leafsfan said:
Hey, I don't support the network, but, hell, CNN, in some ways, is no different with their Pro-American mumbo jumbo.
I agree, But Fox News is much much worse. If we can have fox news here why not an english Al-Jazeera?
I would like to hear both (or all) sides of the story and make up my own mind, but the US news networks don't provide that perspective. Even if Al-Jazeera is biased, it will provide information from another perspective which I can then process and decide for myself how much of it to believe.

It's impossible to get a reasonable perspective on a situation if all you're hearing is one side, and most of the information coming out of the US these days is heavily tainted by their well-meaning patriotism. Since I'm not a US citizen, I don't feel a patriotic obligation to put my faith in their government and their news media.

Anyone who suggests we should squelch perspectives that they don't agree with is a danger to democracy, in my opinion.
Let's just keep this civil. We don't have to all agree, but that's no need to flame people.

As for CNN, I remember being in France in the 80's when the US military accidentally shot down a passenger jet; somewhere in the Middle East. Watching the French news we all thought WWIII was about to start. I went back to my hotel room to watch CNN. I watched their entire evening newscast without hearing about the plane being shot down. Right at the end of the newscast, the mentioned it very quickly. It was along the lines of.

"And in other news, the US military shot down a civilian 727. Good night everybody!"

As Mike said, if we can hear both sides of the story, biased or not, we can make up our own minds.
ken0042 said:
As Mike said, if we can hear both sides of the story, biased or not, we can make up our own minds.
Amen to that -- great point.
Of course, someone arrived with an anti-Fox News comment. The question is, have they ever actually watched the network, or are they getting second hand accounts from the "Toronto CBC/Star/Globe left-wing compact".

I agree with technut that the more news sources you have, the better. Al-Jazeera, as well as Communist China's propaganda networks have had Web sites in english for years, and I have browsed over there on occasion to see what their spin on the news is. The problem is that, unlike the people participating in this thread, too many Canadians accept blindly and read or view exclusively what is printed or broadcasted in the Toronto left-wing media compact. In this example, they believe downright untrue statements from them that Fox News make up facts. Fox does emphasize what other news stations won't broadcast because it would contradict those other stations' worldview, but that doesn't make it unfactual. It may not always present both sides of the story nor are they perfectly balanced (although from my own personal viewing, I would argue that they have far more liberals on their networks to present their viewpoint, than the liberal media allow conservatives to present their view), but neither are the Canadian networks by any means.

Similar to the earlier comment, there are loyal Canadian citizens who don't follow some blind patriotic obligation to believe everything that the federal government says, or believe the unbalanced coverage that the CBC spits out at us, just like there are Americans who oppose the actions of their government, as is everyone's democratic right.
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That was pure poetry Crawler!!

I really like it when people have political views, even if those views are different than mine. What I really don’t like are people that repeat rumors they heard from others as facts, people that vote a certain way because their friend, spouse or whatever voted that way or people that are pro or against a certain party or country without knowing anything at all about them.

Leafsfan’s “mumbo jumbo” comment touched a nerve with me since it sounds so much like the typical anti-American comments that so many blind-sighted Canadians will make
Eventually I was expecting an anti Fox comment myself and wasn't disappointed. Remember, the Globe and Star were making anti FNC remarks long before the station was legal in this country. Poor jouranalism at its finest.
Fox News is a great story in capitalism. Find a market that isn't being well served, and create a product for it. I wish people would stop trying to read into it any kind of great evil, or public service. It's a business. It's info-tainment.

Freedom of the press means they don't have to provide balanced coverage. Do you want it another way?

I trust nobody would want Al-Jazeera banned, would they?

Gary
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