\r\n\r\n\r\nDANCING -- OR YAWNING<\/b>
\r\n -- ON THE GRAVE OF CARLO GIULIANI<\/b>\r\n By Norman Solomon<\/i><\/b>\r\n<\/p><\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n| <\/td>\r\n | \r\n\r\n\"After a police officer shot Carlo Giuliani in the head, Time<\/i> \r\nmagazine published a requiem of sorts -- explaining that the 23-year-old \r\nItalian protester pretty much got what he deserved.... \r\n\r\nThe sanctimonious tone, etched with\r\ngratification, was not unique to the largest\r\nnewsmagazine in the United States. Quite a\r\nfew commentators seemed to accept -- or\r\neven applaud -- the killing of Giuliani as\r\nrough justice.\"\r\n\r\n<\/b>\r\n\r\n<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<\/table>\r\n\r\n<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<\/table>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n<\/table>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n \r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n \r\n
\r\n\r\nAfter a police officer shot Carlo Giuliani in the head, Time<\/i> \r\nmagazine published a requiem of sorts -- explaining that the 23-year-old \r\nItalian protester pretty much got what he deserved.\r\n\r\n <\/b><\/p>
\r\n \r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n <\/table>\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nAfter a police officer shot Carlo Giuliani in the head, Time<\/i> \r\nmagazine published a requiem of sorts -- explaining that the 23-year-old \r\nItalian protester pretty much got what he deserved.\r\n\r\n\"One man died in Genoa; a man, we must presume, who was swayed by \r\nthe false promise that violence -- not peaceful protest, not participation \r\nin the democratic process -- is the best way to advance a political cause,\"\r\nTime's article concluded. \"It is not too much to hope that the next time \r\nhis friends stoop to pick up a cobblestone, they will remember a lesson \r\nlearned when plows first broke the Mesopotamian earth: You reap what you\r\nsow.\"<\/p><\/ul>\r\n\r\n<\/b> The sanctimonious tone, etched with gratification, was not unique \r\nto the largest newsmagazine in the United States. Quite a few commentators \r\nseemed to accept -- or even applaud -- the killing of Giuliani as rough \r\njustice. \"Excuse me if I don't mourn for the young man who was shot dead by\r\npolice during the economic summit,\" wrote Houston Chronicle<\/i> columnist Cragg\r\nHines. \"It was tragic, but he was asking for it, and he got it.\"<\/p>\r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n <\/p><\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n \r\n
\r\n\r\nIn Genoa, assaults by Italian police were\r\nsystematic and widespread, causing\r\nhundreds of serious injuries. But American\r\nnews accounts tended to be cryptic. \r\n\r\n <\/b><\/p>
\r\n \r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n <\/table>\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nIn Genoa, assaults by Italian police were systematic and \r\nwidespread, causing hundreds of serious injuries. But American news \r\naccounts tended to be cryptic. \"Italian police raided a school building \r\nhousing activists and arrested all 92 people inside,\" the Wall Street \r\nJournal reported on July 23. \"Afterward, the building was covered with \r\npools of blood and littered with smashed computers. Several reporters at \r\nthe school were hurt; one had his arm broken. Police said 61 of the \r\ndetainees had been wounded in riots that preceded the raid, but neighbors \r\ndescribed hours of beatings and screaming coming from the school during the\r\nraid.\"\r\n\r\n<\/b> On July 25, when I called the Committee to Protect Journalists, \r\nthe Manhattan-based group had not yet issued a statement. But program \r\ndirector Richard M. Murphy told me: \"CPJ is extremely concerned by reports \r\nthat working journalists were attacked by both police and protesters while \r\ncovering street demonstrations at the Genoa summit.\" The comment was \r\nevenhanded to a fault. The vast majority of the reported attacks on \r\njournalists were by police.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n <\/p><\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n \r\n
\r\n\r\nUnlike colleagues assaulted while\r\ndisplaying press credentials, reporter John\r\nElliott was on an undercover assignment\r\namong protesters. \r\n\r\n <\/b><\/p>
\r\n \r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n <\/table>\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nUnlike colleagues assaulted while displaying press credentials, \r\nreporter John Elliott was on an undercover assignment among protesters. \r\nWatching a water cannon move through tear gas, \"I felt a massive blow to \r\nthe back of my head,\" he wrote in the Sunday Times of London. \"For a second\r\nmy vision whited out. I had been hit by a police truncheon.\"\r\n\r\n<\/b> As more police ran toward him, Elliott quickly tried to regain his\r\njournalistic identity by yelling, \"Giornalista inglese!\" But the clubbing \r\nwent on. \"Two policemen dragged me along the ground, shouted at me in \r\nItalian and then hit me some more. My cycling helmet disintegrated under \r\ntheir blows. Truncheons whacked my back, arms and shins. They dragged me \r\nover railway lines towards a signal box where I was ordered to put my head \r\non a steel rail. I tried to obey, unable to believe this was happening. \r\nGripped by fresh impulses of violence, they started kicking my head, back \r\nand legs. Repeatedly they pushed me to the ground for a fresh pasting.\"<\/p>\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n <\/p><\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n \r\n
\r\n\r\nNews accounts routinely declared that the fatality in Genoa was \r\nunprecedented. But an essay in the London-based Guardian<\/i> debunked that \r\nmedia myth. \r\n <\/b><\/p>
\r\n \r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n <\/table>\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nNews accounts routinely declared that the fatality in Genoa was \r\nunprecedented. But an essay in the London-based Guardian<\/i> debunked that \r\nmedia myth. \"The members of the Landless Movement of Brazil (MST) could \r\ntell you that Carlo Giuliani ... is not the first casualty of the movement \r\nchallenging neoliberal globalization around the world,\" Katharine Ainger \r\nwrote. \"The MST suffer ongoing persecution for their campaign for land \r\nreform in Brazil, their opposition to the World Bank's program of \r\nmarket-led land reform and to the corporate control of agriculture through \r\npatents on seed.\"\r\n\r\n<\/b> Ainger cited other deaths that have gone virtually unreported in \r\nmass media: \"Recently, three students protesting against World Bank \r\nprivatization were shot in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Young men \r\nfighting World Bank-imposed water privatization have been tortured and \r\nkilled in Cochabamba, Bolivia.\"<\/p>\r\n\r\n Meanwhile, around the planet, those who perish from lack of food \r\nor drinkable water or health care have little media presence. The several \r\nthousand children who die from easily preventable diseases each morning, \r\nand afternoon, and evening, remain largely media abstractions. When will \r\nnews outlets really scrutinize the profit-driven violence that takes their \r\nlives?<\/p>\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n <\/p><\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n \r\n \r\n
\r\n\r\nWhile institutionalized violence is\r\nmassive and continuous, supporters of\r\ncorporate globalizing agendas benefit from\r\nthe propaganda value of the street violence\r\nby \"Black Bloc\" participants.\r\n\r\n <\/b><\/p>
\r\n \r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n <\/table>\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n | \r\n \r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nWhile such institutionalized violence is massive and continuous, \r\nsupporters of corporate globalizing agendas benefit from the propaganda \r\nvalue of the street violence by \"Black Bloc\" participants in Genoa (who, \r\naccording to eyewitness accounts, comprised no more than 2 percent of the \r\nprotesters there). It would be surprising if those Black Bloc units were \r\nnot heavily infiltrated by government-paid provocateurs and the like. \r\nHistorically, covert police agents have often pushed for -- and helped to \r\nimplement -- violent actions in isolation from a mass base. In sharp \r\ncontrast, there is scant record of police agents trying to foment militant,\r\nnonviolent civil disobedience on a large scale.\r\n\r\n<\/b> A global movement with literally millions of participants is \r\ncontinuing to organize against the colossal daily violence of the world's \r\nbiggest institutions. Progressive websites that are genuinely grassroots \r\nand international -- like www.indymedia.org and www.zmag.org -- reflect \r\nvibrant resistance to a corporatized future. Other futures are possible, to\r\nthe extent that people are determined to create them.\r\n\r\n <\/p> \r\n\r\n \r\n <\/p><\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n | \r\n \r\n
\r\n \r\n\r\nNorman Solomon's latest book is \"The Habits of Highly Deceptive Media.\" His\r\nsyndicated column focuses on media and politics.\r\n\r\n\r\n <\/b><\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n\r\n\r\n <\/table>\r\n\r\n <\/td>\r\n <\/tr>\r\n<\/table>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\n<\/body><\/html>\n","contact":"","link":"","address":"","phone":"","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"text\/html","summary":"\"After a police officer shot Carlo Giuliani in the head, Time magazine published a requiem of sorts -- explaining that the 23-year-old Italian protester pretty much got what he deserved.... The sanctimonious tone, etched with gratification, was not unique to the largest newsmagazine in the United States. Quite a few commentators seemed to accept -- or even applaud -- the killing of Giuliani as rough justice.\"","numcomment":0,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/2001\/09\/mediavh5ltw.htm","filesize":"13.8 kibibytes","article_url":"\/news\/2001\/09\/9916.php"},"attachments":[],"comments":[]} | | | | | | | | | | |