more on Katrina, view from afar (Figaro) (fwd)

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Steven M. Bellovin" <smb () cs columbia edu>
Date: September 19, 2005 7:14:59 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Re: [IP] more on Katrina, view from afar (Figaro) (fwd)


Quite apart from the merits (or the lack thereof) of that French
analysis, it may have been based on early, false information.  There
was a long article in Sunday's NY Times on just how the media was too
credible, and printed information with little or no substantiation,
information that now appears to be flat-out wrong.

Here are the first few paragraphs of
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/19/business/media/19carr.html
I urge you to read the whole story; it substantiates the basic claims.

---
David Carr
More Horrible Than Truth: News Reports
Published: September 19, 2005

DISASTER has a way of bringing out the best and the worst instincts
in the news media. It is a grand thing that during the most terrible
days of Hurricane Katrina, many reporters found their gag reflex
and stopped swallowing pat excuses from public officials. But the
media's willingness to report thinly attributed rumors may also
have contributed to a kind of cultural wreckage that will not clean
up easily.

First, anyone with any knowledge of the events in New Orleans knows
that terrible things with non-natural causes occurred: there were
assaults, shots fired at a rescue helicopter and, given the state
of the city's police department, many other crimes that probably
went unreported.

But many instances in the lurid libretto of widespread murder,
carjacking, rape, and assaults that filled the airwaves and newspapers
have yet to be established or proved, as far as anyone can determine.
And many of the urban legends that sprang up - the systematic rape
of children, the slitting of a 7-year-old's throat - so far seem
to be just that. The fact that some of these rumors were repeated
by overwhelmed local officials does not completely get the news
media off the hook. A survey of news reports in the LexisNexis
database shows that on Sept. 1, the news media's narrative of the
hurricane shifted.

...


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