You'd think the 'media' would lead the 'multimedia' charge, right?
But no. The most interesting stuff remains exclusively on the internet, and not on press sites either.
Despite being the Luddite-In-Residence around these parts, I'm determined to get in on this multimedia thing, and YouTube offers as good a place to start as any.
As long as you don't mind some strong language, check out CF troops engaged in Afghanistan in Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, and Part 6.
In fact, there's a whole selection available at YouTube with the right search criteria.
I find it astounding that none of this is showing up on CTV, CBC, or CanWest newscasts, despite the recent completion of Op Medusa, the most sustained combat involving Canadian troops since the Korean War. It's not like there's a shortage of actual pointy-end soldiering to film and air.
Here's my question: are the embedded reporters and their camera crews not following the troops off the base in Kandahar when they go into the field to fight, are the producers at the various television networks keeping the film in the can because they don't think it will sell advertising, or is there some editorializing going on to present an intentionally incomplete picture of what's happening in Afghanistan to the Canadian people?
I don't know the answer to that question. I suspect it's a combination of the first two options: the journalists don't get out in the field with the troops often enough, and when they do, all their producers will air are short clips and soundbites. I hope we haven't sunk so low that this is all about brazen manipulation of the imagery.
All I know is that we sure see a lot of the ramp ceremonies for the fallen, and not much else from the network news.
Despite being the Luddite-In-Residence around these parts, I'm determined to get in on this multimedia thing, and YouTube offers as good a place to start as any.
As long as you don't mind some strong language, check out CF troops engaged in Afghanistan in Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, and Part 6.
In fact, there's a whole selection available at YouTube with the right search criteria.
I find it astounding that none of this is showing up on CTV, CBC, or CanWest newscasts, despite the recent completion of Op Medusa, the most sustained combat involving Canadian troops since the Korean War. It's not like there's a shortage of actual pointy-end soldiering to film and air.
Here's my question: are the embedded reporters and their camera crews not following the troops off the base in Kandahar when they go into the field to fight, are the producers at the various television networks keeping the film in the can because they don't think it will sell advertising, or is there some editorializing going on to present an intentionally incomplete picture of what's happening in Afghanistan to the Canadian people?
I don't know the answer to that question. I suspect it's a combination of the first two options: the journalists don't get out in the field with the troops often enough, and when they do, all their producers will air are short clips and soundbites. I hope we haven't sunk so low that this is all about brazen manipulation of the imagery.
All I know is that we sure see a lot of the ramp ceremonies for the fallen, and not much else from the network news.
posted by Babbling Brooks at 10:35 a.m.
8 Comments:
I do seem to recall CTV using some of this footage in late July.
Thanks, Terry. But if it was just clips they showed, that's still not much more than a moving prop to their own commentary.
...proper news judgment would involve a disinclination to use much footage provided by the military itself.
But if they're not going to film and broadcast it themselves, then they're short-changing the Cdn public, aren't they? I'm not suggesting that it's not done with the best of intentions - journalistic integrity and all that - but it's still shortchanging the viewer. And given your comment about having the guts to go out and film it themselves, I'd suggest they should take the footage from whomever they can get it - journalistic integrity is only a leg to stand on if the journalists are willing to go and get the story.
I think we need to get past the tightly edited clips and soundbites, and let the soldiers tell the stories themselves, unfiltered and as complete as we can make them. I don't see our television news agencies facilitating that, and it concerns me.
The Cdn public has an incomplete and distorted picture of the CF and the mission in Afghanistan, and like it or not, the MSM is complicit in that state of affairs.
Can I ask, near the end of the video from July 15th there is a shot of a field where the edge of a trench/furrow is erupting. Am I seeing the effects of a chain gun/gattling gun?
Finally, near the end there is fire, with a much slower rate, that is throaty/deeper. Is this from a cannon on a vehicle?
"I think we need to get past the tightly edited clips and soundbites, and let the soldiers tell the stories themselves, unfiltered and as complete as we can make them. I don't see our television news agencies facilitating that, and it concerns me."
You get that this is symptomatic of the news and not news about afghanistan right. The average length of a news piece has shrunk to about 30 seconds. In depth now means about 2 minutes.
You get that this is symptomatic of the news and not news about afghanistan right. The average length of a news piece has shrunk to about 30 seconds. In depth now means about 2 minutes.
*sigh*
Yeah, I get it. Doesn't mean I have to like it or try not to change it, right?
Cameron - It's a rifle section (give or take). At least 8 soldiers with rifles and a couple of light machine guns firing rapidly.
We don't employ any gatling guns and the only chain gun we have is the ones on the Coyotes and LAV-III's. And yes, the 25-mm cannon (chain-gun) on the LAV-III makes the slow and deep sound I believe you're referring to (usually three-round bursts or single shots).
greg, thanks..
"Yeah, I get it. Doesn't mean I have to like it or try not to change it, right?"
Most certainly not.
But as for changing it, good luck with that. The nightly news is lost, probably forever. It diminishes us all.
One of the big problems is the cost. It costs a fucking ton of cash and time to do indepth reporting. Something that most news agencies don't have. CBC used to, but successive governments have, well, fucked them.
CTV has never really been that big on it, except on W5.. some of the French stations do it still, but mostly focused on Quebec issues.
It's a real problem.
A lot of this footage isn't usable for news, because what's going on ian't clear. Because television news reports are so short (as someone noted above), what they need is very short clips, and consequently the clips must be clear. If you watch carefully, you'll note that most news footage could actually be replaced by still photos without any loss of information.
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