Dear Media... Egypt is happening. But also...

There are lots of people being oppressed or feel they are, all over the world. Though it's interesting what gets reported on, and how it's worded.

When some people disagree with their government and refuse to disband gatherings or follow the authorities, they're called "revolutionary" and "protesters".
When other people do the same thing, they are a "mob" and are "rioting". Disobedient heathens, and often likened to animals.

Hmm. Head-scratcher.

Well, some people do riot don't they??
Sure. No matter how peaceful your protests aim to be, as we all know, human beings do whatever the f@!k they wanna do. I swear, sometimes you could just choke a bastard, couldn't you? They ruin everything. There's always at least one in every group. So of course while MOST of you are trying to stay on point, you will have ones in your groups who simply want to be total and complete 100% bastards. Start doing all kinds of stuff that's criminal. Possibly because they are in fact criminals. They will assault, loot, burn or blow stuff up. They will hurt your cause. They always do. But it's interesting how these are the main people that most media will focus on in certain groups. Not the protesters who aren't doing sh*tty stuff.

Keep that in mind the next time you watch a report on a part of the world where the people don't look like you. Looking at foreign faces makes it automatically foreign to you in some way, that's just a reflex, nothing bad in itself...so that's the first barrier you have to think your way around. We all have our differences yes, but similarities as well. All deserve to be heard in a fair way. You have to ask yourself, "wow is this entire country made up of rioters and crazy people?!" or..are "rioters" and "crazy people" the only thing the media is interested in showing you.


Well, I'll tell ya one thing—and here's one we can all gather round, self preservation—if something should happen and you find yourself jacked up and beat down by your own government, you'd better hope that the main media has something invested in talking about your area's problem. Otherwise, none of their cameras will be there as witnesses or deterrent when the police/military come to put your protesters down, and no positive or sympathetic tone/spin will be attributed to your country's political FUBAR. Would you like to guess how many of our extremely well-paid news anchors/corespondents will fly over and literally camp out in your town to diligently report on your daily happenings by the hour? Zero.



/ponderous thoughts

P.S. I have decided to refer to all such Media F**kery from now on as "StarWarsKatie" in my blog tags, as my own personal reminder about how biased or myopic some things in media can actually be. Nothing personal @ Katie of course.*

*Must always remember to add that part, lest I be sent hate mail by angry StarWars fans or angry Adorable-Little-Bullied-Blonde-Girls-Who-Wears-Glasses fans. Or both.