Thursday, August 03, 2006

The NYT and Anti-Semitism

Funny how the media, without any judgmental comment, reports statements from terrorists and Middle East leaders on how evil Israel and the Jews are. Yet it gets incensed by Mel Gibson’s drunken comments which are mild in comparison.

New York Times:

In Mr. Gibson’s case, it was not The Malibu Times, but a Time Warner-owned celebrity news Web site, TMZ.com, that set off the media storm. On Friday evening, TMZ posted four pages of a sheriff’s report describing what the arresting officer said was Mr. Gibson’s belligerent behavior and a series of noxious remarks, including several deeply offensive comments about Jews.


The police report includes two anti-semitic comments by Gibson:

"F***ing Jew".

"The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world." Followed by: "Are you a Jew?"


Compare that with the NYT treatment of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s statement that Jews in the Middle East “a satanic and cancerous presence and an infected tumor”.

From a NYT article just a couple of weeks ago:

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s spiritual leader and the country’s most powerful figure, said in a speech on Sunday that Israeli strikes in Lebanon and the Palestinian territories proved how “the presence of Zionists in the region is a satanic and cancerous presence and an infected tumor for the entire world of Islam.”


No comment about this being “noxious” or “deeply offensive”.

I guess “noxious” and “deeply offensive” words about Jews can only come from actors when they’re drunk. On the other hand, sober political and religious leaders can be as hateful as they want toward Jews without the slightest hint from the NYT that the comments are noxious. Hmm.

2 comments:

George Berryman said...

Bet your bottom dollar on it - if Mel Gibson had made an epic film debasing Christ rather than praising him, the words “noxious” and “deeply offensive” would not have shown up in regards to Mel's comments when reported in the Traitor Times. Even if the arresting officer did label Mel's comments thusly!

T. D. said...

What's interesting is the NYT put those terms in as commentary rather than as a quotation from the arresting officer.

Anti-semitism is bad except when real political and religious leaders do it.