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Feminist Bias In Media and Why
 

Martin S. Fiebert
Department of Psychology
California State University, Long Beach

 
This is an email thread so you may want to read it from the bottom up to get it in chronological order.
 
From: The Fatherhood Coalition [mailto:FATHERS-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM] On Behalf Of Barbara C. Johnson
Sent: Saturday, August 20, 2005 8:43 PM
To: FATHERS-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM
Subject: Re: Dad climbed Federal building ! -- correction

 

A beautiful series of emails, Mark.
You are correct.
The question is now, How long will it take for everyone to be turned into salt?

Mark Charalambous wrote:

  Have you by any chance seen the latino day-time TV equivalent of Springer et al?   It's truly amazing. The bouncers always stand behind the (seated) man and physically restrain him while the women take turns slapping, punching and otherwise assaulting him.  The sheepish men try to protect themselves in the only way they can-- they put their heads as far down as they can, and move from side to side. At least the bouncers allow them this freedom of movement.  It is truly unbelievable. 

The wheels came off sometime ion the 70s, and without some kind of revolution on the part of (heterosexual) men, it is now impossible to predict what our society will look like twenty, ten or even 5 years in the future. We are spiralling into a black hole with no morality floor in sight.  In my opinion, our society simply cannot continue to exist in this way -- and I don't believe it will.

Bob wrote:

  I agree completely. One reason is even news has become entertainment, fighting for ratings is the priority or profits. Leading news people have been expressing concern about this for some time.

The same thing happens in TV programming. Shows that coddle women and show constant examples of women being empowered (while topping and ignoring men – or “dissing” them completely) are funded and do fairly well. Men do not object that much and women love this stuff. Look at Alley McBeal and other women centric shows that essentially get all their laughs at the men’s expense, making all men look incompetent, unfaithful or just plain dumb and all women look “right” (even though silly often times). Sometime men are laughing at the stupidity of the women, while the women are relating to that behaviour and the women are made to be the hero’s in the end (neurotic behavior and all).

The advertisers know women do most of the purchasing and therefore target them. They also know men as unlikely to object, organized boycotts and other activities. When we do this kind f stuff they will have to change. Until we do we are the second class citizen.

This is fundamental in all of today’s media and few are swimming against this tide. Bob

From: The Fatherhood Coalition [mailto:FATHERS-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM] On Behalf Of Mark Charalambous
Sent: Saturday, August 20, 2005 9:26 AM
To: FATHERS-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM
Subject: Re: Dad climbed Federal building ! -- correction

Mistake in my posting. I said:
"The Riverdance show, from which Michael Flatley left to form Riverdance, was culturally inclusive."

I meant, "The Riverdance show, from which Michael Flatley left to form Lord of the Dance, was culturally inclusive."


Mark Charalambous wrote:

I believe there's something more fundamental at work in the media.  There exist what I call certain "imperatives" that guide what is reported as newsworthy.  Key amongst these are the very visible social engineering political correctness imperatives. They revolve mainly around "gender" politics and race.

W/r to the "gender" politics imperative, stories that illustrate the victimization of women (as a class) by men are newsworthy.  A note posted here yesterday (?) a "news" story about a father in a custody battle who was awarded custody.  Why is this newsworthy?  If it came from our perspective, one could understand it. But it doesn't; rather, it serves as an illustration of a presumed bias against mothers in custody battles, that the media wants the public to believe. 

The second gender imperative is linked with the first: the promotion of homosexuality.  News stories that ostensibly cast homosexuality or homosexuals in a positive light will always be selected by the editors. Likewise, stories that point to persecution of homosexuals by heterosexuals will also be newsworthy. 

Conversely, stories that reflect badly on homosexuals are not newsworthy.  What has happened with the revelations of homosexual pedophilia in the Catholic church does not fit simply into this matrix, because there are strands at cross-purposes. There is one imperative directed at weakening Christian beliefs, and one that works _with_ it to demonize men in general.  But at cross-purposes is the imperative to promote homosexuality, and also another one that has not quite broken through into the mainstream media yet but is quietly building its strength in academia and we can expect to start to notice it anytime now: the 'normalization' of pedophilia.

Also more overtly at cross purposes with the anti-Catholic imperative is the basic pro-homosexual imperative.  This conflict is partially resolved by the the media presenting the sex abuse scandal as one of pedophilia rather than homosexuality.  But regardless, I think you see all I am trying to say is that the sex abuse scandal does not fit neatly into the various media imperatives.

Also consistent with pro-homosexual imperative: any "news" stories that support the notion that homosexuality is a condition of birth and hence natural. The flimsiest "study" from some academics that offers further "proof" of genetic differences between homosexuals and heterosexuals will always be reported.  The plethora of studies that contradict this will NEVER be reported. In fact, even the notion that homosexuality is *primarily* learned, adaptive behavior is simply not allowed to be presented for fear of allowing the average reader to actually think about this.  If people understood that homosexuality is learned behavior, comparisons with the prohibition against mixed-race marriages would evaporate -- because this is a completely bogus comparison -- and the gay marriage movement would lose 95% of its moral argument.

Another media imperative is the need to promote multiculturalism.  People of mixed race get bonus pooints w/r to their media coverage.  Tiger Woods is exhibit A in this regard.

Of course it goes further than this.  Races other than white are overly weighted in importance, and in cultural matters at least, anything all-white is underweighted.  I don't know if any of you remember the Irish "Lord of the Dance" shows that were incredibly popular a few years ago. The Riverdance show, from which Michael Flatley left to form Riverdance, was culturally inclusive.  Lord of the Dance was not. It was purely Irish.  I remember looking for a review of it in the Globe and smiling to myself at what I eventually found.  Lord of the Dance was not only white, but it was uncompromisingly heterosexual.  Beautiful young women, in one part shedding their skirts and dancing in their hose.  Insanely sexy.  And the dances that included the men with the women were a picture of TRUE sexual diversity-- beautifully contrasting male with female.

Lord of the Dance was magnificent, and blew away Riverdance in the bottom line--revenue.  But it was politically incorrect, it did not conform to the cultural media imperatives, and so was largely ignored in the Globe and like media.

I believe these various imperitives are bedrock deep in the media culture, and no memos need to be written about them. They are in fact, unconscious.  The media adheres to them--reporter and editor alike--with no realization of their motive force in determining what gets reported as news.

How does Fathers Rights fit in?  It doesn't.  You must understand that at the fundamental level, the story of the father who is being harmed and prevented from parenting his children is ALSO a story of A WOMAN BEHAVING BADLY.  And since this is happening to the entire class of divorce fathers, we are talking about the entire class of divorcing women  (please.. I do not mean that EVERY family breakup fits this scheme...).

Women's empowerment is probably the single most powerful of all media imperatives.  The locus of female empowerment includes her reproductive "rights" and the money and power she gains by having custody of "her" children after divorce.  The locus of women's power starts at the Family Court and spreads out from there. This female empowerment imperative will not permit any erosion of this power that can start as a small crack in the damn and could result in a true loss of power for women -- which by the way is absolutely necessary for Fathers Rights to gain traction.  My equation:
   Fathers Rights + Feminism = 0

Do the math.

Mark Charalambous

James Nollet wrote:
I agree that the liberal press is biased.  

But the liberal press above all loves stories which have "legs."  When a story has "legs," the liberal press will drop its liberal pretensions because the bottom line and ratings are what's most important.  

Stories have "legs" when there's something about them which is spectacular or sexy. This is why Fathers4justice in the UK is successful -- they understand that pictures of Batman holding up London Bridge make a story much sexier than if it were ordinary dads dressed in a normal fashion.

 

James

 

----- Original Message -----

Sent: Friday, August 19, 2005 7:35 AM

Subject: Re: Dad climbed Federal building !

 

            The liberal press likes to write us off as being mean and vindictive men and therefore probably bad people, but Cindy Sheehan is seen as someone who is rightfully angry and therefore justified is saying mean and vindictive things about President Bush.  On the other hand, John Murtari says nothing bad about Senator Clinton and professes to be peaceful and nonviolent, and he gets no press coverage at all.  To an unbiased observer that would seem to be unfair since both President Bush and Senator Clinton, believing their cause to be right, have supported causes that have lead to the loss of their child(ren).  This observer might even conclude that the liberal press is being hypocritical.

Regards,

Ken in MD

 


From: The Fatherhood Coalition [mailto:FATHERS-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM] On Behalf Of Barbara C. Johnson
Sent: Thursday, August 18, 2005 3:59 PM
To: FATHERS-L@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM
Subject: Re: Dad climbed Federal building !

 

John Murtari has been the bravest Man in the USA for a long while.
Word of his efforts must be spread wide and applauded.


Teri Stoddard wrote:
I just got a call from John.  He's still on the structure.  The police are there asking him to come down, but he won't.  The media isn't there yet.

On 8/18/05, Harry <hdpham2001@yahoo.com> wrote:

The News Release below has details (we need your help in getting it wide distribution).  We still don't know if John was
taken into custody or what he might be charged with.  The web site should have details as they become available:
http://www.AKidsRight.Org/actionc_syr

TO HELP: Please send a fax or make a phone call to the Senator's offices both in Washington and Syracuse.  They are
paying attention to what is going on here.

You don't have to be a resident of New York to call her offices.

Syracuse Local rep, Cathy Calhoun,
tel: 315-448-0470, fax: 315-448-0476

Washington Scheduling Office, Lona Valmoro (Senior
Advisor to the
Senator),
tel: 202-224-4451, fax: 202-228-0121

Most of all, you don't have to express anger. Just let her staff know that you care about Civil Rights protection for families and the Senator should meet with parent's groups regarding the need for National reform...  Let them know being a parent is one of our GREATEST rights. It needs official recognition and protection.

--------------------  NEWS RELEASE
-------------------
PARENT CLIMBS ARTWORK AT FEDERAL BUILDING SEEKING HELP FROM SENATOR HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE,  August 18, 2005

Syracuse, NY (Hanley Federal Building) - At 2 PM a lone parent, John Murtari, climbed the 20 foot sculpture in the Federal Plaza.  He unfurled a banner and also carried  pictures of various parents and children. The message was "Senator Clinton - Please help us!"  He was not dressed as a superhero, but wore a white shirt & tie and represented the group AKidsRight.Org .  He spoke of the need for Family Law reform and protecting the Civil Right of mothers, fathers, and children to be secure as family.  A need to control the ease ofparent/child splits that presently occur due to divorce, separation, or the actions of social services.

The group hopes that a local meeting between group members and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) may be near.  Local and national members have been calling and faxing the offices of Senator Clinton regarding the recognition and protection of their Civil Right to raise their own children.

The group hopes this simple act will demonstrate their love for the kids and their deep convictions that serious reform is necessary.  The National Parent's group (AKidsRight.Org ) is attempting to use the methods of Martin Luther King in its search for reform.  The Group would like Senator Clinton to respond to their petitions for Congressional Hearings into the need for National Family Law reform and potentially a Family Rights Act, by meeting with local parents.

The Group's web site highlights the NonViolent philosophy and practice Martin Luther King used to break the grip of segregation.  It hopes a similar attitude will help bring reform and also healing to parents who are often involved in bitter child custody disputes with each other or social services. If the nation can observe loving mothers and fathers making personal sacrifice to call attention to their unjust separation from their children - positive reform can happen.

Mr. Murtari, a native of Lyons, New York and a former Air Force pilot and Academy graduate is a local coordinator for the group.  He is the President of a small Internet startup company located in Baldwinsville, NY.

In contrast to the bitterness and anger which is normally associated with protest efforts and family issues -- Murtari plans a positive attitude.  He says they are  NOT there to condemn Senator Clinton as a "bad person" or as someone who doesn't care about family or children's issues; however, as a natural part of the political process they want to show their concern over the issue and to increase her sensitivity to their cause. The Group is hoping for Congressional
Hearings into Family Law reform so that group members affected by the present patchwork of laws across the nation will have a chance to tell their stories.

For more information:

John Murtari, Group coordinator, (office: 315-635-1968,x-211).
Mr. Richard Southwick, Asst US Attorney Northern
District of NY:
315-448-0672
Mr. Charles Keller, SU Law School Prof. familiar with case:
315-443-9552
Ms. Cathy Calhoun, Regional Rep. for Senator Clinton:
315-448-0470

Background information at the web site:
www.AKidsRight.Org
-------------------------------------
                                       John Murtari


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--
http://feminist4fathers.blogspot.com
http://www.sharedparentingworks.org
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SINGLE-PARENTS-/

 

--

Barbara C. Johnson, Advocate of Court Reform and Attorney at Law
6 Appletree Lane
Andover, MA 01810-4102
978-474-0833

email: barbaracjohnson@worldnet.att.net
False Allegations: http://www.falseallegations.com
Participating Attorney: http://www.lawguru.com/cgi/bbs2/user/browse.shtml
Campaign 2002: http://www.barbforgovernor.com
-----
The judicial system is very broken. It must be fixed.
There are four people who can do the job:
Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody.
Everybody thinks Somebody will surely do it.
It is a job Anybody can do. But Nobody is doing it.
At least I'm trying. What are you doing?

"Women are not men's life partners, but rivals favored by law."
                 Paul Craig Roberts, in "The Wars We Can't Afford to Lose,"
                 citing Professor Richard T. Hise, The War Against Men

--

Barbara C. Johnson, Advocate of Court Reform and Attorney at Law
6 Appletree Lane
Andover, MA 01810-4102
978-474-0833

email: barbaracjohnson@worldnet.att.net
False Allegations: http://www.falseallegations.com
Participating Attorney: http://www.lawguru.com/cgi/bbs2/user/browse.shtml
Campaign 2002: http://www.barbforgovernor.com
-----
The judicial system is very broken. It must be fixed.
There are four people who can do the job:
Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody.
Everybody thinks Somebody will surely do it.
It is a job Anybody can do. But Nobody is doing it.
At least I'm trying. What are you doing?

"Women are not men's life partners, but rivals favored by law."
                 Paul Craig Roberts, in "The Wars We Can't Afford to Lose,"
                 citing Professor Richard T. Hise, The War Against Men