GUEST BLOG: Lois Griffiths – Silence is Censorship
Last week I sent this email (see below, in quotes) to the news directors of Radio NZ programs: Morning Report, Nine-to-Noon, Kim Hill and also to several MPs. I am not surprised to receive no reply from anyone.
Two years ago I pleaded with National Radio to cover the story of two Palestinian teenaged amputees (because of Israeli military actions), who climbed Mont Kilimanjaro as a fund-raiser for Syrian children . I argued that this story would be of great public interest for the mountaineering challenges faced by brave teenagers with compassion for others. Radio NZ showed no interest, I am convinced because it showed a positive side of young Palestinians.
As for the two recent stories I refer to in my email below, just imagine the reaction worldwide if it had been Palestinians invading an Israeli hospital or if a Palestinian wedding party of men jumping up and down waving weapons and jeering about a Jewish toddler burned to death.
I can’t help but suspect that there is an unwritten code in our public radio media that stories that show sympathy for Palestinians are to be avoided.
EMAIL TO PUBLIC RADIO DIRECTORS
“I wonder who decides what the public is allowed to be told on publicly funded , public broadcasting.
I can think of several horrific stories that are met with silence, a most effective form of censorship.
One is the recent invasion by Israeli IDF, disguised as Palestinians, into a Hebron (West Bank) Hospital and executing someone.
Another is a recent, what has been dubbed as a “wedding of hate”, gathering of young ‘settlers’ dancing, waving weaponry, celebrating a Palestinian toddler having been burnt to death.
The first link is written by a friend of ours , a US-trained Palestinian-Israeli public health doctor (retired) in Nazareth, whom we have visited twice. That link by the way is from an American website organized by an American Jew Philip Weiss, who was a Zionist until he went to Israel & the OPTs with an open mind.
Lois and her husband Martin, having met in Africa where they were both teaching, have always been interested in international justice issues. But after visiting Israel and the West Bank, they are particularly focused on the suffering of the Palestinians.
Radio NZ Lois has just been silenced by this Government policy of gagging all forms of media in NZ today that would be possibly critical of the government so we are now without any free media voice here in corrupted NZ.
My advise is to write to the overseas channels such as Aljazeera or RT or maybe others.
Government does not control them unless they interrupt their transmission.
Well done Lois for bringing this to our attention.
Bravo Lois and you would be right. Lost count of the the amount of genuine investigative journalists who have been censored silenced or even sacked for daring to report against the bias others seem to willingly go along with presumably? actually in the ‘mainstream nooz-media globally’ under pressure from very very powerful pro Israeli lobbies and moguls..
Even Mike Roberts shocked and surprised me during the last attempted Gaza genocide.. I sent him an email and laid a complaint about Henry’s coverage.. No response over either..
When they wont even report with balance about Yemen or Syria either tells you something hmm?
Thankyou for trying to.. Will gladly share your post as suspect this will get even worse if the TPP and TTIP ever get ratified.. Have a feeling BDS movement will be targeted somewhere in those ISDS or other ‘processes’
#Everythingconnects .
Bravo Lois and you would be right. Lost count of the the amount of genuine investigative journalists who have been censored silenced or even sacked for daring to report against the bias others seem to willingly go along with presumably? actually in the ‘mainstream nooz-media globally’ under pressure from very very powerful pro Israeli lobbies and moguls..
Even Mike Roberts shocked and surprised me during the last attempted Gaza genocide.. I sent him an email and laid a complaint about Henry’s coverage.. No response over either..
When they wont even report with balance about Yemen or Syria either tells you something hmm?
Thank-you for trying to.. Will gladly share your post as suspect this will get even worse if the TPP and TTIP ever get ratified.. Have a feeling BDS movement will be targeted somewhere in those ISDS or other ‘processes’
#Everythingconnects .
Probably nothing we can do about Radio New Zealand but I find these facebook pages really good
Kia Ora Gaza
https://www.facebook.com/KiaOraGaza/
And Middle East Monitor
https://www.facebook.com/middleeastmonitor/?fref=ts
Not when Zionists have blown the limbs off them ……
They kill, burn and maim a lot of women and children those zionists …………
The ‘no reporting’ is not altogether surprising – RNZ, especially National Radio, has been in the pocket of government for decades.But not even sending you the courtesy of a reply, even a bland reply, is just plain bad manners. Ignoramuses!
RNZ only survives – and that’s the right word – because of our tax. Albeit channeled through the media police, NZOA,
So where a public service – of whatever kind – is provided by the taxpayer, we have the decision in our hands even if only every three years.
Meanwhile don’t hold your breath – Crosby-Textor have the NZ media and its toadies all sewn up for the Nats.
It is disgraceful that they didn’t even extend you the common decency of a reply to your letter with some attempt at justification for their bias.
Bad conscience?
Or fear of the 5th Estate?
Maybe their fear is that in the age of the internet any reply they gave you would get more circulation than it would have in the old days, to be evaluated for its merit, or lack of merit, by many more people than it once would have.