Okay, I sorta knew this would happen. I always start a project with grand plans, but at the same time the knowledge that I can seldom be arsed to see them through. Hopefully, though, some of the recent happenings in my life will kick start my blog back into action.
First things first: Around about the time of my last post, I joined a band with some of my close friends. We've tentatively named ourselves "Shut Up Iain", after our bassist's frequent pleas for me to stop pointing out the flaws in his arguments. After five months of heavy cannabis usage*, and fuck all else to do, we've written a decent amount of material. 3 of our songs can be heard on our myspace page, www.myspace.com/shutupiain, with more soon to follow.
In similar news, we've decided as a band to start a band-based blog to go along with our Myspace. Here we shall include all the standard things you'd expect from a band's blog; music and gig updates, but also reviews of music, film, games etc. After many a night spent shouting at the Channel 4 news, my fellow band mates seem intent on having me write political diatribes for them, also. All of the material I contribute to Shut Up Iain's blog will probably also be posted here.
I've also been offered a chance to review anime for Anime-Planet.com, which I must say I'm pretty excited about. Again I will probably post my reviews here also, but in an uncut format, as well as any anime reviews that aren't suitable for AP. Currently I'm working on an extended review for MD Geist, which probably wouldn't be suitable for Anime Planet due to extenstive references to homosexuality (though we shall see) and FLAG, which I won't submit as it was reviewed recently and excellently by another Anime Planet reviewer.
My Youtube page, http://www.youtube.com/user/TheHarlequin13, is going to take a new direction. I had recently intended it to be used for my AMVs, but recently my first AMV was singled out for deletion due to copyright infringement (why just mine I don't know), so I'm going to be a coward and play on the safe side; uploading political instead. The first one I intend to post is an answer to a question posed to me about home ownership under Anarcho-Communism. As soon as I get my headset back from a friends house I shall be working on that. I will not be giving up making AMVs, though. Until such time as I find a safer video-hosting site, I shall probably upload them to my Rapidshare account and post links to them on this blog, along with screenshots, reasons for picking the anime and song, all that sort of fluff that I like to read about other people's creations.
That's it for now. Hopefully my next update won't be too long in coming. Perhaps I'll write a review for the Marillion gig I'm going to tomorrow. But the again, perhaps not.
Monday 17 November 2008
Monday 30 June 2008
Divergence EVE Review
The first installment of the anime equivalent of a bookclub, over at Anime-Planet. A very good idea, that I hope will motivate me to give a chance to shows that I wouldn't ordinarily bother with.
Overall Score: 6
Like your typical anime, Divergence EVE had an absolutely terrible beginning and end. The first couple of episodes either had me thoroughly confused/indifferent due to the all pervasive techno-babble that's apparently essential for Sci-Fi (a major reason why I, like chamomille, don't really enjoy the genre) or facepalming at the egregious fanservice. I was wondering whether I could persevere, but fortunately it got a lot better. Not to amazing levels, but enjoyable enough.
Plot: 7
Probabaly the best part of the show, bad beginning and ending aside. Once we get past the techno-babble and sixth form philosophising Divergence EVE provides quite a compelling, if completely unoriginal, plot threads. While I was watching the show I found it very one dimensional, however thinking back on it the show managed to tie a number of plot threads together, not always successfully, but well enough to be worthy of some praise.
I think what interested me most wasn't the main plot, but the underlying atmosphere of the characters' situations, enhanced the backstory. The isolation, and the hidden evil of the Ghoul and Necromancer (Anime/Manga creators really need to stop pilfering from Western fantasy without fully grasping what the terms they're using apply too) reminded me strongly of HP Lovecraft, with the flashbacks to creation of the Watchers Nest and the experiments adding greatly to that impression. Misaki's flirtation with madness, where she slowly loses touch with reality was very well done, as well as, if not better, than that of the main character of "Le Portrait de Petit Cossette", which I watched recently, and almost as good as Satoshi Kon's excellent "Perfect Blue".
Unfortunately this psychological dimension to the story often took a back seat too, and was sometimes downright undermined, by other story elements. The Machievellian scheming of Jean Luc was pretty poorly handled, trying and failing, in my view, to be more clever than it actually was. It was perhaps this angle that I found most frustrating, as the balance between keeping the viewer intrigued and battering you with endless "I know something you don't know" developments was missing in large part. This was not helped by the over-the-top dialogue and other character behaviour. I think this is perfectly exemplified by two characters, Jean Luc, who we know little about right until the very end, and seemed to delight in dropping infuriating hints about things, and Prim Snowlight, who spent half the show lurking around corners, dramatically of course, and the other half refusing to answer anyone's questions.
The rivalry-friendship between the cadets and their training to become full seraphim pilots was fairly valuable to the story, however it was focused on far too much after other story elements were unfolding. It would have been fine to use their interaction to set the scene for what came later, but the way the kept skipping back to them in the midst of much darker happenings made the show wildly inconsistent.
This show felt like it was juggling too many elements at one time, the creators seemingly unable to decide what they wanted the show to be. Had they focused on one area, preferably the psychological horror, it would have been a lot better.
Characters: 5
Fairly average, really. Certainly nothing new. You have the arrogant, conspiratorial Jean Luc, the timid but extremely intelligent meganekko-moe Prim, the incompetent but good natured central character, Misaki, the tough ambitious female commander Ertiana. Basically a bunch of stereotypes. The only real character development can be found in Misaki's and Jean Luc becoming mad. In the former case, however, it's only a temporary thing, so in one seen she'll be her normal, perky, annoyingly-retarded self, the next she'll lose it a bit. In the latter, he spends the whole show, up until the last episode, being smug and self-satisfied, then goes a bit mad when he's nearing his goal and is foiled. Oh, and Luxandra changes her outlook...after she was dead....in Misaki's mind, so that probably doesn't count.
Sound: 6
Soundtrack - Let's forget that the the vile, sugary, ecchi-filled gunk that is the ED never happened. I think it's safer for all of us that way. I was pretty impressed by the soundtrack. Its understated, which I think allows it to get the job done, adding atmosphere to the scenes without ever dominating them. It's not the kind of OST I'd buy (or download) to listen to independently, but in the context of the show it works pretty damn well.
Sound Effects - I've little to say about them really. Aside from a few cool creepy noises, I reckon the show just recycled some stock Sci-Fi sound effects. Not bad, but not memorable, either.
Voice Acting - I was watching the English dub (I know, I know, but ZMP refused to display the subtitles and fuck VLC with a pointy stick) which was pretty bad. Why oh why was Suzanna voiced by someone who's idea of a British accent comes from Dick Van Dykes performance in Mary Poppins? Jean Luc sounded a bit like a camp villain from a Hannah Barbera cartoon. Basically it was just bad. There were a couple of decent performances from some of the cast, but they were few and far between.
Artwork/Design: 4
Character Design - The ecchi, my God the ecchi. I was never fully able to get past the fact that every female character had tits bigger than their heads. Endevouring to pull myself away from the gravity those giant orbs no doubt exude, the rest of the character designs are the kind of thing I've seen in a dozen other anime. Those elements that do standout are universally bad, ecchi in the extreme. For some reason the universally well-endowed (if you can call it that) cadets have to do weight training, target practice etc dressed in thongs. What? Putting on my nerd cap, I also note that their hair is completely inappropriate for military personnel. Aside from the colours being so bright my eyes felt like they were going to start dribbling out of their sockets, they were also spiked up in ways reminiscent of Sonic the Hedgehog, making me wonder why they bothered to spend all that time making themselves look like cartoon erinaceinae when they spent much of their time in training with their heads encased in a helmet.
As for the monsters, I didn't care much more the Ghoul, they looked like fleshy, CG mecha-dragon hybrids, more frightening when you couldn't see them properly, or at all. The Necromancer on the other hand were genuinely creepy, which is quite an achievement, as most anime monsters either make me roll my eyes in contempt, or else roll on the floor laughing until a little bit of pee drips down my legs.
Backgrounds - Good in places, patchy in others, but generally good enough. They did manage to blend CG elements with 2D drawing for the ships pretty well, which deserves some respect, particularly when we consider the fact that this show is now 5 years old, a long time in technological terms. Usually blending CG with traditional 2D animation looks bizarre, but in this show I often forgot that I was looking at a mix of the two. The use of shadows was also impressive. Unfortunately, however, they weren't used consistently throughout, which was a shame. The rest of the backgrounds were entirely forgettable, with the exception of the artificial sky in the residential district and space. However, though I'm a sucker for skies and space, neither are particularly hard to draw. In fact these days you can whip together a good looking sky in about 5 minutes in photoshop.
Animation - Not something I tend to notice unless its either extremely good or extremely bad. Movement looked fluid enough, and I didn't notice any blatant examples of cutting corners animation wise.
Recommendations:
This isn't the sort of thing I'd ordinarily watch, so I can't really recommend something that would be a dead match. I guess the aforementioned "Perfect Blue", based on the elements of the show I enjoyed the most. Also some of the battle scenes of it reminded me of the end of "Voices of a Distant Star".
Overall Score: 6
Like your typical anime, Divergence EVE had an absolutely terrible beginning and end. The first couple of episodes either had me thoroughly confused/indifferent due to the all pervasive techno-babble that's apparently essential for Sci-Fi (a major reason why I, like chamomille, don't really enjoy the genre) or facepalming at the egregious fanservice. I was wondering whether I could persevere, but fortunately it got a lot better. Not to amazing levels, but enjoyable enough.
Plot: 7
Probabaly the best part of the show, bad beginning and ending aside. Once we get past the techno-babble and sixth form philosophising Divergence EVE provides quite a compelling, if completely unoriginal, plot threads. While I was watching the show I found it very one dimensional, however thinking back on it the show managed to tie a number of plot threads together, not always successfully, but well enough to be worthy of some praise.
I think what interested me most wasn't the main plot, but the underlying atmosphere of the characters' situations, enhanced the backstory. The isolation, and the hidden evil of the Ghoul and Necromancer (Anime/Manga creators really need to stop pilfering from Western fantasy without fully grasping what the terms they're using apply too) reminded me strongly of HP Lovecraft, with the flashbacks to creation of the Watchers Nest and the experiments adding greatly to that impression. Misaki's flirtation with madness, where she slowly loses touch with reality was very well done, as well as, if not better, than that of the main character of "Le Portrait de Petit Cossette", which I watched recently, and almost as good as Satoshi Kon's excellent "Perfect Blue".
Unfortunately this psychological dimension to the story often took a back seat too, and was sometimes downright undermined, by other story elements. The Machievellian scheming of Jean Luc was pretty poorly handled, trying and failing, in my view, to be more clever than it actually was. It was perhaps this angle that I found most frustrating, as the balance between keeping the viewer intrigued and battering you with endless "I know something you don't know" developments was missing in large part. This was not helped by the over-the-top dialogue and other character behaviour. I think this is perfectly exemplified by two characters, Jean Luc, who we know little about right until the very end, and seemed to delight in dropping infuriating hints about things, and Prim Snowlight, who spent half the show lurking around corners, dramatically of course, and the other half refusing to answer anyone's questions.
The rivalry-friendship between the cadets and their training to become full seraphim pilots was fairly valuable to the story, however it was focused on far too much after other story elements were unfolding. It would have been fine to use their interaction to set the scene for what came later, but the way the kept skipping back to them in the midst of much darker happenings made the show wildly inconsistent.
This show felt like it was juggling too many elements at one time, the creators seemingly unable to decide what they wanted the show to be. Had they focused on one area, preferably the psychological horror, it would have been a lot better.
Characters: 5
Fairly average, really. Certainly nothing new. You have the arrogant, conspiratorial Jean Luc, the timid but extremely intelligent meganekko-moe Prim, the incompetent but good natured central character, Misaki, the tough ambitious female commander Ertiana. Basically a bunch of stereotypes. The only real character development can be found in Misaki's and Jean Luc becoming mad. In the former case, however, it's only a temporary thing, so in one seen she'll be her normal, perky, annoyingly-retarded self, the next she'll lose it a bit. In the latter, he spends the whole show, up until the last episode, being smug and self-satisfied, then goes a bit mad when he's nearing his goal and is foiled. Oh, and Luxandra changes her outlook...after she was dead....in Misaki's mind, so that probably doesn't count.
Sound: 6
Soundtrack - Let's forget that the the vile, sugary, ecchi-filled gunk that is the ED never happened. I think it's safer for all of us that way. I was pretty impressed by the soundtrack. Its understated, which I think allows it to get the job done, adding atmosphere to the scenes without ever dominating them. It's not the kind of OST I'd buy (or download) to listen to independently, but in the context of the show it works pretty damn well.
Sound Effects - I've little to say about them really. Aside from a few cool creepy noises, I reckon the show just recycled some stock Sci-Fi sound effects. Not bad, but not memorable, either.
Voice Acting - I was watching the English dub (I know, I know, but ZMP refused to display the subtitles and fuck VLC with a pointy stick) which was pretty bad. Why oh why was Suzanna voiced by someone who's idea of a British accent comes from Dick Van Dykes performance in Mary Poppins? Jean Luc sounded a bit like a camp villain from a Hannah Barbera cartoon. Basically it was just bad. There were a couple of decent performances from some of the cast, but they were few and far between.
Artwork/Design: 4
Character Design - The ecchi, my God the ecchi. I was never fully able to get past the fact that every female character had tits bigger than their heads. Endevouring to pull myself away from the gravity those giant orbs no doubt exude, the rest of the character designs are the kind of thing I've seen in a dozen other anime. Those elements that do standout are universally bad, ecchi in the extreme. For some reason the universally well-endowed (if you can call it that) cadets have to do weight training, target practice etc dressed in thongs. What? Putting on my nerd cap, I also note that their hair is completely inappropriate for military personnel. Aside from the colours being so bright my eyes felt like they were going to start dribbling out of their sockets, they were also spiked up in ways reminiscent of Sonic the Hedgehog, making me wonder why they bothered to spend all that time making themselves look like cartoon erinaceinae when they spent much of their time in training with their heads encased in a helmet.
As for the monsters, I didn't care much more the Ghoul, they looked like fleshy, CG mecha-dragon hybrids, more frightening when you couldn't see them properly, or at all. The Necromancer on the other hand were genuinely creepy, which is quite an achievement, as most anime monsters either make me roll my eyes in contempt, or else roll on the floor laughing until a little bit of pee drips down my legs.
Backgrounds - Good in places, patchy in others, but generally good enough. They did manage to blend CG elements with 2D drawing for the ships pretty well, which deserves some respect, particularly when we consider the fact that this show is now 5 years old, a long time in technological terms. Usually blending CG with traditional 2D animation looks bizarre, but in this show I often forgot that I was looking at a mix of the two. The use of shadows was also impressive. Unfortunately, however, they weren't used consistently throughout, which was a shame. The rest of the backgrounds were entirely forgettable, with the exception of the artificial sky in the residential district and space. However, though I'm a sucker for skies and space, neither are particularly hard to draw. In fact these days you can whip together a good looking sky in about 5 minutes in photoshop.
Animation - Not something I tend to notice unless its either extremely good or extremely bad. Movement looked fluid enough, and I didn't notice any blatant examples of cutting corners animation wise.
Recommendations:
This isn't the sort of thing I'd ordinarily watch, so I can't really recommend something that would be a dead match. I guess the aforementioned "Perfect Blue", based on the elements of the show I enjoyed the most. Also some of the battle scenes of it reminded me of the end of "Voices of a Distant Star".
Monday 16 June 2008
Recent Purchases
So I've not updated this thing in over 2 weeks (not that anyone cares), and am at a loss as to what to write about. I've decided to take the lazy way out and post some of my recent purchases. I apologise in advance for the truly terrible picture quality, but I've not yet invested in a digital camera and so have had to use the camera on my mobile phone.
Essence - Mariposa
A bit of an impulse by, but after hearing her guest appearance on the wonderful Lunar Rings by Solar Stone (video below), and after discovering this album was only £1.50 new on Amazon I decided to go for it. Here's a fan video to Luner Rings, a strong contender for my favourite song of the year so far:
The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls in America
I downloaded the leak of their new album at the recommendation of someone over at Digital Dream Door. I fell in love with it (I fully intend to buy it when it's released) and so decided to explore their back catalogue. This album isn't quite as good, but I certainly liked it enough to give it a buy. First Night is probably worth the £6 I payed for it on its own.
Los Campesinos! - Hold On Now, Youngster...
I downloaded this after seeing it at the top of someone's list for 2008. It's as catchy as hell, though the male vocals take some getting used to. They have that forced accent thing which seems to be popular in this country at the moment. Its pretty cringeworthy to hear a middle guy trying to sing in a regional, working class accent, but the music more than makes up for it.
Paprika
I really enjoyed Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue, so after hearing the praise for this film by him, and feeling in the mood to buy another DVD, I decided to go for it. I have no idea when I'll watch it, though, as I've still got Gunslinger Girl, Requiem From the Darkness and the Rurouni Kenshin film on DVD, a good 2 or 3 anime series downloaded on my computer and god knows how many live action films, all queued up to watch.
Hourglass of Summer
I'm not too experience in the world of visual novels. I guess I want to change that (I'll probably write about my impressions of visual novals in a later post), and while browsing JBox I saw this going cheap (I think it came to about £10, including shipping which actually cost as much as the game itself). It seems to be quite highly regarded in the genre, too, so this title is as good as any to get a taste for these types of game. It came with a cool little art book, which is nice, though to be honest I've seen bigger instruction manuals for toasters:
So there we have it, despite my rantings about the evils of capitalism I'm still a bit of a consumerist whore.
Essence - Mariposa
A bit of an impulse by, but after hearing her guest appearance on the wonderful Lunar Rings by Solar Stone (video below), and after discovering this album was only £1.50 new on Amazon I decided to go for it. Here's a fan video to Luner Rings, a strong contender for my favourite song of the year so far:
The Hold Steady - Boys and Girls in America
I downloaded the leak of their new album at the recommendation of someone over at Digital Dream Door. I fell in love with it (I fully intend to buy it when it's released) and so decided to explore their back catalogue. This album isn't quite as good, but I certainly liked it enough to give it a buy. First Night is probably worth the £6 I payed for it on its own.
Los Campesinos! - Hold On Now, Youngster...
I downloaded this after seeing it at the top of someone's list for 2008. It's as catchy as hell, though the male vocals take some getting used to. They have that forced accent thing which seems to be popular in this country at the moment. Its pretty cringeworthy to hear a middle guy trying to sing in a regional, working class accent, but the music more than makes up for it.
Paprika
I really enjoyed Satoshi Kon's Perfect Blue, so after hearing the praise for this film by him, and feeling in the mood to buy another DVD, I decided to go for it. I have no idea when I'll watch it, though, as I've still got Gunslinger Girl, Requiem From the Darkness and the Rurouni Kenshin film on DVD, a good 2 or 3 anime series downloaded on my computer and god knows how many live action films, all queued up to watch.
Hourglass of Summer
I'm not too experience in the world of visual novels. I guess I want to change that (I'll probably write about my impressions of visual novals in a later post), and while browsing JBox I saw this going cheap (I think it came to about £10, including shipping which actually cost as much as the game itself). It seems to be quite highly regarded in the genre, too, so this title is as good as any to get a taste for these types of game. It came with a cool little art book, which is nice, though to be honest I've seen bigger instruction manuals for toasters:
So there we have it, despite my rantings about the evils of capitalism I'm still a bit of a consumerist whore.
Tuesday 3 June 2008
Aire Freshener
A rather trivial post today, compared to the relative importance of my last entry.
I've always liked certain ambient noises. Be it the sound of cars gliding past at night, the sound of waves on a beach, or, my favourite of all, the sound of a rain storm when I'm safe and warm indoors. It is due to my love of noises such as these, that I was drawn to, and subsequently impressed a nifty little program called Air Freshener. Basically it gives you a selection of ambient sounds to play in the background.
I imagine, and believe it was intentended, that this program would be great for people who have difficulty getting to sleep, particularly those who find themselves disturbed by irregular, everyday noises, like dogs barking, fences clattering in the wind etc. It certainly has a very soporific effect, and effectively drowns out all but the loudest of noises.
Being the rebel that I am, though, I've mostly been using it while browsing the internet, when I'm not in the mood for music, and when I just want to sit there and let my mind wander. I currently have it set on "Thunder Storm" and, particlularly in combination with the following wallpaper, it provides me with a great sense of relaxation:
Strongly recommended.
I've always liked certain ambient noises. Be it the sound of cars gliding past at night, the sound of waves on a beach, or, my favourite of all, the sound of a rain storm when I'm safe and warm indoors. It is due to my love of noises such as these, that I was drawn to, and subsequently impressed a nifty little program called Air Freshener. Basically it gives you a selection of ambient sounds to play in the background.
I imagine, and believe it was intentended, that this program would be great for people who have difficulty getting to sleep, particularly those who find themselves disturbed by irregular, everyday noises, like dogs barking, fences clattering in the wind etc. It certainly has a very soporific effect, and effectively drowns out all but the loudest of noises.
Being the rebel that I am, though, I've mostly been using it while browsing the internet, when I'm not in the mood for music, and when I just want to sit there and let my mind wander. I currently have it set on "Thunder Storm" and, particlularly in combination with the following wallpaper, it provides me with a great sense of relaxation:
Strongly recommended.
Sunday 1 June 2008
While scanning the BBC News page, I came across this throwaway paragraph, which I think perfectly demonstrates BBC impartiality, or lack thereof, imbedded in an article about the deportation of a Hezbollah spy:
"A more extensive prisoner swap between the two sides could involve two Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah in 2006 - an act which prompted the 33-day war between Israel and the Shia militant group - and a number of Lebanese citizens held by Israel."
Now it's parahraphs like this that make the more "respectable" mainstream media outlets arguably far more dangerous than the rabid frothing of tabloids like the Daily Mail and TV stations like Fox News. This paragraph, on first glance, looks true enough. Hezbollah did capture 2 Israeli soldiers in 2006, which saw the start of hostilities between Israel and Hizbollah (though clearly the Lebanese people suffered the greatest from this conflict, and not by any accident on Israel's part).
The problem here is not outright distortion of facts, but rather a sin of ommission, as is usual in BBC coverage. They fail to mention 2 crucial facts:
1) Plans to attack Hezbollah, and by extension Lebanon, were drawn up before the raid by Hizbollah. The killing of 5, and capture of 2, Israeli soldiers was nothing by a pretext to put into action a pre-planned operation, a fact not unknown by the BBC.[1]
2) No connection is made between the Hezbollah raid and the Lebanese civilians held in Israel. Israel's attack on Lebanon was prompted by the capture of Israeli soldiers, according to the BBC, but they do not tell us why these soldiers were captured. Liekwise they do not mention the frequent boarder skirmishes between Israel and Hezbollah, or the violations of Lebanese airspace by the Israeli airforce. As a result, the motives for the Hezbollah are left far more open, and we are left to make the connection ourselves, which given the BBC's shoddy reporting is not an easy task for the casual reader.
No doubt if pressed on this issue the BBC will offer the standard media excuses. 'There's not enough room', they'll claim, even though there was enough room to frame Israel's shocking assault on Lebanon as a response to a Hezbollah raid, or they'll point to an article in their archives, and point out that 'Yeah, we have reported that.' Well what a fat lot of good it is reporting it once and never bringing it up again is. The average news reader doesn't have time to trawl through years-worth of BBC news articles for the context behind a 12 paragraph news piece.
As it is, the "context" provided by most BBC news articles is extremely lacking, and strongly biased in favour of certain interests.
Notes
[1] This article itself is extremely hypocritical. The author goes to great lengths to remind readers that Hersh's sources are unnamed, in fact they stress it so much that it's almost as if they're secretly screaming "HERSH IS TALKING CRAP". When it comes to unnamed sources that support the "official" line, however, the BBC does not feel the same need to stress the sources anonymity.
A look at BBC Editorial Guidlines for anonymous sources suggests that it is not a requirement, or even a recommendation, of the BBC that anonymous sources be identified as anonymous, just that their identities be protected. This suggests that it was a concious decision to describe Hersh's sources "anonymous" ad nauseam, rather than a journalistic requirement.
"A more extensive prisoner swap between the two sides could involve two Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah in 2006 - an act which prompted the 33-day war between Israel and the Shia militant group - and a number of Lebanese citizens held by Israel."
Now it's parahraphs like this that make the more "respectable" mainstream media outlets arguably far more dangerous than the rabid frothing of tabloids like the Daily Mail and TV stations like Fox News. This paragraph, on first glance, looks true enough. Hezbollah did capture 2 Israeli soldiers in 2006, which saw the start of hostilities between Israel and Hizbollah (though clearly the Lebanese people suffered the greatest from this conflict, and not by any accident on Israel's part).
The problem here is not outright distortion of facts, but rather a sin of ommission, as is usual in BBC coverage. They fail to mention 2 crucial facts:
1) Plans to attack Hezbollah, and by extension Lebanon, were drawn up before the raid by Hizbollah. The killing of 5, and capture of 2, Israeli soldiers was nothing by a pretext to put into action a pre-planned operation, a fact not unknown by the BBC.[1]
2) No connection is made between the Hezbollah raid and the Lebanese civilians held in Israel. Israel's attack on Lebanon was prompted by the capture of Israeli soldiers, according to the BBC, but they do not tell us why these soldiers were captured. Liekwise they do not mention the frequent boarder skirmishes between Israel and Hezbollah, or the violations of Lebanese airspace by the Israeli airforce. As a result, the motives for the Hezbollah are left far more open, and we are left to make the connection ourselves, which given the BBC's shoddy reporting is not an easy task for the casual reader.
No doubt if pressed on this issue the BBC will offer the standard media excuses. 'There's not enough room', they'll claim, even though there was enough room to frame Israel's shocking assault on Lebanon as a response to a Hezbollah raid, or they'll point to an article in their archives, and point out that 'Yeah, we have reported that.' Well what a fat lot of good it is reporting it once and never bringing it up again is. The average news reader doesn't have time to trawl through years-worth of BBC news articles for the context behind a 12 paragraph news piece.
As it is, the "context" provided by most BBC news articles is extremely lacking, and strongly biased in favour of certain interests.
Notes
[1] This article itself is extremely hypocritical. The author goes to great lengths to remind readers that Hersh's sources are unnamed, in fact they stress it so much that it's almost as if they're secretly screaming "HERSH IS TALKING CRAP". When it comes to unnamed sources that support the "official" line, however, the BBC does not feel the same need to stress the sources anonymity.
A look at BBC Editorial Guidlines for anonymous sources suggests that it is not a requirement, or even a recommendation, of the BBC that anonymous sources be identified as anonymous, just that their identities be protected. This suggests that it was a concious decision to describe Hersh's sources "anonymous" ad nauseam, rather than a journalistic requirement.
Friday 30 May 2008
Welcome
As the more astute of you are probably aware, I've finally shifted my proverbial arse and acquired myself a Blog. Hooray me.
I've had some experience with blogging before, albeit on the thinkers paradise that is Myspace. The results were - as one would expect from a site largely populated by tweenagers and, let's be honest here, total morons - pretty disappointing. My first entry, a disjointed, spur of the moment rant about the unprofessionalism of the mainstream media, went down about as well as the Hindenburg. Subsequent entries were limited to a copy & paste of a frustrating debate I had with the president of Prog Rock Records on filesharing, and my plans for building a PC. The former garnered a staggering one comment, a standard "I don't have anything useful to say, but you're my friend so I'll add a comment anyway" response. The latter was a mite more successful, with around 4 responses. The first one informing me that, in my ignorance, I was planning on purchasing a CPU that wasn't compatible with my motherboard. Useful information to be sure, but hardly the earthshattering breakthrough into Internet Superstardom that I was hoping for.
I'll try and be optimistic for this new endevour. Hopefully I'll be able to snare a few more unsuspecting readers by broadening the range of topics of discussion. With any luck people won't be put off by blog entries that last more than a few paragraphs discussing the intricacies of Workers Militias in an Anarchist society (I sure know how to entice readers don't I?). Fear not, if politics, history etc aren't your thing, I shall be posting some more whimsical material (read: rants about nothing in particular), along with reviews for whatever films, music, books and anime are occupying my thoughts. In fact such content will probably make up the bulk of this blog, being as shockingly lazy as I am. Reviewing the latest Coldplay album, though it may require some effort, doesn't need a small research grant to complete.
I could probably waffle on at you for another few paragraphs, but I'll spare you. I wouldn't want all of my potential readers to fall (asleep) at the first hurdle.
I've had some experience with blogging before, albeit on the thinkers paradise that is Myspace. The results were - as one would expect from a site largely populated by tweenagers and, let's be honest here, total morons - pretty disappointing. My first entry, a disjointed, spur of the moment rant about the unprofessionalism of the mainstream media, went down about as well as the Hindenburg. Subsequent entries were limited to a copy & paste of a frustrating debate I had with the president of Prog Rock Records on filesharing, and my plans for building a PC. The former garnered a staggering one comment, a standard "I don't have anything useful to say, but you're my friend so I'll add a comment anyway" response. The latter was a mite more successful, with around 4 responses. The first one informing me that, in my ignorance, I was planning on purchasing a CPU that wasn't compatible with my motherboard. Useful information to be sure, but hardly the earthshattering breakthrough into Internet Superstardom that I was hoping for.
I'll try and be optimistic for this new endevour. Hopefully I'll be able to snare a few more unsuspecting readers by broadening the range of topics of discussion. With any luck people won't be put off by blog entries that last more than a few paragraphs discussing the intricacies of Workers Militias in an Anarchist society (I sure know how to entice readers don't I?). Fear not, if politics, history etc aren't your thing, I shall be posting some more whimsical material (read: rants about nothing in particular), along with reviews for whatever films, music, books and anime are occupying my thoughts. In fact such content will probably make up the bulk of this blog, being as shockingly lazy as I am. Reviewing the latest Coldplay album, though it may require some effort, doesn't need a small research grant to complete.
I could probably waffle on at you for another few paragraphs, but I'll spare you. I wouldn't want all of my potential readers to fall (asleep) at the first hurdle.
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