What ever happened to Marilyn (A correction)

[liz_marcs]

A few of you asked about Marilyn in my last post.

Ask and ye shall receive.

Marilyn died in 2002 of cancer.

I'm pleased to report that the reporter who wrote it knew Marilyn exactly the way I remembered her.

I was also reminded that I may have been wrong about the timing of when I interviewed her. So, I had cause to go digging around to find my scrapbook (which was buried in a box in the back of a storage closet where I had thrown it when I moved here two years ago).

Strangely enough, my recollection of the autumn air and the kids being out of school is absolutely correct, since it appears I interviewed her the day after Thanksgiving. It was unseasonably warm that year and it is possible that time and distance had muddled it in my mind. VJ Day was important to her, and she did talk quite a lot about VJ Day in the interview I had with her, although that part did not get into the articles I wrote.

The articles I wrote at that time are not online (sadly enough) and I have no ability to put them online.

I will correct the original post (truth is important), and link to this post so the correction can be explained.

Also, there were some typos and I wrote that three planes on 9-11 flew out of Logan when there were only two. The other flights were out of Newark and Dulles.

I want to thank everyone who emailed me privately with their corrections.

I apologize for any inconvenience.

Comments

[airawyn.livejournal.com]

But ABC isn't even claiming that they're exposing truths. They've *admitted* that the scenes in question are fiction. Their excuse is that it's not a documentary.

But they're calling it a "docudrama," airing it without commercials, and originally had Scholastic distributing materials for schools to use. (Scholastic has withdrawn.)

Their actions are telling people "This is the truth. This is the real thing."

If an outcry hadn't been raised, millions of people would have watched that and assumed it represented what happened.

Sure, the people represented could sue. They might even win. It wouldn't erase the impression the movie left on people. Why do you think lawyers try to select juries who aren't familiar with media coverage of a major case. Or in some cases, they try to select juries who *are* familiar with the media coverage, if the coverage is in their favor.

What ABC is doing is not illegal. And it shouldn't be, because that *would* be censorship. But it's irresponsible and morally wrong.

[alchemy-gryph.livejournal.com]

I think you've misunderstood the point of my reply. My quibble isn't with the fact that people have objected to the content of the program, but rather with the fact that many of them have objected to the possibility of the program airing at all.

My point in saying this is that critics of a slanted piece shouldn't attempt to fix the problem they see before them by descending into a far greater ill - the negation of free speech - or by "correcting" the mistakes they see by denying the validity of a true claim or minimizing its importance. I would argue that someone criticizing Fahrenheit 9/11 by way of saying that Bush's ties to the Saudis have no effect on our foreign policy is essentially in the same boat with someone criticizing The Path To 9/11 by saying that members of Clinton's administration couldn't possibly have had an agenda in hiding or destroying records. Both overall works are flawed - and the attempts to refute them on either side equally so. In this respect, my issue with liz_marcs post is entirely pragmatic. What the right suffered from with Moore's movie and what the left suffers from with ABC's program is a lack of responsible debate.

- Madox

[airawyn.livejournal.com]

I think you've missed the entire point of the issue. This isn't a "slanted piece." It's *fictionalized.* ABC isn't even claiming the scenes they inserted happened.


Suppose ABC had put in a scene that showed Bush in a conference with the CIA on Sept. 10, where the CIA said flat-out, "We're going to be attacked tomorrow," and Bush said, "Good, it'll be great for my approval rating." Would you find that objectionable?

[alchemy-gryph.livejournal.com]

Bait noted.

It is not necessary to return continually to an issue that has nothing to do with my disagreement with liz_marcs's post. The ABC piece is fictionalized. Not everything in it is true. In fact, most of it might not be. It's incredibly irresponsible and should never be taken as the unvarnished truth of everything that happened. Fabrications and distortions aplenty.

I don't disagree with you. But the larger problem lies elsewhere.

- Madox

[airawyn.livejournal.com]

I'm not attempting to bait you. I'm trying to offer a right-wing equivalent of some of the scenes that are under fire so you can understand why people are so upset.

I don't understand what point you're trying to make. People can't object to material that they find offensive because it might infringe on free speech?

"Free speech" only covers the truth. Defamation, libel, slander - none of those apply if what's being reported is true.

Truth can be highly subjective in a lot of cases. This is not one of them.

[alchemy-gryph.livejournal.com]

I'm fairly certain that I understand why people are so upset, and spelling it out for me in the vaguely toddleresque "And how would YOU feel?" form is unnecessary (and yes, this is "bait"). I've had lots of practice watching subgroups get upset whenever their political beliefs are challenged, however indirectly or unintentionally, and this is simply the latest example of same. Forgive my saying this, but I don't distinguish between fundamentalist Christians agitating to have Harry Potter removed from public libraries, Scientologists suing newspapers at the drop of a hat, environmental activists campaigning against funding for scientists who want a more holistic view of global warming, conservatives who made ugly fools of themselves blocking lines for Fahrenheit 9/11, and liberals frothing about ABC's program. Why? Despite their differing ideologies, they're all acting on the same impulse.

Disseminate better information about the work in question without descending into exaggeration yourself, go out and create your own work explaining what happened, object all you want, boycott anything and everything - but efforts to counter the program or anything else will necessarily fail if it principally takes the form of outrage that the program is airing at all. It is simultaneously the most visceral and least smart way to deal with the situation at hand, and if people give into it, they've essentially argued themselves out of a constructive position in the debate. Moreover, from a purely pragmatic perspective, this was something of a forehead-slapper. ABC got a fire hose of free publicity from this on a program that I'm sure would otherwise have gotten lost in the flood of 9/11 programming.

Re: libel, slander, and truth, I'll have a comment tomorrow for kimberly_t that addresses this point. Suffice it to say that freedom of speech covers considerably more than just the truth, and the entire entertainment industry would have disappeared if it hadn't.

- Madox, who would note that the "truth" still seems to be pretty subjective given the number of continuing arguments in official and unofficial quarters about events in American counterterrorism since 1993, what happened, when it happened, and - most importantly - what effect it ultimately had on the big picture. Short of fifty years' perspective, it's a series of fights I don't see being resolved soon.

[airawyn.livejournal.com]

I couldn't be certain that you would understand why people are upset, since you seemed to have missed the entire point of Liz's post.

And when I say that truth is not subjective, I mean, as I said above, that nobody, not even ABC is trying to argue that the scenes in question are actually truth. That should have been clear from my earlier discussion. Or should I rephrase it in words that a toddler would understand?

[kimberly-t.livejournal.com]

*ahem* If I may...?

The problem with a fictionalized "docudrama" is that the producers of same be sure to mumble somewhere that the audience might possibly hear, "Some of this, we just made up."

But then they do not tell the audience which parts of the program they're watching are true, and which parts are not.

They encourage the audience to accept their fictional scenes as truth.

They are doing more than telling a story; they are lying, slandering, and counting on freedom of speech to let them get away with it.

And that is not only wrong but actionably wrong, worthy of legal action, in my humble opinion.

Freedom of speech in this country does not cover child pornography, for which I am grateful. Those who make it or distribute it are jailed, because freedom of speech should not be used to justify a horrible crime.

Slander is not nearly as abominable as child pornography. But the right to freedom of speech should not be used to protect such blatant slander, either.

[kat-chan.livejournal.com]

Aside from the above-made points about what "free speech" does not cover, there's another issue here as well.

About two years ago CBS had had a "docudrama" produced based on Ronald Reagan's years in the White House. The same people praising The Path to 9/11 blasted that film because it fictionalized portions of Reagan's life in the White House. Viacom, which owns CBS, bowed to the pressure and moved the film over to Showtime.

On top of this, The Path to 9/11 claims to be "based on the 9/11 Commission Report", which would lead people to believe that it's based in fact. But then they make up a scene from whole-cloth about Clinton and Berger "refusing" the opportunity to take out bin-Laden. What's more, the scene portrays bin-Laden as being pinned down by the CIA and ripe for the picking. It all but accuses Berger and Clinton of criminal negligence by crafting a scene that never occured!

What was stated in the original post was that the media has a responsibility to the people who come to it to get the story right. This includes when you're broadcasting a film about a news event such as 9/11. She has every right to question ABC for being irresponsible in their duty to be public, which is part and parcel of their license to use the public airwaves, for broadcasting something that is of dubious accuracy in its portrayal of a news event that actually occured. You have every right to rebut that opinion. But as a licensed broadcaster, ABC does not have every right to broadcast whatever they please; they are held to standards that we aren't held to in our speech. There are words they cannot broadcast, there are pictures that they cannot show, and they are not allowed to knowingly broadcast false accusations as truth rather than opinion.

This is why the uproar. And the courts have upheld this higher standard for the media, so if you have an issue with this higher standard, take it up with the courts.

[andyluke.livejournal.com]

The 9/11 Omission report don't you mean ? The one that didn't talk about the American and United Airlines put options, that didn't mention the illegal and psychologically cruel and greedy demolition of Building Seven, Norad standing down for the first time ever and routine emergency procedure being completely dispensed with. By focussing on theSudan offer (http://propagandamatrix.com/clinton_let_bin_laden_slip_and_metastasize.html), and realising the symbolism, I'm curious to know if ABC include something like the fore-knowledge of the WTC destruction by thousands or more individuals. The best radar technology in the western world at the Pentagon ? The poor ability of the pilot who allegedly hit the Pentagon ? Perhaps they could have called it The 9/11 Complicity Report. Don't underestimate people's intelligence though. I think that were its a lot of propaganda comes across but there are just those who can't say why or how.

Apologies if i've been too snide. I'm glad I've found an lj were people are talking about this. I should browse around more often.

I do however object to the continued use of "left" and "right". It seems to be like a lot of elitist b.s and its not my framework - just something that is to used to keep the political sideshow going, false little bickering amongst best buddies and a way to keep those of us not in the game under the illusion of change. The only truthful paradigm is right and wrong. And we know this.