Florida Koran burning and its aftermath: Another example of how the media slants the news

Terry Jones, the wacko Christian preacher in Florida, burned a Koran in public the other day. That was followed by wacko Muslims rioting in Afghanistan.

We’re willing to call both sides wacko, but Reuters can’t bring itself to do the same. It only seems to have a problem with one side of this issue and we’re pretty sure you can probably guess which side it is.

terry-jones
Reuters calls Terry Jones, who burned a Koran, a radical, fundamentalist exremist

In an 859-word article headlined “Ten dead in Afghan Koran burning protests,” the huge European news service refers to Jones as “a radical fundamentalist Christian” and “extremist Christian preacher Terry Jones.” Yet no similar incendiary adjectives were used to describe the Muslim Afghan protesters who rioted in the streets of Kandahar and killed ten people. Quite to the contrary, they are called “deeply religious.”

For example, shouldn’t someone performing a suicide attack be considered extremist? Not to Reuters:

A suicide attack also hit a NATO military base in the capital Kabul, the day after protesters over-ran a U.N. mission in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif and killed seven foreign staff, in the deadliest attack on the UN in Afghanistan.

Taliban extremists are transformed into “burkha-clad insurgents” by Reuters:

In Kabul on Saturday, a small group of burkha-clad insurgents attacked a coalition base,

Reuters says Afghani rioters who killed ten people and injured dozens are "deeply religious"

Riot all you want and commit mayhem for days on end, but if you’re Muslim Reuters will not use harsh adjectives to describe you:

A band of around 150 men who had taken to the streets to denounce the Koran burning set tires alight, smashed shops and assaulted an Afghan photographer, Reuters’ witnesses said. Some of the attackers were carrying guns.

The photographer was hit over the head and had his camera taken from him and smashed, by protesters who discussed killing him.

They’re demonstrators, not extremists and certainly not fundamentalists:

Around 5,000 demonstrators flooded into the streets…

The violence was extreme, perhaps, but not those who committed it:

Some were horrified by the extreme violence but not all had sympathy for the foreign dead.

And finally, the article concludes with this:

More volatile protests are possible across deeply religious Afghanistan…

So the way we understand this totally impartial article, Terry Jones is a “radical fundamentalist…extremist” because he burned a Koran in public, but the Afghan rioters who killed ten people, slit at least one throat, injured dozens, and destroyed private property are “deeply religious.”

And that, friends, is what Reuters calls balanced reportage.

Source: Reuters

This post was last modified on January 26, 2021

AfghanistanislamKoranTerry Jones
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View Comments (68)

  • I agree with alot of these posts. This man is irresponsible and has used the power of freespeech wrongly. Why did he burn a Kuran? To satisfy his stupid religous ego. Why did the muslims do what they did? Because they are nutjobs also. They've done this sort of thing for hundreds of years. Why? Because the sun's baked their brains out and their religion/traditions have encouraged them to continue their madness.

  • Daily Koran burnings are required! Followed up by Mexican flag burnings on weekends! That would really make Liberal heads assplode - and be totally hilarious!

    • But then the thousands of Americans that would be killed would all be blamed on the burners. Of course.

      • Well of course! Don't ever expect these (fill in you favorite expletive here) to take responsibility for their own actions...are you crazy?!?

        (sarcasm oozing here, rhetorical question!)

    • Omar, thanks brother for posting that, I am now in LOVE. That woman feels the same thing I do but has the courage to say it on youtube, I think many Americans feel the same way and if our government allows itself to slide into dhimmitude much more we're goina have a BIG problem, I'm talking civil war if they let this take over of our country get much farther.

        • I want to know how I can make my own copy, just in case YouTube decides to file 13 these two. I, like John, am in love with this woman, and I am a happily married man. She has exactly what we need to survive this Muslim takeover and our gubmints rollover!

  • Back when this kerfuffle first began I wanted to get some firsthand scoop on Pastor Jones, mostly because the press was excoriating him, as well as the local politicians and even the president, and it just riled me to no end to see an American citizen being treated that way.

    His mission is just down the road a bit...in this county that means less than 20 miles or thereabouts...so I stopped by to have a chat with Pastor Jones. Took me several tries to actually get a one-on-one with the man, and to be honest I was going to offer my services should he need security help in keeping the lefty press and lunatic followers of that old pedophile rapist from storming the place like they said they were going to.

    Didn't matter if he actually did burn that cult primer, they were after his head just for thinking about it. So I went to see him with an open mind and came away with the distinct impression that he was too imbalanced to make a rational decision on which socks to wear let alone take on all comers for daring to speak his mind.

    Told him I couldn't help him. Place was a nightmare with regards to security and too many innocent folks would be harmed if he did it as he said he was going to, and no amount of any advice to the contrary seemed to be sinking in. But it was on his property and his people were going to follow all the rules for fire-starting, etc, so I shook the mans hand and went home.

    Time passed, and he supposedly did the deed inside and to be honest I don't know if he really did it or not. Rumors here are flying every which way. Glad he listened to some reason and didn't call in the press and start a war. Burning the Koran is his right. So is speaking out against those murderous thugs the world can't seem to fumigate away like the vermin they are. Liking him personally or not isn't the point.

  • No one got upset for The Federal government burning Arabic language Bibles, that were to be handed out to Islamic people.

    It was found out by the Islamic people so our great federal people decided to burn them all. Could have just moved them back to USA.

    So our goverment burns the scripture that was used to create the USA, and all of western society, but no peep or mutter was heard from the freedom of speach-ers that great group of media liers.

    Of course our government is going insain because of it.

    • True,
      But, for what it's worth, I got royally pissed off when Billy Bob and Hilly Nillie cut up all of those gorgeous 1911's they had replaced with Beretta's.

      Now that was sacrilege against something truly Holy.

      • That really pissed me off too, JustAl. I wanted one of those 1911's as a memento of the old army being replaced by the new army and they were cutting and torching them like there was no tomorrow. I hated the Clinton years. I really despised that era of my military carreer because of them, but made it to retirement in spite of the them!

  • Isn't the the same "news" organization who's reporters found out the hard way that you don't go to a fire fight after dark with buddies who carry rpg's and AK's as per the infamous "Wikki" video?

  • Ok, will somebody remind me? Was it Pastor Jones that went over there and killed these people? From reading the Reuters story, it would seem so. Wait, it was Muslims, who were angry because somebody burned a book? Oh, I guess that explains their actions, and now they are absolved.

  • Let's just get ONE thing straight... He is NOT a Christian. He is NOT following Christian mandates, he is not behaving in a Christian manner as a pastor SHOULD behave. This is not a Christian church, this is a group of people usurping and misusing the name of Christ in order to validate their hatred and their stupidity. These people have NOTHING to do with real Christians, they have NOTHING to do with Christ and they CANNOT use the New Testament nor Jesus' words to justify what they are doing.

    Just because they use the name, it DOESN'T mean that is what they REALLY are. They are a disgusting group of people and their selfish and mindless acts shall be retributed to them soon enough.

    • Sounds like Kimmy is making threats against the pastor and his church. Doesn't sound very Christian, Kimmy. Eh?

      • You are an idiot and I say that with justification. Their retribution will come from a Higher Power, because of their use of a Higher Power's name to justify their behavior, if you weren't so blind you would have understood that readily. I am not your enemy here, I agree with freedom of speech and freedom of speech is not the enemy, the enemy are the extremist on all sides that use it for nefarious purposes. We can have rights, but we must also exercise responsibility.

        Your words to nuke AN entire population of people without discrimination is not a very Christian thing to do isn't? You and your little friends that are putting a thumbs down should try having a mature and civilized conversation for a change.

        • pssst, Kimmy, THUMBS DOWN. Your comments are sophmoric at best. What do you do when not reading IHTM, cruise HuffPuff for some good verbiage that you can then cut and paste? Truly pathetic.

          And Kimmy...calling people names, people you don't even know, is not a very Christian thing to do.

          • The fact that you are attacking me tells me that you have no reading comprehension skills, because I was not attacking you I was if anything adding to your post, but with a caveat. You see enemies everywhere eventually everyone will be your enemy.

            Yes I called you an idiot and with justification and I put up the reason for it. I may not know you, but your post was idiotic in nature.

            [JPMotu April 4, 2011 at 11:29 am
            Like or Dislike: 2 3
            Sounds like Kimmy is making threats against the pastor and his church. Doesn’t sound very Christian, Kimmy. Eh?]

            I was justified. You attacked me with a non-sequitur in order to make yourself feel better about the fact that I called you out earlier. You attacked me first. You better remember that.

            Please tell me EXACTLY where in the Bible we are not supposed to call a spade a spade? If you are a fool in my estimation I will call you so. I call it as I see it and there nothing unchristian about it. You want to debate me on how to be a Christian? First of all start with yourself. You are insulting me. What made you come after me when I told you I agreed with you, and tried to debate the issue in a civilized and respectful way? Idiot is an insult to you? Really? I would assume you have been called much more worst.

            That post right there tells me that first you have NO idea who am I AT ALL. If you knew me at all, you wouldn't have posted that. You are ASSuming that I am a liberal and THAT is sophomoric at best.

            All in all like I said, I am not your enemy, but if you want me as an enemy fine. Overall in the end, I don't care about your nor your issues, all I was doing is debating an issue agreeing in some points and disagreeing in others if you can't handle that, that is just too bad.

      • Kimmy - I think Jameela and its friends are back under a new name, thumbing down good posts.

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