Should Bluelight actively manipulate the media?

^If you base your judgment of what is "typical" off of cable news reporters or bloggers you're going to run into some major sampling error. Most journalists work for newspapers or magazines, and the tone of drug stories is an exception, not the rule. I've met quite a few journalists working in print and for the most part they've been passionate but critically minded thinkers.
 
No, I based my judgement on print journalism. Every time I read a news story on a subject that I know about it's bollocks. I assume that this isn't a coincidence, and that the articles on subjects I don't know about are bollocks too.
 
I don't trust the media at all. They lie all the time, often basing stories on the worst case scenario to scare people into paying attention. They can generally only be trusted to cater to the financial needs of those who benefit from the drug war, big pharma, and alcohol advertisers. The death rates of people dying from Rx drugs, tobacco and alcohol are staggering, yet a couple of unconfirmed deaths from mephedrone (almost all of which were actually from methedrone, methadone, or combos of many drugs) was enough to get it banned in the UK (when the only real confirmed death from it was some guy with health issues IVing it).
 
No, I based my judgement on print journalism. Every time I read a news story on a subject that I know about it's bollocks. I assume that this isn't a coincidence, and that the articles on subjects I don't know about are bollocks too.
In what way do you mean "bollocks" to intend that their lapsing in their civic duty? It's a very ambiguous term. You can be a critical thinker while being very ignorant of an area, too. Reporters necessarily know very little about what they're investigating sometimes, simply because the news can demand they know about any area of expertise and they can't be experts in everything. So in what way do you mean it about the articles if not displaying ignorance, that they're insincere, or they're vacuous?
 
They tend to be shallow and badly written. It actually surprises me that you use the term "critical thinker", because one of the things that annoys me most is the tendency to include baseless, silly claims and to treat opinions as fact. Of course journalists are sometimes going to be ignorant with regards to a particular subject; however, I would prefer them to actually do some research so that they can write a well-informed article, rather than just churning out another worthless article that demonstrates not only ignorance, but a lack of basic understanding.

I'm guessing you live in the US (because of your reference to "cable news reporters"), it could be that the standard of print journalism is better than it is here in the UK.
 
No, I based my judgement on print journalism. Every time I read a news story on a subject that I know about it's bollocks. I assume that this isn't a coincidence, and that the articles on subjects I don't know about are bollocks too.

Agree 100%.

Not to mention, the times that I've been mentioned in newspapers (a couple of times, nothing to do with BL), the stories were incredibly sensationalised.

I've also been contacted by the media in relation to some secondary research that I posted on my website (related to drugs) - they were treating me as some kind of expert, when my research is clearly labelled as grad-level university secondary research (e.g., I read some newspapers and some govt papers).
 
^Ok, but what is your specific response in the context of the arguments above that argue against that notion?
I don't wish to be rude, but for someone who writes using a broad vocabulary at every turn and probably isn't hampered by a lack of education... you seem slightly naïve.

Journalists lie in order to feather their own nest. The only reason that guy told you to write in was:
  • so his editor is given the impression that his 'story' generated interest, rather than the usual eye-rolling and bewilderment such gash would normally be regarded with
  • so that the letters could be used to perpetuate the sensationalism
  • so that the free and uncensored debate that can be had efficiently online, can be controlled and staggered in a dying print media
The only reason he told you that he was skeptical of some of the claims about magic mushrooms, was so that you'd hold out some hope that there might be somebody in the media who was "on your side". It's bullshit. He's just stringing you along for his own ends. There's other threads on BL where (despite being warned by other Bluelighters) members have been conned by journalists who initially gained their trust, then fucking annihilated them in print or on camera.

The fact that he'd write a garbage article when he has doubts as to its veracity should tell you something about the kind of person you're dealing with. I particularly laughed at this part:
Peter de Graaf said:
...my views have no place in a newspaper story (there would be, quite rightfully, howls of complaint if I did try to pass off my views in the guise of a news story)
Ah, that old chestnut. They always say that.

Yet from his article, perhaps he could explain who's view is: "users could also do things while hallucinating that they normally wouldn't, such as trying to fly from a building"?

No attributable quotation marks. No evidence. Just speculative regurgitation of sensationalist crap.

Or maybe he'd like to point to the ownership of this gem: "the mushrooms' active ingredient, psilocybin, was a class A controlled drug... ...cannabis was by comparison only class C, which illustrated the seriousness of magic mushrooms".

Hahahaha! :D Yes Peter, because as we know, drug classifications are logical, proportionate and totally evidence-based. Therefor, a higher classification means it must be "more serious". Not a hint of non-sequitur, eh? :\

And these are the critical thinkers you want to influence?

The irony is, the arguments against dealing with journalists are contained within the very responses that you've received from this guy. Bluelight would do well to maintain a guarded distance from these cretins.
 
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if it could be managed properly (as in, knowing the journalists could be trusted, lol), a forum or section for the media, similar to the Drug Studies forum, and the partnerships the site will start forming soon, really wouldnt be a bad idea. journalists are already free to come here in search of data, but if there was a specific section, they might feel more "welcome" and the thread generated for the creation of the article could be given in the article itself (perhaps as a mandatory condition of using bluelight to gather data for their article?), so that readers would be able to see how skewed or misinterpreted the author made things. (didnt Drug Studies start kinda like that? first we had a few researchers here and there come around looking for data or research volunteers, leading to some partnerships which then led to the Drug Studies forum?)

that said, its pretty widely known that journalists cant be trusted, but if we could somehow gain partnerships with those rare ones who could, it would be beneficial to the cause, by ensuring that at least some unbiased information is being put out there.

we certainly shouldnt be hostile towards the media, but given that people have been fucked over in the past, letting us know we cant trust them, we certainly cant be too inviting either. i still say any active involvement is more trouble than its worth.
 
My claims about print journalists tending to be critically minded and having a strong sense of civic duty is in reference to my numerous experiences working with print journalists of all different stripes in the U.S. as a former student of journalism. I’ve spent years studying the media, and public opinion of the media as taught by academics who are extremely critical of the field. I’m certainly not naïve. I know that reporters have fewer resources and less time than ever to cover the news. I know that TV journalists and journalists that work for partisian rags are far from what constitutes the average reporter (where does the idea that the typical article is sensationalized come from when the majority of articles are things like hard news, arts and business reporting – things that don’t even lend themselves to sensationalization?). I know that reporters continue on in their field despite the fact that their newsroom is staffed with less than half the workers it had a few years ago and that their salaries have been slashed (it sure is weird they’d stick around if they’re all just a bunch of self-serving narcissists out to slander everyone they have a grudged against so they can write a titillating story that’ll magically make them wealthy) . I know that their job isn’t to simply parrot what they’re told, that they have little to no time to work the way they’d like to, but also that they do pretty well given the reality they face, and that’s what I base my comments on.

I also know that the public is highly ignorant of the realities journalist face and that surveys show that the average member of the public holds numerous self-contradictory beliefs and expectations about the media (especially those members from “disenfranchised” groups who perceive themselves as outside the mainstream, like drug users). I also know that all the people champanioning blogs and citizen journalism and political chatrooms as a replacement for traditional journalism are living in a pipe dream, an information echo chamber of extraordinarily limited scope compared to traditional news sources saturated with like-minded people who regurgitate each others’ preconceptions for re-consumption and learn nothing, and change nothing (see Cass Sunstein’s “Republic 2.0”). We love living in these bubbles because they allow us to spout off our undiluted opinions without having to do the work of examining them to a receptive audience that reinforces our beliefs. It's all so much self-delusion and distraction. How do we think anything is going to change if we don’t get outside our customized, user-controlled little online worlds?

The public sphere on which a functioning democracy is contingent is no longer a physical space where we necessarily run into the dissenting views that refine our thinking and press debate forward. The major source of news is not a printed paper we need to look over where we necessarily discover stories we’d normally not think to read. It’s an electronically filtered torrent of recycled garbage that we’re already comfortable with, and it’s our own fault. The news we consume is less and less about the communities we live in and about a diverse range of general happenings, it’s a highly fractured hodgepodge of dilettantish nonsense from anywhere and everywhere that we choose for ourselves like children stuffing their faces with candy until they’re sick. We do ourselves no service by shying away from engaging with those who don’t agree with our viewpoints. Why the hell would they ever change if they’re never given reason to? (I’ve already detailed why Bluelight is in a unique position to influence the media and public opinion in a way organizations like NORML can’t earlier).

It’s true that publications in the U.K. tend to be far more sensationalized than U.S. journalists, and perhaps that’s true for some other countries, too. But how exactly do some of you responders think a letter to the editor or a personal email to a journalist or editor is going to be used to sensationalize an issue and backfire disastrously on Bluelight as an organization when the letters would be written independently by posters as individuals, not as self-identified members of Bluelight (as stated and re-stated previously)? How does one sensationalize facts that contradict a sensationalized story? As far as the risk to Bluelight is concerned, don’t you think the mephedrone debacle has exposed the online presence of drug based communities and the RC market by now anyways? Bluelight is no secret, as the largest drug board and the top Google search result for all major RCs we're totally open to slander as it is. Please, spell the danger of a courteous and evidence-based rational defense of pro-drug and harm reduction related viewpoints for Bluelight out explicitly.

Also, how does whether we trust journalists or not play into what’s been said in the thread so far? A letter to the editor is printed, not openly debated in the paper. It’s just information out there for people to read. So how is, for example, de Graaf’s invitation part of a devious plot of a fiendish and untrustworthy journalist to “perpetuate sensationalism” for his own selfish ends? An email to a journalist or editor is read by them; how exactly are they going to “sensationalize” that in publication? These responses are full of paranoia, selective reading, and attacks against straw men. I guess I’m trying to put myself in your shoes, as someone who has read this entire thread and is responding to it in its full context, and I’m wondering how it can be that we’ve read the same thing.

Where specifically did I put de Graaf on a pedestal as a paragon of critical thinking and journalistic practice? I just mentioned sampling error and then tambourine-man tells me that I’m offering de Graf up as an example of a typically critically thinking journalist. I just mentioned how sardonic comments about biased stories about drugs and the reporters who write them made to a congregation of other drug users accomplishes nothing, and now this thread is being used as an opportunity to make fun of the mushroom story even further. It’s all so silly. Don’t tell me further about factual errors and reporter’s hypocrisy, that’s not the scope of this thread, please tell them.
 
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This is definitely a very interesting discussion. It would be good if Bluelight became a more recognised site throughout the world... a sort of online mega-HR/drug info forum. The problem with introducing the media to it would be that there would be even more politics within BL, we'd have to be a little more careful with what to post, and the sense of community would disappear. However, it would be quite useful if there was a section designated for journalists.

I believe that a lot of the problem with popular news (whether that be TV, print, radio etc) is that it is often a reflection of the wider view. Saying what everyone likes means ratings, which means success and money.

It's a hard question psood0nym... But I'm glad someone asked it :)
 
Dealing with the press is tricky and can turn volatile very quickly, even when the press has a mostly positive disposition towards you or your cause. I'm sure that is why 7. in prohibited use of Bluelight which now reads "act as an official representive of Bluelight; " used to say something like "act as an official representative of Bluelight to the press".

Given the nature of the forum, I think predicting that 20% of the press being prepared to treat BL fairly would be a very high percent. I think BL's mission is best served at this point by being a low profile resource. Advocacy in the press or towards governments would best come from a organization that doesn't have users letting it all hang loose as much as it happens here.

A crusading or ticked off journalist could find several dozen posts that quote well for creating a very bad impression within in less than a half hour.
 
Fuck the media.

They're like cops, just stay far away and don't talk to them.
 
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