Saturday Age - 2 page spread, kinda balanced, missing some info

[johnboy]

i was kinda not suprised to see a two page spread in the Age today on "Ecstacy", what with other major papers doing similar spreads, and they often do a story when huge parties are on (GC)...
but what did suprise me was how balanced and non-hysterical the article was, and not just by comparison to other papers, in and of itself its a pretty decent bit of journalism.
there is a whole lot of quotes from ordinary users, interviews with rave promoters, sensible story on adulterants in e...
i havent read it all in depth yet, but so far no gross misinformation has leapt out at me.
one glaring problem i had tho (and there is a part two tommorrow and hopefully it will be there) is that there is no mention of either ez-test of gas spectro testing in the article about adulterants. no mention of either of these things is very dodgy to say the least. if there is no mention in tommorrows edition i think a letter writing campaign is in order.
if anyone does write a letter i'd suggest that the positive aspects of this story be noted before any chastising happens, i'd like to see the Age's bold choice of actually doing fair coverage of an issue pay off for them.
if we are ever going to get MDMA decriminalised we are definitly going to need some friends in the media

stop press

just found the online version so everyone can have a read:
http://www.theage.com.au/news/20000422/A18276-2000Apr21.html
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.... he who makes a beast of himself, rids himself of the pain of being a man...
[This message has been edited by johnboy (edited 22 April 2000).]

 

[CrazyAustralian]

Hey Johnboy,
Just read the article, and your right, it is pretty fair! I'm as surprised as you are. The Age tends to have much less on E compared to Hearald Sun or the Australian.
Other bluey's should read this, so consider this message a bump.
I'm down with the letter writing idea, and I won't dis em before complementing them on a relatively fair article.
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Keep On Rockin in the Free World!

 

[drawkcab]

Yes, relatively forgiving to its own arguments expressing 'most but not all at these raves are on drugs'...
But in all its fairness, it did have a big call sign for 'testers' in the paragraph discussing mixed substances in pills, surely in their research they would of come accross e-z testers ?

 

[johnboy]

about the testers, yeah you think they'd have come across them, im writing an email to them right now basically asking that.. i mean they are for sale on swanston street, its not exactly a hush hush thing

 

[DoC]

Well its intersting that the ages sister paper fellow fairfaxer the sydney morning herald also did a fair and balanced report on ecstasy.....maybe we have some fellow beaners at fairfax ?

 

[thomasthetank]

After reading the article it seems that the lucrative dealer story was far fetched, l don't know any guys dealing that have their own security, or bribe security guys large amounts of cash. Show me a bouncer in the scene who says no to free drugs or cash ?
Anyway it was a reasonable article that should try to take the emphasis away from raves = E's, I mean everyone is taking E's everywere from home to clubs to pubs. It is no longer a drug confined to the "rave" scene. Even then the "rave" word has been abused is GCrasher a rave or a dance party ??? I mean everyone presumes that a party with dance music is a rave and if it is classified as a rave everyone is on E's.