One of the Morning Call's local stories today concerns two dudes who were just nabbed for dumping chicken guts from some poultry plant into the Schuylkill River. I know plenty of people who use hamburger or cheese as bait on opening day. Chicken is a lot more healthy, except for the fish feeders, who now face a gazillion years in jail.So am I going to squawk about the arrest? No. I'm no bird brain. I'm sure this is a very serious matter and I, for one, am thankful that our state AG was all over that like turkey on rye. Good for him!
Is it the news account? No, it's a dispassionate and factual account by Tracy Jordan, one of the paper's best.
What really bothers me are the two pictures that accompanies the hard copy story. There are two very large photographs of the defendants, dressed in attire that make it obvious they are Orthodox Jews. Were these pictures in any way relevant to the story? No. Are these dangerous and at-large criminals, who might be egging your house and car at night? No.
But these fowl men are Jews. And an unintentional message, thanks solely to the photographs, is that this is what you should expect from greedy Jews.
It worked, too. One Morning Call Readers' Forum commenter quickly notes, "JWWISH new york scumbags." Another, who calls himself "Hymie Rabinovitz," adds "We killed jesus and we're proud of it!"
The newspaper often declines to publish the ethnicity or race of an at-large rape suspect because of stereotyping concerns. But doesn't the publication of these photographs amount to the same thing?
They face as many as 255 years in jail. They are charged with serious big-time corporate pollution crime. They are not dumping bait. But God forbid we want to look at their faces because that makes us anti-Semitic.
ReplyDeleteYour analogy is misguided. An "at-large" suspect is unidentified, and writing that the race of the suspect is Black or Hispanic does what, in terms of identifying? Not much. Here, we have a photo of two individuals, not a description that matches a third of Allentown's population. Make sure we all rant the next time the newspaper publishes a photo of a Black or Hispanic suspect.
ReplyDeleteanon 9:08, 225 years in jail is slightly on the harsh side? last week a mugger punched an 85 year old lady in the face three time inside her garage, he was apprehended, but no photograph. i suspect if these defendants didn't have beards and yarmulkes there would be no photographs, much less ones so large. even if the photographs were not anti-semitic, they were certainly used for sensationalism. in recent years there have been mass abuses of pets and animals, without photographs of the accused.
ReplyDelete"God forbid we want to look at their faces"
ReplyDeleteWhy would you need to see their pictures? Why is that relevantr to the story? If a paper declines to identify the race of an at-large rape suspect about whom many other identifying characterisitcs are known, then why would it publish a picture of a nonviolent defendant who poses no threat at all but whose photograph clearly identifies him as a Jew? Is that really part of the story? Isn't there a risk that publication of this photograph just feeds a negative stereotype?
on the same page there were several other crime stories. one 23 year old man beat his father unconscious and the father was hospitalized with broken ribs and other injuries from the beating. A 46 year old man sexually assaulted a 15 year old girl. Only the Jewish chicken part defendants had their photo's shown.
ReplyDeleteAllegedly,
ReplyDeleteRon Angle has said you can tell the Jews from their horns. They are also shape shifters and their horns may not be visible, but they always have a small bag of Jew gold wrapped about their neck.
Watch them closely, the are a quick people.
Bernie,
ReplyDeleteDon't forget you have sold out to the MCall and shouldn't make negative comments about their stories, pictures, or font choices.
"Ron Angle has said you can tell the Jews from their horns. They are also shape shifters and their horns may not be visible, but they always have a small bag of Jew gold wrapped about their neck.
ReplyDeleteWatch them closely, the are a quick people."
Those are leprechauns, you idiot!
These guys are charged with serious offenses that may result in serious sentences. Photos are appropriate for all serious criminals.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, Blacks and Latinos seem to be off limits with the Call. Political correctness is the new black, you know. It's change we can believe in.
O'Hare defends anti-semite Angle and attacks jewish Glenn Reibman and his friends, very interesting.
ReplyDeleteCould say about you what you say about the Morning Call.
All this blabber is based upon the assumption the newspaper always has access to defendant photos ... likely the AG press office publicity machine distributed the photos. If the Allentown PD routinely released mug shots you'd see all the muggers, too.
ReplyDeleteCould you post the other guy's photo, too? Curious minds want to see. At the risk of being called hateful, of course.
ReplyDeleteAt least we know what picture of Bernie they will use when he gets busted! Or Maybe the one from his disbarment?! That would tell us all lawyers are evil!
ReplyDeleteAren't all lawyers evil? All Jews cheap and shrewd? All Hispanics criminals and all Blacks stupid and poor?
ReplyDeleteIsn't this Bernie's point?
Bernie:
ReplyDeleteI agree with you and feel they did emphasize the picture for the very reason you mention. My opinion.
While I am here, I thought I would mention I keep having this vision of a big" market" for dead horses in the Lehigh Valley.
Beating them seems to be our communal pass time, at least in the blog world.
This comment is NOT directed toward any one individual and is not meant to be derogatory toward anyone, including the horses, who will suffer the most.
In advance, my apologies for having offended someone since I am sure I have.
Which is the very reason I spend less and less time on the blogs.
Too much focus on personalities when we should be addressing principles.
Squirrel
I live where people fish all summer. Some fisherman use raw chicken livers for bait. If you ever smelled day old raw livers laying around in the noon day sun in July you would want to string these two guys up by there giblets as well.
ReplyDeleteListen, enough of the bullshit.
ReplyDeleteWe are talking about biodegradable material that will provide food for not only fish, but also for plant life and other invertebrates that live in the river.
This is an absolutely ridiculous charge in terms of environmental protection. Yes, they may have dumped waste, but waste that will have no negative environmental impact.
Actually, that said... it's a possibility that the waste had developed ecoli or the like, and in that case the the entire water supply may be tainted.
It's important to analyze the waste and determine if those who had dumped the waste had deemed it eco-friendly, i.e. no ecoli. If so, this is a ridiculous charge and will not make it past a preliminary hearing if the attorney hired can raise these points. It's analogous to throwing bread into the water for ducks to eat.
Squirrel,
ReplyDeleteA few points.
1) I am aware of your site and would like to link to it, but have not done so bc everytime I try to load it, it overpowers my PC. I will try it from another, higher speed, PC. In the meantime, please feel freee to explain your site and I will do a shout out.
2) Those pictures were, in fact, attached to the AG news release. But I don't think they added anything to the story except for those who are looking to slam Jews. The size of the pictures was very large.
3) I don't think the MC intentionally tried to sensationalize this matter, but can understand why some of us think so.
4) Your criticism is valid and applies to all of us, including me. But you're never going to find perfection.
Will you use a County Computer like you usually do. Since you use the County as your Office you should be paying rent.
ReplyDeleteUsing the County taxpayer facilities for your own fun and profit, nice for a watchdog.
Try again, asshole.
ReplyDeleteComputers are available to the public in the law library, but Internet use is banned and software prevents access to all but the county web page and a legal research site. Your facts are way off, but don't let that stop you.
When I blog during the day, whether posting or responding to comments, it is from home or a private office.
calling someone asshole, that's nice. no unprovoked insult there, two faced O'Hare!
ReplyDelete"Bernie Ohare 4" of 5:52PM, you should delete your comment immediately for the simple fact that it makes you sound like an idiot. You do not understand the charges, the seriousness of the offense, and the science of this type of pollution. To say this has "no environmental impact" is a unbelievably stupid comment and comparing it to feeding ducks is even dumber. You have no undertsanding of what is going on here. These organic wastes not only contribute to the proliferation of microorganisms, they increase P and N, decrease dissolved O, etc. These types of things have serious ramifications all the way up the food chain.
ReplyDeletePapier,
ReplyDeleteUm, the "idiot" in question is finishing up his Ph. D. in Chemistry.
"calling someone asshole, that's nice. no unprovoked insult there, two faced O'Hare!"
ReplyDeleteIf the show fits ...
You falsely accuse me of using county facilities for "fun and profit." You are an asshole. You're a coward, too, who is too afraid to identify yourself by name.
Bernie,
ReplyDeleteThen he should stick to chemistry and stop commenting on biology.
He may be finishing up his Ph.D in chemistry but he clearly has no concept of basic biology and environmental science. All of his comments are wrong and he sounds dumb.
....show??
ReplyDeletePapier,
ReplyDeleteOf course he sounds dumb! He's my son, damn it!
I understand that dumping chicken parts in a river is bad for the environment, but not nearly as bad as the cars we drive every day of the week. Yet these dudes are facing a much more sentence for endangering fish than you or I would face for killing each other. Talk about dumb.
And the point of my post is not so much the offense, but the photographic obsession with the religion of these terrible criminals, which feeds into a stereotype.
Exactly what stereotype are we talking about: the one that unfairly labels those of Jewish persuasion as illegal dumpers of chicken parts?
ReplyDeleteCome on Bernie, you sound foolish.
anon 3:08, the photographs resulted in about 40% of the comments on the topix(morning call) being anti-semitic based. these comments were a direct result of the photographs. considering that only about 1% of Jews are ultra-orthodox (proscribe to laws pertaining to skull cap and beard) why not omit the photo's and avoid ethnic stereotyping?
ReplyDeleteHey, BO, I wanted to say I read your kid's comments on Stop the Bernie were pretty damn Funny!
ReplyDeleteThis blog and others have righly criticized the Morning Call's forum as a place where racists and others can post unchecked. So why is this situation any different? If a story with a photo of an African American elicits these type of racists comments, then should the newspaper refuse to publish those photos as well?
ReplyDeleteThe answer is no.
In addition, it appears this blog has a bit of a double standard. The newspaper should not publish the photo out of some unfounded concern that it might sterotype all Jews as chicken dumpers, but when Bernie places the photo on his blog it's for altruistic purposes.
There are times when newspapers show bad judgment, but publishing photos of alleged criminals, who happen to be orthodox jews, is not one of them.
This blog has no double standard. I make no claim to being objective. My pictures are intended to make a point.
ReplyDeleteMy question, and I have yet to get an answer, is what relevance do those pictures really have to the story. Those pictures depict peoplle whose attiree makes obvious they are Jewish, but I fail to see what it adds to the story. If it was relevant, why didn't Tracy Jordan describe both defendants as orthodox Jews? Because it has nothing to do with the story.
If these were two black gangbangers, I would be wondering the same thing and people would be making remarks at the reader forum about that.
Those pictures sensationalized this matter.
many who read the morning call on the internet, which did not have the photo's, do not comprehend the point made by bernie's post. the defendants pictures were side by side, both large, conveying a message much more than the one photo depicted here on this blog.
ReplyDeleteHere's an answer as to why the photos are relevant. Because they are photos of the people involved in the news story. Why are many of the photos you run on your blog relevant? When you wrote about Moragnelli and the judicial candidacy you published his photo. Why was that relevant? Can't wait for your tortured logic on this one.
ReplyDeleteYou can't compare my blog to an MSM newspaper. A newspaper stresses objectivity while I have a point of view. I've already said that. What I do here is not what a newspaper does. We simply complement their stories, for the most part.
ReplyDeleteThese are photos of the two dudes accused of committing a crime. You have a point. But what does their physical appearance as Orthodox Jews have to do with the story? Nothing. I think running those pics just sensationalized the situation. The proof of that is the anti-Semitic remarks that followed on the readers' forum.
Now if this were a kosher plant, which is held to higher standards than other plants, I could see the relevance. In this situation, I don't.
At the end of the day, you (Bernie) are inventing a situation.
ReplyDeleteYour want somebody to justify the use of the photos by pointing out their relevance to the story, given the fact that the photo makes clear thay they are orthodox jews.
Their relevance: they are the people accused of the crime. The only person that seems to care about them being orthodox jews is you. I hope I see this same criticism when the newspaper publishes photos of African American, Italian or Hispanic criminals. Under that model, any newsworthy person who expresses any multi-cultural traits should be barred from the newspaper. The only criminals that are eligible for publicity under your model are white males, since they can't be offended.
You point to the fact that the newspaper's forums are filled with anti-sementic remarks, but that is not unique, thus failing to support your argument. Now, if the forum was relatively free of racsist remarks and this photo generated more than usual, then at least you could build a coherent - though still false - argument.
Finally, you, nor Mr. Molivinsky, have yet to answer how the images of the accused leads to stereotyping, given they were charged with illegal dumping and not being thrifty.
The only people making a big deal about their religion is some rascists on the forum and you and Mr. Molovinsky.
I invented nothing. The MC ran a story about two guys who dmped chicken parts. It added not one, but two, pictures of the defendants to that story. The photographs were larger than other photographs accompanying other stories. The photos were centered on the page in a way to draw the readers' attention. That's exactly what happened.
ReplyDeleteIf the fact that these two defendants are Orthodox Jews is part of the story, why didn't Tracy Jordan mention it in her account? She did not do so bc it is irrelevant. So the paper published pictures that make obnvious these guys are Jews. It makes this irrelevant fact part of the story. The reader forum responds with typical hatred. The photos led to the stereotyping and sensationalizing of what would otherwise be a very minor story.
The MC studiously refrains from describing the race or ethnicity of at-large defendants of violent crimes like rape and assault when doing so might help lead to their apprehension. In some cases, there have been surveillance photos used by the ET and 69, but the MC has refused to publish them. But in this case, where the defendants are already apprehended and pose no danger, large pohotographs are published that do nothing but imply these were cheap Jews. I believe the paper was wrong to publish the photos.
Having said that, I understand your point. You say that bc they are the defendants, their pictures are part of the story. I say NO bc they needlessly fan the flames of anti-Semitism.
Your bottom line is the mere fact that these defendants are jewish, it fans the flame of anti-semitism. That's a sad and incredibly cynical commentary on society -- that is, if it were true. (Please don't give me the forum, that's about as intellectual and representive of the public at large as a bathroom stall on the NJ Turnpike)
ReplyDeleteI fail to see the connection between the photos and promoting anti-sematism. Under your logic, when the MC publishes photos of Muslim woman in head scarves, young black youth or perhaps Indian woman with dots on the forehead, they are exploiting them and promoting racism.
While I am not naive enough to ignore the fact that a newspaper might consider the mug shots of two orthodox Jews - largely considered conservative, law abiding citizens - as a bit unusual and provacative, I don't believe that the paper would have covered the story any differently if the pair looked any different.
Perhaps you are right and I am wrong. But let's look at some of your examples and replace them for the actual defendants. If these were two Muslim or Indian "terrorists" or black "gangbangers", don't you think there's a danger that prominent photos would be accenting who they are as opposed to what they (allegedly) did? That's more or less my point. I have no training in journalism, but it seems to me to be sensationlism.
ReplyDeleteYou don't want me to use the reader forum bc you claim it does not represent the LV. I hope you're right.
One other point, if I may.
ReplyDeleteRegarding my admitted cynical view of our society's progress, I need only point you to the Christmas lights in Lower saucon rearranged in the form of a swastika. Not enough? How about the family in P-burg, right across the river, that names one child Adolf Hitler and another Aryan Nation?
I might also remind you that in the not too distant past, Jews like Max Hess were required to pay a higher rate to advertise at the MC than gentiles like me. Jews were regularly banned from most country clubs in this area and had to start their own.
Yes, we've made progress. But we're not there.
Next time there is a problem, you be the negotiator. Please tell the Palestinians that they now have their own exclusive club endorsed and formed by Israel.
ReplyDeleteTo your point about how images of muslim men and "gang banger" terrorist migh accent who they are and not what they did
ReplyDeleteAs a member of the media, I have learned one thing: How readers interpert, analyze and digest news often says more about the reader than the author. Authors can not control these factors, despite all efforts of objectivty and neutrality. The same goes for images. The bottom line is that if some rascist moron looks at a photo of a muslim and it conjures up irrational and hateful emotions, I don't see how the newspaper is the bad guy.
O'Hare has made such an issue out of this because you and your anti-semetic buddy Angle are on the same page.
ReplyDeleteYou really like to pretend to be the great humanist but scratch the surface and you are like your pal Angle.
You, like Angle, love to attack Reibman and his friends and everyone knows what that is all about.
To the media member at 9:34,
ReplyDeleteYou may be right and I may be wrong. I seem to be fighting an uphill battle on this one. I appreciate your interpretation.
Anon 9:32, What does the palestinian problem have to do with this? Why the need to bring that up?
Anon 9:37, Let's look at your logic. I criticize Reibman. Reibman happens to be Jewish. It therefore necessarily follows that I must be an anti-Semnite? Stunning logic.
The question should not be about publishing photos of Jewish suspects. It should be about the MC's terrible fear of publishing photos and descriptions of Black, Hispanic, and Muslim suspects.
ReplyDeleteMM wants an assault on a symptom (i.e. publishing photos that may stoke hatred). We need to assault the actual problem (i.e. hatred, itself, then the MSM's selective political correctness - especially as it relates to Blacks, Hispanics, and Muslims).
I saw the pics of these two men on channel 69 news and a Philladelphia news channel as well. So why is it all the MC ??
ReplyDeleteI don't watch that much TV, although I do see 69 and did not see it there. Had I seen it there, I would have the same objection.
ReplyDeleteif they dumped all this gook in the river knowingly without a care, what else did they dump in> cleaning fluids, solvents, chemicals, preservatives, nitrates,etc. How about wondering if they do this... is the food they sell really Kosher????????????????
ReplyDelete