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Is Al Jazeera anti-American?

Are they Anti-American?

  • Yes

    Votes: 11 45.8%
  • A little bit, but it's miniscule

    Votes: 4 16.7%
  • No

    Votes: 9 37.5%

  • Total voters
    24

Tyrannosaur

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Do you think Al Jazeera, the fastest growing news source in the West has an anti-American bias? I didn't think so before, but after reading some of their articles about Osama bin Laden, I'm beginning to think that they might just be anti-American / anti-freedom.
 
Dinosaur,

Could you link me to one of these articles? I don't regularly read/watch Al-Jazeera, but I think what they do is just report the news from an Arab-World perspective, much like our news networks report from a Western perspective.
 
I have heard that their editorials and opinion articles are very Pro-Arab and at times Anti-American, but that their actual news is good.
 
Do you think Al Jazeera, the fastest growing news source in the West has an anti-American bias? I didn't think so before, but after reading some of their articles about Osama bin Laden, I'm beginning to think that they might just be anti-American / anti-freedom.

Al-Jazeera is an Arab news station and, as such, its views are reflective of the Arab world. If you consider the Arab world to harbor "anti-American" views (whatever that means), then perhaps it's time to reexamine some of our policies and figure out why we piss them off so much. It's certainly understandable that they wouldn't like a country that they perceive as occupying their lands for oil, siding with Israel (whom they perceive to be their biggest threat) against the Palestinians, propping up their corrupt dictators, and not really caring about human rights abuses unless they occur in a country that isn't aligned with the US. How would we like it if another country did that to us?

As for being "anti-freedom," I see no evidence of that. Al-Jazeera has gushed praise on the democracy protests in the Arab world, much moreso than Western media outlets have in fact.
 
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I've read some articles from AJ that are quite slanted to anti-Americanism, and some that are quite balanced, it depends on the topic and the writer.
 
Dinosaur,

Could you link me to one of these articles? I don't regularly read/watch Al-Jazeera, but I think what they do is just report the news from an Arab-World perspective, much like our news networks report from a Western perspective.

Pretty much anything on the front page about OBL. It's all pretty subtle though, such as a word that implies America as being bad or casts America in a bad light.
 
I think it's strangely narrow to think of them as anti-American. They're an Arab news media outlet. They aren't American cheerleaders, nor should they be. There are some arab regimes to whom Al Jazeera is decidedly hostile, as well.

I've noticed that every media outlet that isn't glowingly supportive of every act of the U.S. government, to a nauseating degree, is deemed anti-American by some. Sometimes, a helpful critic is of considerably more worth than a foolish yes-man. In fact, I would contend that American media outlets have become government stoolies to a disgusting degree, and should be far more critical and cognizant of government missteps than they currently are.

An active press is an essential ingredient of a democracy. Having a press that buys every word our government says, hook line and sinker, is not helpful to the health of our union.

Groupthink is not a good thing.
 
Do you think Al Jazeera, the fastest growing news source in the West has an anti-American bias? I didn't think so before, but after reading some of their articles about Osama bin Laden, I'm beginning to think that they might just be anti-American / anti-freedom.
What definitions of "anti-American / anti-freedom" are we using for the poll?
 
I think it's strangely narrow to think of them as anti-American. They're an Arab news media outlet. They aren't American cheerleaders, nor should they be. There are some arab regimes to whom Al Jazeera is decidedly hostile, as well.

I've noticed that every media outlet that isn't glowingly supportive of every act of the U.S. government, to a nauseating degree, is deemed anti-American by some. Sometimes, a helpful critic is of considerably more worth than a foolish yes-man. In fact, I would contend that American media outlets have become government stoolies to a disgusting degree, and should be far more critical and cognizant of government missteps than they currently are.

An active press is an essential ingredient of a democracy. Having a press that buys every word our government says, hook line and sinker, is not helpful to the health of our union.

Groupthink is not a good thing.

But saying something that casts America in a bad light is not pro-American.
 
But saying something that casts America in a bad light is not pro-American.

Perhaps America should avoid doing things that cast itself in a bad light, if it doesn't want to look bad on the global stage.

Aren't conservatives supposed to be big fans of personal responsibility?

If we don't act like bullies and thugs, people probably won't print stories about us being bullies and thugs.
 
Contrary to popular opinion, foreigners don't determine their entire political ideology on how they feel about America. Al-Jazeera is primarily a pro-Arab and pro-democracy in its editorial content. They will trash the U.S. when they perceive an attack on Arab interests and praise the U.S. when they offer support.
 
But saying something that casts America in a bad light is not pro-American.

.... America helped prop up Latin American dictatorships during the 1950s and 1960s. Is that anti-American? Or just true?
 
We're still helping to prop up dictators in the middle east in 2011. Bahrain, anyone? That isn't anti-Americanism, it's a fact. If we feel ashamed of that, perhaps that suggests that our policy decisions are out of whack with our stated core values.
 
First off define which Al-Jazerra.... Arabic or English version

Define "anti-Americanism" also.

But on the face of it no. Is the channel critical of the US? yes, but it is also critical of Saudi Arabia, Iran, Israel, most European countries, most South American countries, China and pretty much everyone else.... it is kind of the job of the news media to be critical and investigate... I know the US media have forgotten how to be a true news media so you might not know this, but in the rest of the world, that is the primary job of the free news media.
 
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They do have that right. Too bad (for us) if we do not like it...
If we do not like it, perhaps we should learn.
 
I have heard that their editorials and opinion articles are very Pro-Arab and at times Anti-American, but that their actual news is good.

That's been my experience with them. If it's happening in the Muslim world, they've got boots on the ground first, and are rolling video while the rest of the Mainstream Media is making airline reservations.

But yeah, they are quite anti-Israeli, anti-American and pro-Muslim on an editorial level. That's pretty much to be expected. They are definitely pro-democracy, however.
 
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Do you think Al Jazeera, the fastest growing news source in the West has an anti-American bias? I didn't think so before, but after reading some of their articles about Osama bin Laden, I'm beginning to think that they might just be anti-American / anti-freedom.

In large part, the Muslim world (with some exceptions) is anti-American. It only makes sense that there main news station would be so biased. So what? Why do we feel like everyone has to like us?
 
Do you think Al Jazeera, the fastest growing news source in the West has an anti-American bias? I didn't think so before, but after reading some of their articles about Osama bin Laden, I'm beginning to think that they might just be anti-American / anti-freedom.

Strange way to phrase the question in that in the context of the Middle East being 'pro-freedom' necessitates being 'anti-american' in the sense of being anti-american policies (how else could one be against a country?) given that it is the United States (along with France and the United Kingdom) that has supported these dictatorships for decades.
 
Do Arab/Muslim Americans face stereotyping and bigotry or do they not? What is unfair or unbalanced about reporting something ignored by the mainstream US media?
 
No, they just report from the point of view of the Arab world. You want a Anti-American news network, go check out Russia Today.
 
I think its just an alternative news source coming outside of the dominant corporate ran American news...
Just another view..... Which doesnt do anyone harm. Got to have all sides of the spectrum and stories..
 
Americans' views on Al Jazeera have been impacted by the way they see the Middle East as a whole. i wonder if the recent coverage of the uprising in Egypt changed anyones views on Al Jazeera? we saw hundreds of thousands of young people demonstrating in Tahrir Square. they were not demonstrating against the United States, they were not demonstrating against Israel and they were not demonstrating against the West.

they were demonstrating for something a lot of us take for granted. that is democracy. they are a lot more like us than some people give them credit for.

thank you to Al Jazeera for getting that message out.
 
CNNs coverage of the protests in the middle east was much better.

"It's like on twitter and stuff"

...for half an hour at a time.
 
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