The truth about Bowling for Columbine

[apothecary]

http://www.hardylaw.net/Truth_About_Bowling.html

Just came across this link, good for anyone who didn't already know what a sensationalist liar Mr Moore is

[Vertmorpheus]

I think (probably incorrectly) that De Bono coined the phrase "flieing"... bullshitting to make "truth" "true-er". Which is an accepted method of making a point, winning an election, getting off in court.. or nailing someone in court. But Mr Moore carrying on like that is a bit like Media Watch running ads to sell the home of one of its producers... once you've said you DO know better, you really have to stick to it!

BFC should be in the "edu-tainment" section of the shelf... along with Al Gore and Tracey Grimshaw No, shes neither educational or entertaining.

I reckon we should send michael moore to a starving african orphanage so they can...uhhh... redistribute his wealth ;)

Please Sir.... can I have some Moore?

GD

Edited June 3, 2007 by greendreams

[Legba]

Moore makes people think. This at least has some merit to it. But deception is not the way to inspire clear thinking...

perhaps, now that MM has fame, he can venture closer to the facts with less fear of 'disappearing' (CIA vernacular) because of his comments??

[No_One]

IMO sensationalising the truth is the most effective way to get people to pay attention to it and break through the "she'll be right mate" attitude and get people off their arses, neccesity is the mother of all creation and by creating a neccesity based on a version of the truth that is more accurate then the current version being propegated could trick people into finding out the truth for themselves.

What he spoon feeds people mixes up their heads and gets them questioning their beliefs; it takes powerful stuff to make this happen. Sensational is powerful.

I'd rather see the masses walking round thinking this stuff is the truth rather than the common groupthink which has been formed on what Governments want the masses to believe.

The sensationalised "moore" accurate version when added to the trumped up less accurate version cancels the impact of the other one out to a degree, what your sort of left then is a happy medium, I guess what I'm describing is like when intelligent people hear both sides of an argument before they decide on what they believe, it's the middle ground most of the time and wether or not you happy with this obviously depends on where you stand i.e. what your ideals are and what you see as positive and negative, etc.

At the end of the day though; if one sides portrail of truth is wrong why can't the other sides verision be wrong aswell?

[Pelinster]

I find this quite disturbing.

I thought Bowling was a great film and I also happen to personally agree with a lot of what is speculated by Moore regarding the media's formula for fear and consumption. However, I thought Bantamweight 911 was just over the top and really dismissed it as propaganda, so it isn't all that surprising to me that Mr Moore himself is a master of doctoring footage to support his message, I thought 911 was extremely biased and could tell just from watching it that a lot of the footage used was being taken out of context.

Whilst some of the messages in Moore's films may be good messages, I can't condone the fact that he misrepresents facts to get that message across. By doing this Moore looses his audience's trust, which I think just ends up tainting the message more than anything.

Edited June 4, 2007 by Pelinster

[Hagakure]

if moore twists the truth he is no better than the fox network when they do it.

doesnt matter what side you are on, lies are lies.

[Vertmorpheus]

yeah but it gave us all a nice cynicism fix for the day didnt it, and isn't that what the new millenium is all about?

" oh great, the cannonball guy... yeah HES cool...."

"dude... are you being sarcastic?"

"ahhhh I don't even know anymore...."

GD

[No_One]

doesnt matter what side you are on, lies are lies.

You have to look at human nature though, we tend to leave the important things till it's a do or die situation i.e. a body will continue in it's motion until acted upon by an equal and opposite force.

Whilever the ignorant think that things are fine they're gonna continue with their routine patterns of behaviour unless they are acted upon by a force that makes them change their routine patterns of behaviour, who knows, for some that force might be a sensationalised doco about the alternate possibilities of certain world changinf events?

Getting people to pay attention to alternate possible truths (i.e. lies) is a challenging proposal in contemporary times where where the accpeted way to sell lies is through things like celebrity, drama, flashing-lights, millions of dollars, etc.

Getting people to focus their attention for long enough on extreme left-wing propaganda has to have some effect in canceling out the bad effects we suffer as a result of all the extreme, uncensored right-wing propaganda filling our environment.

By doing this Moore looses his audience's trust, which I think just ends up tainting the message more than anything.

I know it's ambiguous a times as to wether Mike Moore knows he's got his finger stuck on the hyperbole button but you must admit, if he threw a doco together in the traditional format most people would simply zone out therefore no truth whatsoever would penetrate into his target audiences consciousness. Atleast what he does get's people talking/thinking about other possible realities/versions of events.

I can't condone the fact that he misrepresents facts to get that message across.

Judge his work and not the man, it's all art and I reckon he has succeeded in achieving what he set out to achieve i.e. getting non-thinkers thinking.

"The artist must know the manner whereby to convince others of the truthfulness of his lies"...Picasso

The Government feeds us their version of truth and it is rarely challenged so believing everything the Government says eventually becomes habitual to those that don't think for themselves.

The Western World is supposed to be Democratic but it's only Democratic at election time. IMO the style of Government we really have is a meshing of Socialist and Anarchistic agendas it's just that the Anarchists are so few and far between. With the style of government we have, without the Anarchists throwing what they see into the mix the Socialist agenda gets out of hand. This to me is what Mike Moore is trying to do i.e. present a different version of the truth to what the drones are used to in the hope that it negates some of the damage the Government has done to their minds.

Peace

[Hagakure]

I know it's ambiguous a times as to wether Mike Moore knows he's got his finger stuck on the hyperbole button but you must admit, if he threw a doco together in the traditional format most people would simply zone out therefore no truth whatsoever would penetrate into his target audiences consciousness.

i disagree. people can make interesting docos that dont contain blatant lies.

they do it all the time.

has anyone seen that new doco "crude"?

i havent seen it yet but have heard good things about it.

[devance]

http://english.people.com.cn/200706/05/eng...605_381021.html

A picture a new [purple fluorescent]arrow frog. Which nothing to do with the topic.

---------------------------------------------------------

I know one thing, TV has had it as educative force.

[was quoted by Swedish interviewers as saying, ""Michael Moore is a screwed asshole .... He is a horrible human being."]

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Ray_Bradbury...ision_0604.html

[No_One]

i disagree. people can make interesting docos that dont contain blatant lies

How many make it on to the big screen or into the mainstream though?

A man's gotta do what a man's gotta do and Mike Moores certaintly doing what he has to do to compete with likes of Hollywood, Disney Land, McDonalds, The Government, etc for the attention of the masses.

Most people don't give a shit about the subject of "worldly issues".

To sucessfully get people to give some quantity of shit about "worldly issues" he's obviously going to have to shed light on them in a style that will not only get but hold peoples attention, hence the sensationalism.

[Hagakure]

sensationalism means being striking or shocking to make an impression.

sensationalism doesnt equal making up stuff

by all means, people like moore should be sensational to get messages across to the mainstream viewer. they just shouldnt lie.

[Vertmorpheus]

I think it was terry pratchett of all people that had a good run-thru of "necessary lies"... "Educational lies"... his tale started out with you as a child, where you are told hospitals are where you go to get better.... then as an older child, you are told that they are where you go when youre sick to get better and not die... then as you becoem an adult you can handle the truth.... that a lot of people in there are just waiting to die. But tell a 7yo that when his dad is going in for a bypass and all hell braeks loose (I personally don't fib to kids but given most kids are full of lies anyway, one more doesnt do any harm). Likewise, light travels as rays... then particles... then waves... as you travel thru schooling.

Still... he doesn't need to bullshit. Noone saw the movie because they had already experienced the "potency" of the content... they saw it because they're "that kind of person" to start with, then made a rellie or a mate watch it, spread it around some. I find being overemphatic is a bit counter productive, most people have worked out by age 2 that half the things mum and dad insist are going to wind up hurting you never do... its usually the unmentioned hazards that end up as a bump on the scone.

I don't think anyone with more than a few properly firing braincells needs any kind of "seasoning" to believe that too many guns floating around probably isn't real safe, let alone the cultural aspects and background of those that tend to want one...I know people with guns... they don't believe Indonesia is the devil, or that whites are the master race, or that force equals righteousness...they just dont want to live anywhere where only the cops and soldiers have guns... cliche but it holds some kind of water I reckon. But check out the military fair at the table tennis centre near downey park in brissie sometime.... SCARY people. Two tables of stock, one is full of nazi daggers and emblems, the other full of shittily printed texts explaining how the holocaust never happened. One gun show we went to , I saw someone pull a ROCKET LAUNCHER (the 66, those groovy pull apart ones eg Falling Down?) from under the counter (which was covered in "white is right" and "who invented society" stickers) and start chatting with a bloke, until a surprisingly calm young policewomen came over and booked him, took it away, called his rellies to come and take his stall home.

As was said truthfully in the docco though, places such as Canada have just as many or more firearms...and a whole lot les sshootings. maybe guns don't kill people, just fuckwits.

off to buy some downpipe, endcaps and marine grease....

GD

[The Dude]

Not sure about the specific lies, in these sort of 'documentaries' you invest your trust and take their word for it, i'm not going to double check every 'fact' and research his reseach, that is the journalists job and we usually give them the benefit of the doubt. It concerns me when i see much of it was bullshit. I mean.. you always believe the leftie, you think this is the right side.. ermm by that i mean the left.. the Correct side, they (we) dont lie. i trust him.

Thing is even without the lies say its all true, the unnecesary sensalisation and tear-jerking bullshit was immediately obvious. It shows his respect for his audience and lets me know this movie is actually intended for children, (synonymous with mainstream culture) but I don't fall for the shit. Sensationalism = emotional manipulation = bullshit and an unenjoyable watch.

Sensationalism = necessary for penetration into mainstream, so good for him, i guess the cause is furthered and the msg is there. On the other hand our 'side' is now laughed at for being full of shit. I guess its insignificant relative to rightwing propaganda, but it does illegitimise our arguments some.

Point is he was sloppy about factoids and re-interpreted factoids into his own truths which he regurgitates into an 'entertaining' or atleast Sensational peice which has a significant impact on mainstream culture in raising awareness of Americas socio-political issues, Especially with Farenheight 911. Where he overlooked the Bush govt. "false Flag' conspiracy and mistook it for incompetence. 1st impact is raising awareness then raising doubts then raising questions, mostly steered in the direction of moores credibility but maybe.. JUST MAYBE it is going someway to train the public consciousness into a more skeptical and Aware society that questions its' mental hijakers. questions where exactly they're taking us.

Skepticism is ncessecary but then so is faith. Empiricism and the Faith of Materiality is the modern day solution to the scary problem of forming a reality foundation. The thing is that we revert back to the old back to a conservative perspective, to conserve traditions, of culture of reality for that familiarity that comforts us. We believe in what we see in front of me, not of what could be. Although we have much fear of what Could be, and thereby manifest those realities, we introduce nightmares into existance by feeding them, by getting stuck in whcihever negative thought loops, but on a larger transpersonal scale we all play a part. Moore teaches us to be skeptical of Authority, which is saying, do not place your trust into this authority but give it to me, give me authority over your trust, and then his skeptics say no do not trust him either, so who do you trust? who will lead the masses. I'm all for showing up flaws but where are the solutions? wheres the leadership.. i guess i want a messiah figure in my documentary film maker...

I guess the answer he provides is to present the big meanies with some kind of symbol of their mean-ness and hope we can guilt them into being less mean. cuz being mean back to them helps us none. But that bullshit with Charlton Heston and that photo of the girl was fucking stupid!

[Vertmorpheus]

Bullshitting? Lefties? Since when? For what? It's not like they're trying to sell books/movies/articles/doccos/websites to us or anything, or just make a name for themselves as tuned in dissident types.... oh... thats right.My mistake!

Off to wonder why people bother...

GD

[The Dude]

Bullshitting? Lefties? Since when? For what? It's not like they're trying to sell books/movies/articles/doccos/websites to us or anything, or just make a name for themselves as tuned in dissident types.... oh... thats right.My mistake!

Off to wonder why people bother...

GD

gah ur a smartarse, no shit every1 is in it for the money. the only thing is my exposure to leftie media was mostly pretty fair and accurate it seemed. stuff by john pilger or interviews with noam chomsky.. most anything on sbs although they also had some obvious sensationalist propaganda bullshit. Still with the seemingly good quality journalism on sbs i saw the awful truth that managed to laugh at some tragic realities. it was a great program i thought. It was obviously entertainment and I guess it's dumb to believe an entertainer will make a proper effort to be accurate with his facts and not make shit up and rearrange peoples quotes, still i'm onto this whole trusting people initially thing i dont believe people have malicious intentions to fool people, even if they DO wanna make a buck i figure they've cleverly arranged facts into entertainment and sold out. Not necessary to lie cheat or steal to make money, but i guess it IS easier.

[chilli]

Shiva, I don't really understand some of your comments... I agree that films that hope to infect mass consciousness might need to be flashy and well produced, but I don't see how that justifies dishonesty... you ask why can't an opposing version of the truth also be wrong? It can be, but unfortunately it means it is then wrong, which puts it on the same level as whatever it is trying to refute. Opposing lies with more lies just seems so blatantly counterproductive to me.

GreenCaveFloat, there is a very important difference between unavoidable bias and outright lying... any documentary or book or whatever presents the author's perspective, but this is drastically different from purposely distorting facts or taking people's comments out of context to present something that is false.

Overall, I agree that Moore's film was better than nothing, but I just think how much better it could have been if he wasn't such a fat, smug hypocrite.

[Vertmorpheus]

A smartarse? On the internet? Where?

There's a lot to be said for the feet of clay idea ;) Everyone wipes their own bum... well... more or less everyone. The godly are not God, and any truth can later become a falsehood... thats why we have so many words meaning "bullshit". BUt those that bullshit for good reasons tend to at worst look silly... those that bullshit for evil reasons (andrew bolt on a stick, anyone?) end up looking, well, evil.All liars are not bad people,but it makes even good people look a bit dodgy. So then no matter what other truths they DID pass on to you, they are coloured by the upfucks they make in their presentation.We end up feeling personally ripped off, whether we have been or not.

I tell ya, theres enough nutes in Mr Moore and Mr Gore to start quite a nice vegetable garden for some simple tribal culture. somewhere.

GD

[chilli]

A smartarse? On the internet? Where?

Surely not!?

GD, what is a nute? And what does Al Gore have to do with this?

[No_One]

you ask

Not trying to be a smartarse but I wasn't asking the question I was simply posing it for people to ponder.

I don't really understand some of your comments

Which ones, where am I losing you? Do you really want to know or are ya taking the piss?

unfortunately it means it is then wrong, which puts it on the same level as whatever it is trying to refute.

Define lies, you need truth before you can lie. What's the truth?

"There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so"...Shakespeare.

Opposing lies with more lies just seems so blatantly counterproductive to me.

Pretty tired but here goes.

Imagine the truth is a ferrous ten-pen bowling ball. Each of the gutters of the lane your playing in are magnets of equal magnitude.

Roll the ball and what happens, it stays in the middle and you get a strike.

Now, by some form of magic, the right gutter has found a way to increase it's attracting power. The right gutter now becomes a more powerful magnet than the magent in the left gutter and hence has a bigger influence of the ball i.e. the truth.

Roll the ball again and what happens? The ball i.e. the truth veers to the right under the influence of the now more powerful right gutter.

If the aim is to bowl strikes you want the ball to travel down the middle of the alley (unless you can bowl them cool curvy ones like the pro's) but that's pretty hard when your balls being pulled to the right all the time.

How could you fix up your alley and bowl strikes again? You could add more magnets to the the left gutter or you could start taking away some of the extra magnets the right gutter has mysteriously pulled out it's arse.

In this lies are the magnets that guide the ball, do you want the ball pulled one way all the time or running straight down the middle of the alley?

Peace

[chilli]

Hi Shiva, I wasn't taking the piss at all, no need to be defensive. Whether your question "if one sides portrail of truth is wrong why can't the other sides verision be wrong aswell?" was supposed to be rhetorical or not, I think I answered it pretty fairly... I simply pointed out that if it was as you suggested then both versions would be wrong.

I wasn't referring to truth in some ultimate sense, just observable facts like for instance what someone is recorded on camera as saying... if someone else comes along and cuts their words out of context and puts it into another context it can appear as if they were saying something very different to what was really said. In this case, the 'truth' is what was really said and the 'lie' is the distortion of what was said. Any reasonable person can check the recording and determine whether the message was distorted or not. I'm sure you understand this, and if you really believe differently, why are you bothering to have this conversation?

Then again, you did say you were "trying to be a smartarse"

Edited June 6, 2007 by IllegalBrain

[apothecary]

I wasn't referring to truth in some ultimate sense, just observable facts like for instance what someone is recorded on camera as saying..

Thanks for that, my issue here is that Shiva (and others!) seem to hold the right up to the standard of ultimate truth, which they do not meet, therefore they are evil, however it is ok for their "opponents" to not meet that same standard as long as it is for the "right cause".

How very antinomian.

Shiva, if neither side is telling the "truth" by your definition, and that's alright, then what exactly is wrong with the opposite of left?

[No_One]

my issue here is that Shiva (and others!) seem to hold the right up to the standard of ultimate truth, which they do not meet, therefore they are evil, however it is ok for their "opponents" to not meet that same standard as long as it is for the "right cause".

The right i.e. the Government, the Ruling Body, the System, the Man, etc. has become the nipple from which the masses of Western Civilization have become dependant upon to ease their existential anxiety, by doing this they are escaping actual reality to instead put there head in the sand

If that nipple never meets any resistance it'll steer itself wherever the fuck it wants and then drum up some sort of justification for what ever it does.

Shiva and others realise this aspect of reality and hence respect people brave enough to make the type of noise that makes it hard for the nipple to do whatever the fuck it wants.

The nipples had it too easy in the past, now that technology has given thinkers have a means to spread alternate information to the masses they are doing so and ruffling a few feathers in the process.

What does the nipple want to do? Your guess is as good as mine, WS threw some possibilities at us but IMO they were very extreme possibilities, still they were possibilities all the same.

Ultimately the nipple wants to manifest it's ideals, what about those that don't agree with their ideals?

Are you happy with the damage the nipple has caused to Gaia or the general Mental Health of humanity?

The masses answer to the Government but who does the government answer to?

I tried to get a thread going to discuss this here: Civilization

How very antinomian

I don't subscribe to religion and I'm not patriotic (unless it's sport related), If you need to call me something call me Universal.

"And me, I still believe in paradise. But now at least I know it's not some place you can look for, 'cause it's not where you go. It's how you feel for a moment in your life when you're a part of something, and if you find that moment, it lasts forever"....Leonardo Diccaprio's character in The Beach

What's the common thread that links us all and ultimatley all life, consciousness, matter, etc are part of?

"You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race"....George Shaw (I think)

Shiva, if neither side is telling the "truth" by your definition, and that's alright, then what exactly is wrong with the opposite of left?

Nothing at all, all oppinions/versions of reality are equally valid but do you take what your told as gospel or do you wait and see what percentage of that "truth" remains after you've scrutinized it?

Your mind loses it's lustre if you don't scrutinize what you let into it.

"The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds"....John Keynes

A large percentage of the global population don't scrutinize what goes into there minds, they take the first thing they are told and run with it, it's a side-effect of the "stick with the pack and do what your told" mentality.

"In religion and politics, people's beliefs and convictions are in almost every case gotten second hand, and without examination"....Mark Twain

Any reasonable person can check the recording and determine whether the message was distorted or not. I'm sure you understand this, and if you really believe differently, why are you bothering to have this conversation?

Then again, you did say you were "trying to be a smartarse"

Nice one!

We need more "reasonable person(s)", Mike Moore blasting equal and opposite lies holds the standard "believe what your Government tells you" mentality up to the spotlight which an unreasonable person should find rather cathartic and hence become less unreasonable.

Unreasonable Persons Mind:

"if Mike Moore can spin shit like that then why doesn't the Goverment do it.....Hang on.... maybe they already do!...Holy Shit!....I better start checking my facts from now on!"

By producing artwork that can successfully hold the attention of the unreasonable while he puts the "believe what your Government tells you" mentality up for scrutiny he should yield more "reasonable person(s)".

If the unreasonable become reasonable by checking their facts from now on then Mike Moore has had a victory.

Peace

[apothecary]

I think it is rather silly to think that "unreasonable" (by this I guess you mean people who you don't agree with) people who recognise MMs lies are going to do anything but dismiss them and go back to the "nipple".

Your logic seems circular.

[No_One]

It takes time, of course those that are too far gone are going to head back to the nipple but the youngsters i.e. the future will benefit from being aware that this sort of thing goes on and they can be conscious of it when they formulate an understanding of reality.