Fox News stoops to digital graffiti

July 3, 2008

I know I mentioned this briefly yesterday, but I’m still flabbergasted.

It’s pretty common for children to take pictures of people they don’t like and manipulate them, perhaps with crayons. They’ll black-out a tooth, draw a mustache, add glasses, draw earrings, etc.

What’s breathtaking, however, is when a major news outlet acts the exact same way, only instead of children with crayons, we have Fox News using Photoshop. If you haven’t seen this video, by way of Media Matters, be sure to take a look.

You’ll notice in the clip that the hosts of Fox News’ “Fox & Friends,” Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade, are complaining about an alleged “hit piece” on the Republican network, published in the New York Times by Jacques Steinberg and Steven Reddicliffe. They showed pictures of both Times staffers.

However, Fox News digitally altered the images of both, yellowing Steinberg’s and Reddicliffe’s teeth, exaggerating noses, darkening eyes, and eliminating hair.

I’ve been following Fox News’ travails for quite some time, and this might be the single most ridiculous thing the partisan network has ever done. And given its track record, that’s not a claim I make casually.

Please take a minute to go to Media Matters’ piece on this, so you can see the actual pictures of the Times’ journalists and what Fox News did to manipulate them.

According to a report in E&P, the Times’ Culture Editor Sam Sifton called FNC’s photo alterations “disgusting,” and the criticism of the paper’s reporting “a specious and meritless claim.” Asked if the paper planned to respond to Fox News actions, Sifton said the Times would not: “It is fighting with a pig, everyone gets dirty and the pig likes it.”

And what does Fox News have to say about this? In a striking display of cowardice, the network hasn’t responded to requests for comment, and “Fox & Friends” did not mention the incident this morning.

In just the past few weeks, Fox News has been forced to apologize repeatedly for its on-air antics. First, Fox News contributor Liz Trotta joked that she’d like to see Barack Obama killed. (She apologized and faced no punishment for her remark.) Second, Fox News anchor E.D. Hill said the fist-bump between Barack and Michelle Obama might be a “terrorist fist jab.” (Hill later “clarified” that she didn’t mean it.) More recently, the network characterized Michelle Obama as “Obama’s baby mama,” a slang phrase for an unwed mother who gets no support from a baby’s father. (Fox News acknowledged that this was an example of “poor judgment.”)

I appreciate the fact that Fox News doesn’t care about respect or journalistic standards, but an apology to Steinberg and Reddicliffe is obviously in order.

Those reminded me of the Nazi propoganda films where they greatly exaggerated Jewish peoples’ facial features to make them seem less human.

The parallels between Fox and the Nazi propoganda machine are quite abundant.

  • Isn’t there some sort of regulation of the news media? Either by a self-governing industry body or some other organization?? Oh, wait…there is a little group called the FCC that I found when I googled on the subject.

    From their website: The FCC was established by the Communications Act of 1934 and is charged with regulating interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite and cable.

    Hmmm…I bet they’ll slap Fox with some penalties, I’ll bet.

  • Fox and Friends is a joke. Don’t forget this episode of Fox and Friends where the Friends fell for an Onion Style Fake News parody involving a fake cafeteria food fight at a real high school.

    The Friends reported the story as fact defaming the school administrator subjecting him to threats and intimidation. Seems that the Onion style Parody had the administrator formulating anit-Ham response plans to protect muslim students from pork and the like. Angry wingnuts took it upon themselves to harrass the administrator.

    The Friends only got off the hook, when the Judge ruled that extreme stoopidity is a defense to defamation allegations. And that the Friends were extremely stoopid and thus not liable.

    I am not making this up.

  • for better or worse, cable content regulation is very, very light. (as is broadcast content regulation, really, its just that in theory there is regulation of broadcast content, for cable it doesn’t even exist in theory.)

    the theory being that broadcast operates on over-the-air spectrum, which is a scarce public resource, and therefore the use of it — for free, no less — comes with obligations to operate in the public interest (also known as a hook for regulation notwithstanding the First Amendment).

    because cable in theory operates on a privately-constructed, wired broadcast network — no finite amount of spectrum, not a public resource — such public interest regulation is allegedly not necessary and there is no hook for regulation to get around the First Amendment.

    disclaimer: not saying i agree that any of the above is as it should be, just noting the theoretical underpinnings of how it presently is.

  • It’s hard to believe that FOX was stupid and/or arrogant enough to think that they wouldn’t get caught in such a transparent fake. OTOH, the howls that would come from FOX should say, Keith Olbermann, pull the same stunt on some of their people would be heard twenty miles out to sea.

  • Manipulating news photos without acknowlegement is a huge journalistic no-no. This is a big deal. Has Fox been manipulating other photos on its broadcasts?

  • Ya know, it sure would be nice if Steinberg, Reddicliffe and especially The New York Fucking Times were demanding that Fox apologize, instead of relying on all of us DFHs to do their dirty work for them.

    Once again, I’d remind the media that the first one of them to move back into the reality-based world would have a ready-made audience and attendant riches undreamed of waiting for them. Once again, I’d remind myself that they are corporate media and will never do any such thing.

  • Anyone else remember the weeks of shrieking from FOX about the digitally enhanced smoke in some of the pictures from Lebanon? Or how FOX “experts” declared that the dead civilians in other pictures were not representative of the real situation there?
    FOX News: We distract, you decide.

  • Why is anyone surprised by this? This is what Fox does – over and over again. To assume that they are not very intelligent is a misreading of their intent. They are very intelligent. They know what they are doing and they know why they are doing this. And they don’t care if their twisting of facts is exposed by Media Matters. MM is not their target audience. Their target audience is the people who watch Fox.

    No, Fox is not dumb in doing what they are doing, but they are counting on their audience to be dumb enough to swallow their propaganda. And it seems to be working pretty well.

    As I said in a previous post here – this campaign is a war of deception. And Fox is one of many,surrogates who are waging this war against Obama and liberals.

  • What’s really annoying is they did such a bad job of Photoshopping. Apparently figured that if their viewers can’t read, perhaps they can’t see so well either.

  • Those reminded me of the Nazi propoganda films where they greatly exaggerated Jewish peoples’ facial features to make them seem less human.

    Um … not to be the turd in the punchbowl, but America did that as well with Germans and especially Japanese in our posters. Dr. Seuss even did a few of them (he regretted it later).

    That does not, however, change your central point: That this manipulation of images is nothing more than propaganda designed to elicit emotional reactions against something. In this case, those darn fact-users* at the New York Times.

    (*Note: “Fact-users” only applies to a small subset of people employed by the media. A stunningly, disturbingly small subset.)

  • What’s really annoying is they did such a bad job of Photoshopping. -Georgette Orwell

    No kidding. It’s such a hack job the cloning is obvious even without the original image to compare it to, not to mention the smudging attempt to blend on the one gentleman’s forehead.

    If you’re going to lie with Photoshop, at least hire a decent ‘shopper.

  • Fox News digitally altered the images of both, yellowing Steinberg’s and Reddicliffe’s teeth, exaggerating noses, darkening eyes, and eliminating hair. — CB

    I’m sure that Faux did it only for their protection; given how well armed and excitable Faux’s audience is, it is better that the NYT’s journos not be easily recognizable.

    PS. It’s not just children who indulge in altering photos; teenagers do it too. Every November, when Warsaw was decorated with posters celebrating the October Revolution ( sounds strange, I know. But Russia didn’t change its calendar till much later than the rest of the world), Lenin got “dressed up” with extra facial hair. And I’m told that even today, before elections, the posters of the less popular candidates get “ornamented” also and it’s not done by tots.

  • If anyone here is good with photoshop, I’d love a picture of Lex Steele giving Rupert Murdoch some tough love.

  • I don’t know why everyone is making much ado about this.
    Look, everybody knows you watch fox not for its news worthiness,
    but for its silliness.You catch fox and friends while surfing and if you
    think something is funny, you stop and laugh at them and move on.
    You don’t take this “noise” personalities seriously, they are like clown that
    make the morning fun. Seriously people get a life and don’t forget to
    grab the National Enquirer at the W-mart stand, it’s freeeeeeeeee.

  • Maybe during the next public speech by Barack Obama, the morning host “journalists” can sneak up behind him and make a “V” sign behind his head. Or ring Nancy Pelosi’s doorbell and run away.

  • Notice that Kilmeade and Doocy don’t actually refute anything written in the article by Steinberg and Reddicliffe.

  • Actually, they made Steinberg’s hair BIGGER.

    The doctoring of Steinberg’s photo was the more obvious of the two, and the most obviously racist. They pretty much just made Reddicliff look older, but their manipulation of Steinberg’s photo was right out of the Nazi propaganda handbook.

    When, oh please when, will the MSM call Faux News on this crapola..

  • Fox and Friends isn’t transmitted with the intent of being consumed publicly. Hence, the FCC doesn’t actually have rights to interfere with their speech.

    That’s why the FCC is having trouble cutting down some of the fraud products advertised on cable.

  • Fire with fire. I think Jon Stewart or Coubert could do follow-ups using facial distortions to mimick Hannity or some, O’Riely, or some other dork from Fox Noise and add it to some comic dialog. Wait, those guys already look pretty weird…

  • I love it! The power of visual media. Two NYT reporters make some untrue remarks about FOX and FOX gives it to them with some “artistic licensing.”

    Both guys were just as ugly before the fixin’ as after.

    Everyone on the comment board who is comparing the photoshopping of a couple of losers at the “Dusty Gray Lady” to Goebbels propaganda machine needs to calm down and quit taking themselves so seriously.

    Fox and Friends: Thanks for the laughs!

  • I might start watching Fox news if they embraced the concept of silly exaggerated news a la Daily show (but not as funny or accurate)

    Watching now would make me think I was lending them credibility.
    They might get better ratings if they drop the pretense.

    Black out the teeth! Make Al Gore cross eyed! Go for it! It’d be a hoot!

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