| ▲ | ExoticPearTree 5 hours ago |
| Why all the quotation marks in the article? It's not like they interviewed toddlers that said funny things. |
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| ▲ | afavour 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| It’s in quotation marks because it’s a quotation. The BBC have not independently verified that the Houthis have taken control of the island, they are reporting what a government source has said. |
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| ▲ | blitzar 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | They need to start doing this when other "regimes" make wild claims. | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | They always have. It's funny to see the evolution of language. Quotation marks indicated that something was a direct quote. Then people started to use them as a sarcasm indicator. Now we're to the point where people can't even recognize them as indicating a direct quote. | | |
| ▲ | tovej 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | I think the parent was pointing out that Israel's or USA's claims are usually stated without quotes, such as: Israel invades Lebanon due to risk of Hezbollah attacks rather than: Israel says "risk of Hezbollah attacks" reason for invasion | | |
| ▲ | sanderjd 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I'm unconvinced that this is a pattern that is distinguished by the nation being reported on. Headlines vary. Both of your example headlines might appear at different times in the outlets I read. I think this was just a stylistic choice and that this whole thread is a weird tangent. | | | |
| ▲ | Cyph0n 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | A few more examples: “40 beheaded babies” and mass/systematic rape propaganda accepted with zero verification (journalism 101) and, once debunked, zero retractions were made Hamas-run, but not Likud-run Condemnation of atrocities by Israel and the US that comes from Israeli and Western voices is given significantly more weight than the same claims coming from Palestinian or Arab voices. After all, the native lacks the capacity to be objective. Israeli gov statements are taken as undeniable fact, while Palestinian (Gaza or West Bank) gov spokespeople or even Palestinian people in general are barely even platformed Over-representation of Zionists in editorial teams of every major newspaper and news channel across all Western countries, which (naturally) led to coordinated suppression of any Palestinian voice internally and externally (started to change only relatively recently). And the list goes on. | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | As far as I can find, every mention of beheaded babies in the BBC is explicitly a statement of other people's claims and not a statement of fact. | | |
| ▲ | Cyph0n an hour ago | parent [-] | | I was not talking specifically about the BBC. On the BBC specifically, try reading through their articles, especially from early on, and tell me what the editorial slant is. Yes, most of the content is neatly wrapped in quotation marks, but what picture were they trying to paint? On UK media in general: https://www.declassifieduk.org/beheaded-babies-how-uk-media-... My point is that both UK and Western media immediately jumped on and recirculated the claim in the first few days without confirmation. This was just enough to sear the image of beheaded babies into the minds of viewers & readers in the West, helping to justify Israel’s campaign to starve out the “human animals” and raze Gaza (a least in the mind of the avg citizen). |
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| ▲ | megous 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | There's a well researched report on this bias: https://cfmm.org.uk/resource/bbc-on-gaza-israel-one-story-do... | | |
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| ▲ | jimbokun 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I don't think that's true and would be curious to see evidence otherwise. I believe BBC and other outlets with journalistic standards use quotes when reporting what officials say and only drop the quotes when they have independent verification, like eyewitness reports from one of their own journalists. | |
| ▲ | frereubu 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Are there good examples of this from the BBC? Genuine question - no snark intended. | | |
| ▲ | blitzar 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | US insists Strait of Hormuz is open as it exchanges strikes with Iran - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cj9gkpp0dkeo Iran says Strait of Hormuz is 'open' but tracking shows few ships moving - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwydexp39ddo | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | Those have the same implication even if it's written slightly differently. "US insists" makes it clear that "open" is a claim by the US, not an independent fact. The first one doesn't match the supposed pattern where one side's claims are stated as facts, despite the lack of quotation marks. | | |
| ▲ | frereubu 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | I think it's a fair example given how untruthful the US administration has been about whether the strait is "open" or not compared to the practical reality. Both would work with or without quotes, but the Iranian one is quoted. Still doesn't show systematic bias, but it's what I asked for. | | |
| ▲ | wat10000 an hour ago | parent [-] | | I'm pretty sure the Iranian one is quoted because they used the word, whereas the US one is not quoted because the statements that the reporting was pulled from never used the actual word "open." I see how it would read as bias if one interprets them as scare quotes, but it really does just mean "this is verbatim" when used here. |
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| ▲ | meowface 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I am not saying this is necessarily incorrect but is it empirically actually true. Have people compared lots of different articles. | | |
| ▲ | bandofthehawk 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | Yes, it's been true for a long time. See the book "Manufacturing Consent" for example, but there's been lots of research since. There are numerous ways that the western media biases news to build support for the objectives of those in power. |
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| ▲ | omnicognate 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I don't see anything stated as fact (without quote marks) here solely on the basis of Trump having said it, and I see use of quote marks for things he has said, eg. 'Trump says Iran war will end "immediately" after US midterm elections': https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/cp7r8vgl2lgt The BBC's main sin in relation to Trump is sane-washing, treating his bizarre outbursts as if they were reasonable things for a US president to say. Eg. were he to say "I have a solid gold prostate!" they'd have an Anthony Zurcher piece entitled "Is Trump's prostate really made of gold?" with a quote from a doctor saying "while it seems unlikely and would probably be uncomfortable, having a gold prostate would be unlikely to cause any noticeable side effects as the metal is inert" and a discussion of the benefits of replacing a cancer-prone organ with a noble metal. | | |
| ▲ | jimbokun 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | There is no way to win that battle. Not reporting on Trump is not an option because his words and actions have huge ramifications for the world. I think in general the press has gotten much better at just straight up saying that Trump is lying or wrong, as opposed to previous policy of only reporting counter claims from other parties. |
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| ▲ | jimbokun 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | They do. |
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| ▲ | huurtehoog 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | It has nothing to do with verification. They are simply reporting what sources have said: Houthis 'take control' of Perim Island - government source
published at 09:00 Houthi rebels have "taken control" of Perim Island in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, according to a source. Earlier, we were reporting that the group had reached the key island. The AFP news agency also says Houthis have "taken over" Perim Island, also referred to as Mayyun, according to eyewitnesses and a local government official. "Boats carrying armed Houthi fighters reached Mayyun Island after government forces withdrew from it yesterday," the official tells AFP. | | |
| ▲ | afavour 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | My point about verification is simply that if the BBC had independently verified it’s true then they wouldn’t use the quote in the headline. They’d just say taken control without quote marks, because it wouldn’t be a quote. | | |
| ▲ | huurtehoog 2 hours ago | parent [-] | | My point is that they always use quotes when quoting even if it is verified by them to be true. Reporting discourse is different from reporting fact, and I do not know the BBC for reporting unverified discourse or facts. |
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| ▲ | nayroclade 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| This is completely standard journalistic practice when reporting a quote on something that is currently contentious or unproven. For example, consider the two hypothetical headlines: Activists decry police murder of protester Activists decry police "murder" of protester The first implies that the police murdering the protestor is an established fact. The second makes it clear that it is the activists who used the term "murder" rather than it being a non-contentious fact. |
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| ▲ | lkey 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Both versions are fancifully direct in our era a media+police stenography, try: Mayor denounces "radical activists" rioting and damaging city property in response to an officer-involved incident that resulted in one fatal kinetic altercation with a "loud and provocatively dressed" man. | | |
| ▲ | amiga386 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > officer-involved incident Ah, the past exonerative tense. https://archive.is/wPVdy Read McSweeney's guide to ambiguous grammar, where they lead you step by step from the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog to the ultimate say-nothing sentence speed was involved in a jumping-related incident while a fox was brown, and the punchline is you can then translate "the St Louis County Police Department was involved in an officer-involved shooting after officers came under heavy gunfire" to "a police officer shot a black person" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Michael_Brown) https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/an-interactive-guide-to-... But no, that's the language issued by police departments covering their asses. Journalists are a little bit covering their asses in making clear what is a quote and what isn't, but they're still responsible for what they choose to quote, and to be clear on whether they have verified the claims they're quoting. Ideally, unverified claims shouldn't even be in an article. But when there _has_ been some kind of stramash, they just don't know who did what, the need to rush out an article to get clicks means they'll just quote both sides and try to give them equal prominence until they can do more verification. | | | |
| ▲ | jimbokun 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Do the BBC or other outlets use "officer-involved incident" without quotes? It's generally police officials that use that terminology. |
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| ▲ | dylan604 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It doesn't help when snippets are post leaving out the other context clues where things like "according to" or "anonymous source stated" or similar attribute of the quote. Just putting words between quotation marks does not lead me to believe they were quotes if there is no attribution. Otherwise, it's a Trump level "people tell me" type of "quote". | |
| ▲ | JoshTriplett 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | In that case, that seems like a variation of the "past exonerative tense". | | |
| ▲ | gowld 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | Do you consider every trial defendant to be exonerated? |
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| ▲ | vanschelven 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Presumably to indicate that the parts in quotes are indeed quoted literally from the source that is mentioned in the same sentence? |
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| ▲ | jihadjihad 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journalism_ethics_and_standard... |
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| ▲ | nkoren 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| When I moved from the US to the UK, the use of quotation marks in news headlines was something that confused me. In the US, these would be "scare quote", with the quotation marks basically standing in for the words "so-called". In the UK, that is NOT their meaning. The quotation marks mean "we are not ourselves in a position to verify this, but it is the words that a source has told us". Very different meaning -- and once I got used to it, I think the UK use of language in this case is more honest and useful. tl;dr: two countries, divided by a common language. |
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| ▲ | gobip 5 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | This is like this in most of Europe: when in "quotes", it is not the journalist, but the person who said something. For example, Obama said "Yes we can". He did not say yes we can, he said "Yes we can". It is not about the quotes being verified or unverified. It is about something said by somebody, that you are reporting. | | | |
| ▲ | jameshart 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | It’s not so much ‘we are not in a position to verify’ as the fact that the person who said the thing, and what they said, is itself newsworthy. If you’re reporting that “Government sources say Houthis have ‘taken control’ of an island” then the fact that government sources used the words ‘taken control’ is itself interesting. The headlines “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Zelensky”, “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Putin”, and “Russia ‘will be defeated’ in Ukraine says Taylor Swift” all tell of vastly different news events. | |
| ▲ | jimbokun 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I don't think reputable US news outlets use quotation marks in the way you say they do. | |
| ▲ | shawnz 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Is it really a different meaning? Isn't the implication that they tried, and failed, to independently verify the claim? | | | |
| ▲ | cynix 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Does “so-called” not mean “words that someone has told us”? | |
| ▲ | NDlurker 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Huh? That's how quotation marks are used here in the US too | |
| ▲ | qw12kl 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | [flagged] |
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| ▲ | pessimizer 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It's a garbage habit that they've all fallen into. The quotes will fall away when future stories refer back to this story. That single quoted phrase was set in the context of other words, and that context defined its meaning. We know this to an extent that almost no one could have imagined since LLMs have become a huge part of the world. My favorite example of this is how no article in Britain during Corbyn's leadership of the labor party would ever quote an entire sentence that he had said. Thousands of articles, and the quotes were all fragmentary phrases and lone words framed in editorial. edit: Brits and the BBC especially do this more than most, likely because of their bizarre libel laws (that were once even worse than they are now.) |
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| ▲ | 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
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| ▲ | kevmo 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
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| ▲ | consumer451 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | No, this is actual journalism. When it's from a direct single source, it's a quote, not an agreed upon fact. | | |
| ▲ | kevmo 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | I would agree if they were actually quoting someone or if it was a more substantial quote. In this case, it appears to be an anonymous source. | | |
| ▲ | carlosjobim 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | From the text: "a government source says", "In a statement, the Houthis say", "The group also claims...", "They group's military spokesman claims...". |
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| ▲ | bcjdjsndon 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It's because they been taken to court for mindlessly parroting shit they hear, but instead of actually verifying the truth of the claim (ya know, the entire purpose of a journalist) they just put it in quotes as some kind of "buyer beware" disclaimer |
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| ▲ | carlosjobim 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | Journalism is just as much reporting what different influential people say, whether the underlying statement is true or not. > actually verifying the truth That's the job of the reader, not the journalist. Unless you're living under oppression. So you have misunderstood the purpose of reporting. |
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| ▲ | joejohnson 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| The BBC only assumes government sources as truth when it's from the crown or Israeli / US governments |
