rantspace.org - Farenheit 9/11

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I actually really enjoyed the movie.

You have to take everything with a grain of salt but hopefully it allows people to go and educate themselves on the issues rather than listen continually to one side.

There was a great talk about it last night on ABC's Critical Mass. As one of the people said in America there is no equivalent to the leader of the opposition and so basically the media act as a form of opposition in giving a second point of view. Mike Moore is an extreme example of this but he admits this himself.

I understand there are issue but the scenes of the recruiters targeting the poorer areas really bugged me.

I just hope that people look at all sides of the coin to make a decsion. In that vein have a look at MM's own website www.michaelmoore.com to get his rebuttal of the above article. And then make up your own mind!

Posted by: DK The Elder on August 2, 2004 12:25 PM

But he lies alot.

For example, Moore goes to Washington and asks Congressmen why they have no children in Iraq. And he states "Not a single member of Congress wanted to sacrifice their child for the war in Iraq." That's perfectly truthful because not one sane person alive wants to sacrifice their child for a war.

But what he doesn't say is that some members of congress have had sons serving in Iraq. In fact seven congressmen have sons serving in the military. This is not disclosed. He asks Representative Kennedy if he would send his son to Iraq. To which Kennedy responded his son was considering a career in the forces and his nephew was currently en route to Afghanistan. Kennedy's response was edited out leaving Kennedy simply looking bewildered.

And he calls out to Congressman Michael Castle who is on the phone and waves him off. He is represented as another with no wish to sacrifice a child. What Moore does not point out though is that Castle is childless. He couldn't sacrifice a child even if he wanted to.

Posted by: b on August 2, 2004 04:15 PM

i haven't seen farenheit 9/11 yet, but one thing that bugged me a bit about bowling for columbine, is moore's tendency to look at issues that are a bit besides the point (well, in my opinion anyway).

eg, remember in bowling for columbine, when he focused on the 4 year old girl who had been shot dead in her kindergarten or prep class by another classmate, i don't recall the exact details, but i'm pretty sure the little boy had found the gun lying around his house, his single mother worked two jobs just to get by and obviously wasn't paying enough attention to what her son was up to.

moore made a point of tracking down the directors of the company that the mum worked for and almost tried to make them take responsibilty for this tragedy. (well that's what it seemed like to me, but hey, everyone's biased).

anyways, to me, this seemed rather farfetched. its not this guy's fault that a little girl was shot dead by a boy who took a gun from his home to school. sure, maybe the mother has "no choice but to work two jobs", but to want to hold her senior level boss liable for this event is besides the point.

what's the real issue here?? inadequate childcare options, easy access to firearms, promotion of violence to children through the media, lack of role models - to name a few.

surely the director of a fast food chain should not be held liable for society's ills....well, not necessarily in this debate - let's not get started on obesity problems!

i haven't seen farenheit 9/11 so i probably shouldn't comment because i don't know how much screen time moore dedicates to the whole 'would you send your child to war' issue - but come on. I would think that the ADULTS in the USA's armed forces are there by CHOICE and understand that at some stage, they may be called on to give up their lives for their country.

Sure, we all hope that such a situation never arises, and we like to trust that our democratically elected leaders will do their best to resolve conflicts peacefully - no one wants their child to go to war. But personally I reckon that if you're in the armed forces, and you have made a conscious decision to be there, then take the positive aspects of your job with the negative ones like everyone else does.

What's the point of getting elite weapons training and being taught the most efficient ways to kill opponents??

But hey, maybe that's just me.

And I like to think myself as a pacifist who believes that conflicts can be resolved without violence, just for the record. Perhaps one day we can phase out the armed forces when we learn to resolve our conflicts without force.

Anyway, in this day and age, no one should get all their information from one source, and its good to see people questioning what they are fed and doing their own research. Kudos to Moore for making people sit up and take notice of important issues that they might not always be passionate about.

Believe what you wanna believe, but educate yourself through a variety or sources. (Yes I know I should practise what I preach and do more research for this comment)

Critical Mass is a good show, I wish it was longer. Um, I think that's all.

Posted by: Em on August 2, 2004 09:48 PM

I would love to comment on the film, and your review, but I too have not seen 911. However, I know the Americans have been fed a stream of bullshit for years now, culminating in the invasion of another country, and we have happily swallowed similar shit and joined in the invasion. It's nice that an opposing voice can be heard so loudly. If he lies (and the jury is out here, as omitting facts is a bit different to blatant lying), then, to be honest, I don't care. He is trying to show the state of the nation, and it is bad. Maybe he needs to bend the truth to make the facts more obvious. Maybe he is doing it all for personal reasons, and Bush is actually a saint (and Johnny a little angel), but somehow, I doubt it.

Posted by: Sparker on August 3, 2004 09:45 AM

I have seen Farenheit 9/11 so I can comment (not that that has stopped anyone yet).

It is one sided. It is not entirely truthful. It is however not meant as entertainment. It is a piece of biased propaganda and I hope many millions of Americans see it.

George Bush has told so many lies, distorted the thruth and kept so many things hidden that it is hardly surprising that Moore feels he needs to go to similar extremes to get peoples attention. Moore has publicly stated that he is out to get Bush and will not stop until he has left the White House. Personally I think this is a good thing.
There are some parts of the film which I felt didn't need as much attention as they were given, but they might be the parts that motivate enough people to vote against Bush to get him out.

It is unfortunate that the film needs defending in this way, but I sure hope it works.

On a side note, little angel Johnny Howard is aware that the film is Bush-bashing but suggested that there might be someone in Australia who thinks the same of him the Moore does of Bush.

If only he knew how many of us there are...

Posted by: fel on August 3, 2004 11:09 PM

Are not all documentaries bias? It is impossible to present any story without some bias.

I admit that he is politically skewed to the point where he is willing to manipulate the footage (using final cut pro, damn mac lover) for the desired effect.

He is not against bullshitting either. Example from Bowling for Columbine:

1. You cannot walk into that Bank and walk out with a new Account and gun, it took around 1-2 weeks before they have finished checking your background and allow the gun offer.

2. That footage used of the NRA meeting was portrayed to be several days after the columbine shooting but they were so heartless as to come anyway, it was footage from months before the shooting.

Moore loves using statistics to proove his point of view, 58% of people know that :)

Comparing the number of guns in America to Canada he advises there are comparable numbers of guns, yet Canada has a vastly reduced homicide rate.

Moore must have forgotten to mention that Canada's firearms are largely made up of hunting rifles, unlike America's pistols, semi auto guns and sporting weapons like the tek9 (pretty much a semi auto version of the scorpian sub machine gun).

In the end i'd rather have Moore making left wing documentaries compared to someone of his talent making right wing documentaries.

I don't disagree with most of Moore's opinions but I didn't think much of him ambushing Charlton Heston at the end of Columbine, what's the point of questioning a clearly confused elderly man with dementia, specially when the questions are those that cannot be answered by anyone. Cheap.

Posted by: trauma on August 24, 2004 10:44 AM

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