MITCHELL MCIVOR
Opinions Writer

When I awoke the morning of Oct. 22, the day after the controversial George Bush presentation, I was eager to hear what our local media had to say about the issue.

I turned on my TV and opened my newspaper expecting to hear the arguments of both sides in an attempt to learn why some were willing to pay good money to see George W. Bush and why others were willing to take time from their busy schedules to protest him. Regardless of how one personally felt about the issue, we were all owed this kind of objective reporting.

Instead of the objective reporting I expected, however, I found the media’s portrayal of the event to be quite the opposite.

For those who did not witness the event, around 300 people met at the farmers’ market and peacefully marched to the street opposite TCU Place where they then received speeches from local business owners, peace activists, students, lawyers and even a soldier who spent nine months fighting in Iraq. This group comprised students, professionals and citizens of all walks of life who can all be considered intelligent, rational people.

On the opposite side of the street waiting in line to get into TCU Place were around 2,000 individuals who had purchased tickets to see Bush talk. This group similarly comprised students, professionals and citizens from all walks of life who can also be considered intelligent, rational people.

Finally, one last group comprising around 40 individuals positioned themselves nearer to those going to the Bush talk, on the opposite side of 22nd Street across the street from the other 300 protestors. This group, while their enthusiasm was something to be admired, differed from the bulk of the protestors in what they were saying.

This group of 40 expressed notions that the 9-11 attacks were propogated by the U.S. government. They made personal attacks on George Bush, saying he was unable to read or form a sentence. They gave those going to see the talk the middle finger and even told them they were going to hell for attending such an event.

It is important to note, however, that these views were not expressed by the 300 other protestors who sat on the opposite side of the street and whose only real form of communication with those waiting in line was chants of “Bush go home,” “Arrest Bush now” (speaking to the war crimes they felt him guilty of) and “Sold out” (referring to those who had paid to see Bush talk). This was how the event took place. Oddly enough this was not how the local media portrayed it.

On television, CBC ran a two minute clip of the event in which the 300 protestors were shown marching for ten seconds and then not shown again, instead represented by footage and interviews of the 40 individuals expressing the aforementioned opinions like 9-11 being an inside job, which were again in no way indicative of the opinions of the vast majority of the protestors.

The StarPhoenix did a better job of explaining both sides of the event via a few different articles yet also included an article by Les MacPherson in which he cited the views of the 40 more radical protestors, presented them as representative of all of the protestors and then basically called the protestors incompetent based on views the majority of them did not hold or express.

Such misrepresentation of the protestors is far from responsible journalism and gives the public a skewed version of what went on that morning.

Bush was once one of the most powerful people in the world and there is no denying that he has changed our world. One need not justify to anyone why they went to see him speak and I am glad our local media was able to convey all the reasons people admire him (such as his strong morals and his ability to act in an undeniably difficult situation).

I am disappointed the other side of the story was dominated by a minority group of protestors with radical views generally unrepresentative of the protestors as a whole.

I find it sad that CBC could fail to even mention the reasons most protestors were there including Bush being the aggressor in a war not sanctioned by the UN and Bush detaining and torturing an array of terrorist suspects without trials.

This misrepresentation in the media is again proof that we must read and watch all our news with a critical mind.