Media Gets Punked, Again
In this year's version of the "Balloon Boy" fake news story, it was revealed today that the "Botox Mommy" story was a complete fabrication. In other words, those stalwart "journalists" -- busily gatekeeping their little hearts out to keep the mainstream media so very, very far above the blogosphere when it comes to fact-checking -- once again got punked. Not only did they get punked, but it actually cost them at least ten grand in the process.
From Salon's report on the matter (which relies heavily on a TMZ article):
It turns out Kerry [Campbell] (real name Sheena Upton) was paid $200 by [British tabloid] The Sun to write a story called "I Give My 8-Year-Old Daughter Botox." As Upton told TMZ, "I was provided with the story, instructions and a script to follow for a recorded interview." The saga unravels:
After the story ran in The Sun, Upton says she was approached by Good Morning America and Inside Edition, and claims she was offered "a large fee" to appear on camera. She went on both shows and re-told her story.
After the interview, child welfare officials took Upton's daughter away.
Finally realizing that maybe being the face of the world's worst mother wasn't worth the cash, Upton told her case to the child welfare agency, who took her daughter (whose name might not even be Britney, who knows) to a hospital to check to see if she'd actually had her body modified in any way.
"After my daughter received a full medical exam, the results indicated that she has not ever received treatments including Botox or other such injections."
Upton claims to have been offered $10K for Good Morning America, which is a hell of a lot more than what the Sun paid her. If that's true, it's hard to decide what's worse: that a sleazy newspaper would put out a call for a sensationalist fake story and pay so little, or that Good Morning America would pay so much to Upton, under the assumption that she actually did inject her child with a neurotoxin for the sake of beauty.
I'm going to go with the second choice at the end, there. It's worse that American television paid this woman ten thousand dollars than it is for a British tabloid to shell out two hundred bucks for a fake story.
Let's just assume for a moment that the story was actually real. Let's just ignore the whole "Has anyone fact-checked this story?" thing, for now. The story was that a mother who had some sort of nurse's certification had personally injected Botox into her daughter's face to remove wrinkles so the daughter would have a better chance on the beauty pageant circuit. She also said she had her daughter body-waxed, but that's less of an issue than injecting botulism into your daughter's face.
The story here (assuming, again, for the sake of argument that the mother's claims had been true) to any competent journalist would have been to lean on the state's child protective services department, and demand of the state government why this child hadn't been immediately removed from her mother's care. That was the story. Instead, a "morning news" show decided to get the mother on air as quickly as possible, and offered her ten thousand dollars cash to tell her side of the story to America. In other words, the producers of such a "news" show (I'm sorry, but the "scare quotes" are necessary) made the decision to support the mother's behavior by paying her so that she could (assumably) afford some more Botox injections for her little girl.
That's just sick. I'm sorry, but it's just heinous. The "journalists" get to act all high and mighty, and clutch their metaphorical handkerchiefs to their collective bosom over what a tragedy and a crime it all is -- while they pay her ten large. One wonders what they'd pay for an interview with any other criminal. The implications are just staggering. The more heinous the crime (assumably) the bigger the payout? [Fill in your own hyperbolic example as to where that could easily lead.]
So, despite the headline to this article, it really doesn't surprise me all that much that the American media got punked by this story. That can even be (try to) excuse themselves with the old nostrum about the demands of the "24/7 cable news cycle" and all of that tommyrot. "Everyone else was reporting it..." you can hear the media whine, to explain why they bought this story hook, line, and sinker. To which, of course, the adult response is: "If everyone else jumped off a bridge because someone said there was a juicy story to be gained by doing so, would you jump off the bridge with them?"
The real story, though, is not that the media went along on this particular ride. The real story is how much they were willing to fork out in hard, cold cash to a woman they were demonizing on an ongoing basis -- just to score that "exclusive interview." That is why the media should be hanging their heads in shame right now -- not just because they got the story so wrong.
[Grammatical Note: I don't care how much money Ashton Kutcher is now making; on general grammatical sensibilities I refuse to use his preferred term: "Punk'd." At least not until someone offers me ten thousand dollars to do so. Heh.]
-- Chris Weigant
Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant
To which, of course, the adult response is: "If everyone else jumped off a bridge because someone said there was a juicy story to be gained by doing so, would you jump off the bridge with them?"
If it would make a bigger story, I bet they would!!
Michale.....
...and that, in a nutshell, is exactly what is wrong with the so-called "mainstream" media. (i'm sure the "scare quotes" are warranted there as well.)
Chris, it's awful -- but is it surprising? After all, while the US was deploying 120,000 troops to the Middle East a full year before the invasion of Iraq, the same morning show was interviewing them from "secret locations" with their own network cameras. The MSM knew the preparations for war with Iraq were under way -- they had to know -- but they did not tell us. The Bushies played them like a fiddle in whipping up a case for war. Nothing changed in the last eight years because no one in the media ever pays a price for this kind of bad behavior.
The Bushies played them like a fiddle in whipping up a case for war.
Such control over the media is not just the purview of the Bush Administration..
Factual evidence proves that the Obama administration has a bigger stranglehold on the press than Bush could ever hope for..
And the press willingly allows it..
Michale.....
As long as people keep clicking on it, it's not going to get any better in the current system.
You get paid for viewership (or clicks). What drives viewership and clicks? Scandal.
*sigh*
I'm going to go make a donation to public radio during their fund drive.
-David
I'm going to go make a donation to public radio during their fund drive.
I don't see Public Radio being any better than the MSM....
Other than feeding at the Public trough, that is..
Michale......
I don't see Public Radio being any better than the MSM.
Maybe you should give it a listen. Or check out a world news service like the BBC.
Unless, that is, you feel you'd fall under the mind-corrupting spell of the news ... heheh.
-David
I have checked out both...
I actually like the BBC, for the most part, because they don't have the "tingle" effect regarding Obama that the US MSM has... :D
The BBC is not in the bag for Obama like the vast majority of the US MSM is, NPR included...
Michale.....
I don't care how much money Ashton Kutcher is now making; on general grammatical sensibilities I refuse to use his preferred term: "Punk'd."
"Dude, dude, rule one. No Kutcher references."
-Dean Winchester, SUPERNATURAL, My Heart Will Go On
:D
Michale....
Osborne -
You are 100% right about that "not ever paying a price" thing. Bill Kristol commands a stupendous salary so that he can prove to be wrong on every single issue he ever comments upon, for instance.
Michale -
I like the BBC because they treat the rest of the world as actual news, instead of just a footnote -- something the American media simply cannot do unless there's a natural disaster involved.
I've also been looking a Al Jazeera, because they are providing the best coverage of the day-to-day situation in Libya.
Oh, and my wife enjoyed your quote, as she is currently watching the season finale of "Supernatural." I only ever watch the show to see their cool car, myself...
:-)
-CW
Oh, and my wife enjoyed your quote, as she is currently watching the season finale of "Supernatural."
DON'T SAY A WORD!!!!!! I can't watch it until tonight.. :D
I only ever watch the show to see their cool car, myself...
Hehehehe
You should watch that MY HEART WILL GO ON episode.. It's hilarious!! I know you will love it...
Michale.....
Michale -
The only episode I enjoyed was the one that sent them back in time to the American West, a la Star Trek (TOS) into the OK Corral ("Spectre Of The Gun," I believe...). Hilarity ensued, but I still like the shots of the Impala, personally...
As Wikipedia puts it:
Growing up, Kripke connected to television shows that had signature cars, such as The Dukes of Hazzard and Knight Rider. This prompted him to include one in Supernatural. He originally intended for the car to be a '65 Mustang, but his neighbor convinced him to change it to a '67 Impala, since "you can put a body in the trunk" and because "you want a car that, when people stop next to it at the lights, they lock their doors." Kripke has commented, "It's a Rottweiler of a car, and I think it adds authenticity for fans of automobiles because of that, because it's not a pretty ride. It's an aggressive, muscular car, and I think that's what people respond to, and why it fits so well into the tone of our show."
Heh.
-CW
I never knew that... :D
He originally intended for the car to be a '65 Mustang,
Now you HAVE to watch the MY HEART WILL GO ON episode..
Trust me, you'll thank me...
Michale....
If you like the funny episodes, you'll also like THE FRENCH MISTAKE..
Sam & Dean are transported to an alternate reality (by Balthazar) where they are two actors named Jared Padalecki & Jensen Ackles and star in a TV show called "SUPERNATURAL"...
Dean:"No, seriously, why? Why would anybody want to watch our lives?"
Sam:"Well, according to that reporter who interviewed me, not many people do."
:D
Michale....
Oh My Gods!!!
Just finished the season finale of Supernatural!!
I am floored!!
Cas going dark side....
It's going to be a long, long summer...
Michale.....