Comments on: BREAKING NEWS: Peaceful Protesters in Peru Attacked, Killed

By: Carlo

Carlo — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 07:36:32 +0000

I urge you all to pick up a copy of Flat Earth News by Nick Davies, from the library or Amazon. You’ll get the low down on exactly how the media works. Of course, if he can be believed…but he’s a highly respected veteran journalist, and he has no shortage of evidence to the claims he makes. You will never read/watch another newspaper/news program the same way.

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By: Ryukyu Mike

Ryukyu Mike — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 04:49:33 +0000

Just got an email about a wildlife photo contest. Audobon Society has a trip tp the rain forest in Peru as a Grand Prize. One thing I can tell you from my experience, on both sides of massacres is this: There’s two sides to every story. It’ll take awhile for peace and the truth to break-out.

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By: Julie Schwietert

Julie Schwietert — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 04:40:15 +0000

John-

I share your frustration. One of the refrains I keep hearing repeated in all external media is “There’s no independent corroboration of these facts.” Which begs a few questions:
1. Who’s independent?
2. Who’s reporting “the facts”?
3. What constitutes corroboration?

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By: John H.

John H. — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 03:41:29 +0000

I have only recently moved to Lima from the USA, but seeing the information here is disturbing. As much as I have become cynical about the US media reports, I still somehow believed that if people died, it would be reported accurately in the media. There are simply too many ways for information to be dispersed now there.

I have watched the local Peruvian television news reports about this incident, and until now, had sympathized with the police. Based on these stories, the officers did not deserve to die, as they were carrying out orders from above. However, if the report here is accurate, the protesters did nothing to deserve their deaths, either. I now am starting to see signs that, once again, the media is under government control. I am now very confused as to how to get the “real story” about anything happening in Peru.

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By: Julie Schwietert

Julie Schwietert — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 01:39:43 +0000

Jenny-

Thanks for the local insight. Foreign mainstream media are essentially playing out the same story you’ve described here, which raises lots of questions about how information is obtained and what different motives are on all sides.

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By: Jenny

Jenny — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 18:39:28 +0000

I am living in Lima right now and just thought I’d report on one media response to this conflict. A commercial, funded by the government no less, shows images of injured and killed policemen, and then their families at the funeral, and puts up stats about how indigenous are taking land that isn’t theirs, and they are already given so many hectares of land. It’s unbelievably one-sided and emotive, and I’ve seen it playing almost everywhere I go.
more to come…

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By: Ryukyu Mike

Ryukyu Mike — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 03:39:04 +0000

Been tryina get ahold of you, Tim, through Send Message on yer Profile and couldn’t get through. Could you drop me an email, sometime?

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By: Tim Patterson

Tim Patterson — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 03:34:50 +0000

haha, enjoy that coffee and the Okinawa sunshine!

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By: Ryukyu Mike

Ryukyu Mike — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 03:17:36 +0000

Meant to say have the Visa Card…
Damn typwriter has “V” & “C” too close together. More coffee..

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By: Ryukyu Mike

Ryukyu Mike — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 03:14:59 +0000

Just happened to hace the ol’ Visa Card out paying some bills when this popped-up. Started to make a donation and the damn thing asked me for $100 and I got pist-off.
Then I see another blog about an American gal starving in Peru, somewhere and a picture of Starbucks coffee, so I run out and get me an iced-coffee and settle down and went back to donate here.
Sonovagun, if you just click-on the $100 thingy and backspace, the damn thing lets you put $20 in there!
Now, I got change leftover for Darfur, Somalia. Tibet, Mild Seven Light cigarettes and a few ,ore iced-coffees.
Sometimes I wish everybody would just become travellers and leave everybody else alone!

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