Media plays 'Blame the Victim'

[Venetia]

Seems to be a trend in all Media these days

"Blaming The Victim" Strategy Remains In Food Industry's Playbook

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I do not want to be accused of speaking ill of American Industry while being on foreign soil, but in reading the New York Times and today's story titled "Increasingly, Food Companies Cannot Guarantee Safety" by Michael Moss, it makes it clear that the U.S. food industry cannot get off its "blame the consumer" soap box.

Mr. Moss looks at the aftermath of the pot pie salmonella outbreak of 2007 that sickened at least 15,000 Americans. After going through the background of the outbreak and the difficulty pot pie makers were having in being certain their products were being sold pathogen-free, the New York Times reports this:


"So ConAgra — which sold more than 100 million pot pies last year under its popular Banquet label — decided to make the consumer responsible for the kill step. The “food safety” instructions and four-step diagram on the 69-cent pies offer this guidance: “Internal temperature needs to reach 165° F as measured by a food thermometer in several spots.”

Never a newspaper to resist a challenge, NYT headed for their kitchens with the instructions. Alas, there was a problem:

But attempts by The New York Times to follow the directions on several brands of frozen meals, including ConAgra’s Banquet pot pies, failed to achieve the required 165-degree temperature. Some spots in the pies heated to only 140 degrees even as parts of the crust were burnt.

A ConAgra consumer hotline operator said the claims by microwave-oven manufacturers about their wattage power could not be trusted, and that any pies not heated enough should not be eaten. “We definitely want it to reach that 165-degree temperature,” she said. “It’s a safety issue.”

One of my clients said it all:

ConAgra’s episode has raised its visibility among victims like Ryan Warren, a 25-year-old law school student in Washington. A Seattle lawyer, Bill Marler, brought suit against ConAgra on behalf of Mr. Warren’s daughter Zoë, who had just turned 1 year old when she was fed a pot pie that he says put her in the hospital for a terrifying weekend of high fever and racing pulse.

“You don’t assume these dangers to be right in your freezer,” said Mr. Warren, who settled with ConAgra. He does not own a food thermometer and was not certain his microwave oven met the minimum 1,100-wattage requirement in the new pot pie instructions. “I do think that consumers bear responsibility to reasonably look out for their well-being, but the entire reason for this product to exist i

[Venetia]

Oprah Seems To Believe That Illness Is All In Our Head. I couldn’t disagree more. Living With Chronic Fatigue Syndrome


Oprah Seems To Believe That Illness Is All In Our Head. I couldn’t disagree more.


Is Your Illness All Your Fault? — by Catherine Morgan (cross-posted at BlogHer)

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Excerpt:
It seem that Oprah has ruffled a few feathers while explaining her recent bout with thyroid problems. Some are saying that she is just using a thyroid problem as an excuse for a recent 20 pound weight gain. Others find her method of treatment [a one month trip to her Hawaii estate for total relaxation and healthy eating] to be a bit grandiose, and not exactly a treatment available to the average woman with thyroid disease. And then others are a bit taken back by her “expert” Dr. Northrup, and her attempt to blame the patients (mostly women) for their thyroid disease.

[Venetia]

Through the looking glass: women and ... - Google Books

[Venetia]

http://www.pavsa.org/documents/Mental.doc

Excerpt:
Be aware of the tendency to blame the victim, especially when dealing with people who have a mental illness.
end

Interesting concept.

[Venetia]

Psychiatric illness and the politics of blame (review of Madness on the couch: blaming the victim in the heyday of psychoanalysis and Blaming the brain: the real truth about drugs and mental health)

CMAJ. 1999 January 26; 160(2): 233–234.

PMCID: PMC1229996
Copyright © 1999 Canadian Medical Association
Psychiatric illness and the politics of blame (review of Madness on the couch: blaming the victim in the heyday of psychoanalysis and Blaming the brain: the real truth about drugs and mental health)
M. G. Leith


http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/pic...6&blobtype=pdf

Fair use

Excerpt:

A growing number of psychiatric residency programs, he laments, are providing inadequate
psychotherapy training, and HMOs are reducing the role of the psychiatrist
to that of drug dispenser.

The net result is that patients become merely pieces of flawed chemistry to
be put in order by the appropriate agent or combination of agents. No
attempt is made to understand the problem or to offer treatment in a
broader context.

These are cautionary tales. They tell us that today’s gospel could well
be tomorrow’s lie, that the pendulum of opinion in the mind–brain debate,
left unchecked, swings in extremes.

end

[kmar]

I watched this show and was not happy with it. ..... stopped watching during the program cuz I couldn't take much of it. But I don't buy that it took the audience writting to her telling her to check her thyroid knowing that she has all those doctors readily available to her... can't believe that NONE of her docs thought to run a thyorid test at her age!

Give me a break ( one in Hawaii would be fantastic! )

[Venetia]

It's upsetting to learn that Media- all Media- is controlled. What they publish in newspapers and magazines, News, TV, it's all carefully controlled.

Hard to believe that Oprah would buy the line that she has a Thyroid condition because:

Excerpt:
The downside is that the talk show host has been vague about her diagnosis and treatment and even suggested that her body’s imbalance of thyroid hormones was the result of working too hard and not relaxing enough
end

[Dove]

Having lots of money does not mean that one has control. Her opinions reflect her sheltered/blinded/one-sided life new age bullcrap. I think it may be life's sense of humour... when you think you're at the top of the mountain you find out you're really sitting on a toilet and everyone can see.

[kmar]

What happened to OPRAH taking on the Lyme issue? Remember Dr. Oz was collecting stories?

I have been waiting on that. Has Oprah been bought out?

Like she even needs it.

IF IF IF oprah talked about the silent Lyme epidemic, that would make
waves. Why is she delaying? Surely she has seen the movie "Under my skin"?

Maybe not?

I'd like to see her use her influence to help.

[Venetia]

Agree, Kmar !! If Oprah were allowed to present Lyme Disease truth or the Fiber Disease issue- she would have done so many years ago. If she did present the TRUTH about Lyme disease or the Fiber disease- we could get the help that we need.

I'm certain that many sufferers have written and emailed her over the past 7 years. I did.

You're right! What did happen to Dr Oz and his story collection?

Dove, you know the best way I can answer your post about Oprah is to point out what happened on 911.

This exemplifies what TV/radio/news personalities are about:

Notice- that the building that the reporter is talking about- WTC 7 - is still standing as
she is reporting that it was collapsing.....

I watched this report- (when the video was available) it happened.


The BBC's 9/11 Conspiracy Files: Points Which Were Ignored - includes video

Excerpts:


"...more on the latest building collapse in New York ... we was talking a few minutes ago about the Salomon Building [WTC 7] collapsing, well indeed it has. ... it was because the building had been weakened during this morning's attacks." [15.6 MB WMV download]





News reporters only repeat what they have been told, and it is obvious that these reporters did not know what WTC 7 looked like because it is the building burning in the background of this live footage. Who told the reporters that WTC 7 had collapsed? How did they have foreknowledge of the collapse? Why was Google compelled to remove this video from their servers minutes after it appeared? [More details]

end excerpts

If memory serves- it was about 20 minutes or so later that WTC 7 DID collapse. Guess they didn't account for the time zones?