I've always considered quote mining to be no better than lying. But how far can you take quote mining before you stop calling it that, and you start calling it downright lying? I got this off of another topic:
Would that be considered quote mining? I am asking because, to me, that seems even worse than quote mining. It's one thing to leave out most of a quote (like what most Creationists do with Darwin)... but to do something as extreme as a voice-over seems pretty horrible.
That reminds me of a similar tactic I saw on ABC News (a popular news station in the U.S.) that caused me to lose complete trust in the news media (well I was only a kid at the time). Back in the late 1990s when the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) and World Championship Wrestling (WCW) were getting extremely popular, many kids (like myself) began to engage in "backyard wrestling." Many kids were getting hurt and even dying. ABC News interviewed The "Hardcore Legend" Mick Foley. During the interview, they showed him a clip of some kids wrestling in a backyard and asked him his comments. He commented on how the kids probably shouldn't be horse playing, but that it's not that bad; it looks like they're just having fun. ABC news then took his comments and played them on television; however, they switched* the video to a more violent video that showed kids jumping off roofs onto each other and even using a cheese grater to draw blood on each other. So it appeared that Mick Foley was commenting on a much more violent video clip. And to top that off, ABC news even cut out a part where Mick Foley was begging kids engaging in the "extreme backyard wrestling" to please stop, because they can get hurt. So the moral of that story is to not always trust news sites.
Would that qualify as quote mining also? I've been wondering lately... how far can you take quote mining before you just start calling it complete lies?
*The switching of the video tapes was mentioned in Mick Foley's book (I don't feel like going through my book to find the pages; if anybody actually cares, I will check, but I didn't want to go and check for the pages because most likely no one cares) titled Foley is Good: The Real World is Faker than Pro Wrestling
A video of the original ABC News clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMGFc08BcWI
| Bikerman wrote: |
| a) The video is edited with a voiceover and not a true recording of the interview (another typically dishonest tactic).
b) At no point did Dawkins say that 'someone started the creation process'. He was asked what the statistical probability for the non existence of God was and he made it clear that it was very unlikely but he wasn't comfortable putting a statistical figure on it. This is entirely honest - you cannot prove a negative absolutely, you can only say it is very unlikely. He was then asked if it were possible that some alien had seeded life on earth and he explained that yes, it is possible BUT that alien life would itself have needed to evolve, which leads to a circular argument |
Would that be considered quote mining? I am asking because, to me, that seems even worse than quote mining. It's one thing to leave out most of a quote (like what most Creationists do with Darwin)... but to do something as extreme as a voice-over seems pretty horrible.
That reminds me of a similar tactic I saw on ABC News (a popular news station in the U.S.) that caused me to lose complete trust in the news media (well I was only a kid at the time). Back in the late 1990s when the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) and World Championship Wrestling (WCW) were getting extremely popular, many kids (like myself) began to engage in "backyard wrestling." Many kids were getting hurt and even dying. ABC News interviewed The "Hardcore Legend" Mick Foley. During the interview, they showed him a clip of some kids wrestling in a backyard and asked him his comments. He commented on how the kids probably shouldn't be horse playing, but that it's not that bad; it looks like they're just having fun. ABC news then took his comments and played them on television; however, they switched* the video to a more violent video that showed kids jumping off roofs onto each other and even using a cheese grater to draw blood on each other. So it appeared that Mick Foley was commenting on a much more violent video clip. And to top that off, ABC news even cut out a part where Mick Foley was begging kids engaging in the "extreme backyard wrestling" to please stop, because they can get hurt. So the moral of that story is to not always trust news sites.
Would that qualify as quote mining also? I've been wondering lately... how far can you take quote mining before you just start calling it complete lies?
*The switching of the video tapes was mentioned in Mick Foley's book (I don't feel like going through my book to find the pages; if anybody actually cares, I will check, but I didn't want to go and check for the pages because most likely no one cares) titled Foley is Good: The Real World is Faker than Pro Wrestling
A video of the original ABC News clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMGFc08BcWI
