#BringBackOurGirls
Have you seen that one floating around? Do you know what it means? If not, you aren’t the only one, but it is pitiful and horrifying you don’t know. For the past two days, I have searched for a source to tell me how many times any one media outlet mentioned the kidnappings in Nigeria, I couldn’t find one. Finally, today I gave up, this is too important it lays heavy on my heart and needs saying.
What has been trending since 15 April:
- Benghazi (FAUX) – Repeatedly this one rises to the top of the heap of the GOP manure pile of scandals. Never mind it has been debunked; never mind it is a waste of TAXPAYER MONEY. Never mind, it is pure and unadulterated BULLSHIT. Yes, I said it and I apologize if I offended you; this tripe remains front and center in the hearts and minds of FAUX, the GOP and their funding partners for one reason only, to discredit this President and future Democratic contenders. Nothing more or less. The willingness of their mindless followers to believe anything assure them zombie like adherence to whatever drivel they offer up as proof of malfeasance.
- Malaysia Flight 370 (CNN) – I am not saying this wasn’t a tragedy, certainly it was. However, CNN led with this story for six (6) weeks. During this same period, other things happened in the world, other tragedies of equal if not greater import.
o Crimea, Ukraine and Putin
o SCOTUS and the new rules of uncapping contribution rules make it even easier to buy a politician, a party or for that matter a seated Supreme Court Justice
o Tragedy at Fort Hood, Texas, four (4) dead including the gunman, sixteen (16) wounded.
o School stabbing in Pittsburgh, when a student wanders through the halls with a kitchen knife stabbing his classmates. Twenty wounded, no deaths.
o Mudslide in Oso, Washington left behind forty-one (41) confirmed dead, two (2) still missing and millions in damages.
o The capsize of MV Sewol with 476 passengers on April 16, resulting in the loss of 240 lives, most of them students.
- Cliven Bundy – enough said really. Hero till he turned zero. Criminal, bigot and fool.
- IRS Scandal – really, yes. It’s this one is still out there and still being talked about both by the GOP and by FAUX. They cannot let this go. Not if there is a shred of possibility, an iota of opportunity, a dribble of slobber to catch in the drool cup that is the GOP witch-hunt. Today alone, there is no less than four different Right-Wing blathers plus the latest in Congressional attempts to push the envelope, specifically the House Rules Committee considering holding Lois Lerner, former IRS official in contempt.
- Climate Change Denial – this one, it goes along with the entire issue of deregulate the world and we might consider bringing jobs back to America. You might include the other fun ideological standard, thought but never said aloud, “your water is burning, your children are sick and your rivers are sludge…don’t worry that is actually the way it is supposed to be, don’t you remember before all these job killing regulations were there and you had jobs”.
- ACA Failure – yes, they are still harping on this one, over and over and over again. If it isn’t one thing it is another. The worst part of the problem though, they don’t just whine they lie. I wouldn’t mind a difference of opinion on policy, but the outright lies, the putting real humans at risk this truly does bother me.
Now back to where I started.
#BringBackOurGirls
The names of the lost girls, this is what it looks like. Stark and real.
On April 15th, 230 School girls were kidnapped from the Chibok Government Secondary. Notice the date? Right, it is during the same six (6) weeks I was documenting CNN’s enthrallment with the lost flight 370. Not once that I could find did they ever mention this tragedy, not once. I could be wrong, but I couldn’t find it. Certainly FAUX didn’t mention it and I couldn’t find it elsewhere either.
Why did I want it separate? It is simple really; this is a real tragedy, happening to real people. These are young girls with their lives before them, kidnapped and potentially sold into slavery, married off or worse for what any of us might spend on a large coffee and a donut. This horror wasn’t reported, not by FAUX certainly and since they set the standard for the circus, not by any other station. This is a truth, where FAUX goes the rest follow. If FAUX screams Benghazi, no matter how played out this story, CNN, MSNBC and the rest of them follow tails tucked firmly between their legs and tongues hanging hoping for a bone. The rest of the media ignores everything and anything that might be of real value, have real truth-telling for those who don’t give two tinkers damn what the GOP, the Kochs or the morally bankrupt talking heads of FAUX think.
How did we fall so far? It is simple; we turned our backs and allowed apathy to win. We tuned in and tuned out. We allowed ourselves to be lulled by the soothing voice, the pretty face until it all seemed ‘smart’ and it was too late. We failed to verify, failed to demand truth, fairness and above all ethical reporting. Now what we have is entertainment with zero value.
Now what we have is 300 young girls in a nation FAUX doesn’t deem important enough to report on, 300 young girls of a complexion FAUX doesn’t deem ‘beautiful’ enough to care about, 300 young girls of a religion FAUX doesn’t deem ‘right’; 300 young girls who might never be reunited with their families because it took to long for their story to hit the mainstream.
What it took for the story of these young girls and their tragedy to hit the mainstream is the voices of their families to reach non-traditional media outlets, twitter, bloggers and Facebook.
Do I seem bitter? Yes, I am bitter, I am bitter because this isn’t just these girls, though their story is the most tragic and the most important. I am bitter because as we fight to change the course of the nation and the world, we are fighting what seems a losing battle against a monolithic media force that seems to own the minds of a zombie horde. The good being done by our President, by our Vice President, by our First Lady, by others in the administration are lost in the FAUX news blathering and it is only through the concerted efforts of a few voices we hear.
Yes, I am bitter. I was told recently well placed hate can be a force for good, I believe I am learning this might be true.
For now, get informed and get involved:
Read related posts with information about this tragedy here:
Petitioning World Leaders, The ObamaCrat
#Bring Back Our Girls, The ObamaCrat
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder Offers Law Enforcement Help For Kidnapped Nigerian Girls
#BringBackOurGirls: Extremist Islam Is Scared Of Little Girls
Get Involved:
Facebook: Bring Back Our Girls
Twitter: @Rescueourgirls
Change Org Petition Bring Back Our Girls
QBG_Tilted Tiara 
Yes, it’s a horrifying true life story. And yes, I’m also sick of hearing about the ACA, Malaysia flight 370, the crisis in Ukraine and the collapse (yet again) of so-called Middle East peace talks. This ordeal in Nigeria is akin to the thousands dead along the U.S.-Mexican border. It shows a country that is essentially leaderless and unable to combat terrorist forces within. Just like the Mexican drug cartels are giving a finger to Mexican law enforcement and the international community, so are the rebels in Nigeria who kidnapped all those girls.
It’s unfathomable that this could happen in the 21st century. I heard the father of one of those girls say he’d rather know his daughter was dead than knowing she was sold into slavery or forced to marrying an adult male. I’m eager to see what the world plans to do about this mess, including Africa.
I wish enough of us cared to change direction and force some compassion.
Thank you for this post!!! I wish that so many people read it, I wish that it be a wake up call …. but then again, wishes!! How frequently do they become a reality?? 😦
Reblogged this on Reflections on Life Thus Far and commented:
More about our news media and the Nigerian girls taken from their school nearly a month ago. Please share so we don’t forget and maybe just maybe the government will wake up and help the poor girls likely slaves by now.
I agree that some news is thrown as a smoke screen to hide / cover up something else. Why is politics always such a game with those in need as puppets in the middle?
I wish I had the answer to that one Tess. Puppets? I think those in greatest need are something else, they are the bone the all fight over, but none want.
Heartbreaking isn’t it?
Yes, indeed. Heartbreaking.
So true Val, so true. Not even our national paper reports on the Malaysian airline anymore. Personally, I think CNN have some inside info on the story. It could be the only possible reason for it. Psst It isn’t where they say it is.
I can’t understand why the opposition is wasting time on Hillarygate. So much time and money is wasted on crap. Why doesn’t anyone just focus on helping the people of the U.S of A? The social divide just in Baltimore is disgraceful. Think of it as like flying. If the oxygen mask falls, place the mask over your face first before helping children. It should be the same principles for all countries. When a country is safe and the financially sound, only then it should provide assistance to others.. Look after your own FIRST.
Same thing is happening in Australia. The people who made Australia what it is today and paid taxes all their lives are forgotten. If you can’t look after your elderly you shouldn’t be funding other countries economies.
I am sick of hearing about how much money we give to other countries when we have people sleeping in cars. Want to help a third world country? Send in a workforce to teach them how to be self sufficient. Supply products like sustainable housing etc Create jobs both here and there. Make it a win/win.
Current politics is BULLSHIT!!!
Current politics, everywhere, is absolutely BULLSHIT!!
We are being driven by money in the back, brainwashed by those who want to divide us further and it is the same people, everywhere in every nation. One of these days, all of us will have to stand up and say enough. Pitchforks in hand we will have to take these devils in three piece suits out, tar and feather them and run them out of our nations.
It might be the only way to save ourselves.
We are about to get hit with a uber tax hike thanks to the previous government who, during the world financial crisis borrowed huge amounts of money from overseas and then encouraged everyone to spend, spend, spend to avoid the crisis. Well, we did avoid it until NOW. Seems we are having our own little financial crisis. When will they learn you can’t avoid the inevitable!!!!
I have my pitchfork Val, just say when 😉
I think Loon, it is simply the piper being paid everywhere. We have yet to pay but sometime someone will have to. Let me rephrase that, most of us have been paying, but eventually the rest will have to. At least it sounds like they will spread the pain in Australia.
I just can’t imagine why it took so long to act,
I mean it’s been almost a month and the trail
has gone cold…
Those girls need reuniting with their families
and I hope that when that happens, that they
will not have been molested, though given the
circumstances I doubt that very much, which
is a sad statement indeed.
What is wrong with this world that children are
not safe in their schools? The blatant acts of the
many are stifling what could be a wonderful
world…
Let us hope that there is a positive conclusion to
this heinous crime, and that there will be a higher
justice for those that prey on the innocence of
children. The world has gone mad…
Andro xxxx
You and I are of the same heart and mind Andro, we ask the same question as well. It is a sad, heartbreaking world.
Done! Thanks for sharing. Been on board #BringBackOurGirls campaign. Reading so much more about the wider net of sex trafficking of girls everywhere. It’s all very disturbing and frightening.
Yes, it is. It is coming more and more to the forefront. But the problem is, not here, not by the standard media flow. It is as if here, we simply don’t notice. I am so disturbed and so ashamed of those who look like me.
Child please, “it ain’t just folk who look like you”. Lots of folk are caught unaware these days–either too daggone distracted or trusting of mainstream media to do what’s right. I can only imagine the half that never surfaces. Aargh! We’ve got to keep on talking, doing, marching, advocating, empathy building, more!
And beating the hell out of certain people, who I am sorry to say look like me. Power breeds contempt. Too much power and the fear of its loss, breeds hate.
Apathy is one thing, we have plenty of that to go around and share. But this, this is something else altogether and it is coming ugly.
Yes m’am. Maybe us empathetic folk will keep each other sane. Lord help us.
Lord help us indeed.
This disease has spread even to ‘serious’ programs such as ‘documentaries’. I puke at the dozens of crap passing off as documentaries that portray some brain dead shithead wrestling and traumatizing animals in the wild.
I suppose it’s all to do with ratings – they put out what the majority laps up!
It’s no better in Asia – the big news in India is about this young actress making out in a car and arrested by police. Of course, the police routinely ignore the daily rapes of hundreds of women and boys.
You’re doing your part, Val – well done. We can all do our parts too.
Peace.
You are right Eric, it is all so horrifying and so pervasive. I am afraid it will get worse before it gets better. So do you think, if we each do our small part it creates enough ripples?
I pray this is the case.
This morning’s CNN broadcast had segments on the Nigerian story. Meanwhile, I reached into my archives for this important perspective about FOX News. http://afrankangle.wordpress.com/2011/05/30/on-fair-and-balanced/
Thank you Frank, I need that. The problem is, the rest follow their lead.
FOX may have the most viewers, but I’m not convinced they are the directors.
Yet where Fox goes the others follow, where Fox leads the others are in lock step on their stories. This is what I consider the problem.
I know there are plenty of exceptions to the rule, but I saw additional stories about the Nigerian situation again this morning.
Yes indeed, the media seek to shape our minds and we unfortunately let them. However the flip side of the coin is a media controlled by government which is just as bad. Too bad we can’t get a media that is detached from politics or under control of self seeking media moguls
You know, Val, I did see the articles about these girls and Boko Haram on the CNN front page way back in April (there’s actually another huge Boko Haram top headline there now). I guess CNN does take breaks from MH370 once in a while. But there was also a couple of landslides in Afghanistan that killed thousands of people – which I learned about from weather.com of all places, since CNN apparently doesn’t consider this front page news. (To be fair, the cnn.com did run a couple of articles about it – roughly one for each thousand of victims).
I looked through the CNN archives, I could find nothing on the US CNN, nothing but I could have missed it. Yes, they ran something on CNNi, and there were a couple of ‘articles’ online, but nothing mainstream. So as far as I am concerned, they get no credit.
I didn’t, by the way pick out everything and only picked things in a six week period. The landslides in Afghanistan missed my time slot.
—-Val,
I guess we are too busy talking about what the F*ck Kim Kardashian is wearing or who changed her hair style.
Superficial shit that doesn’t matter.
Just retweeted..
LOVE xxxx
Yes, we do seem to be worried about that don’t we. It is stunning, it is horrifying. My heart is cracked nearly in half. Our first world problems pale in comparison don’t they?
Love and hugs back at you.
Bravo, Val! Well stated on all counts.
Thank you my friend. I had to sit on this one a few days, my rage at the neglect simply spilled over onto the page. It took me more time to clean up the language than it did to write it.
I have stopped watching the news more than occasionally because of the very reasons you highlighted here…its not real life its what someone somewhere.. Wants jammed down our throats ..I started thinking after becoming aware the Malaysian plane led off even six weeks after its disappearing.. The reported news is diversion from what is really going on . I heard about this yesterday and on a human level am sick to death that its not been reported .. The plane..tragic..but it’s gone..these girls are alive and every second they weren’t the first middle and last news story was minutes wasted to save them from god knows what horrible fate. Your voice is strong and thank you for this post.
I don’t often watch the news either. Now and then I will watch BBC or something on a channel I am interested in, but there is nothing I can bring myself to sit and watch for long anymore. The ‘news’ is truly nothing more than entertainment and misdirection.
I wish I could say my voice was enough. I wish I thought it mattered.
One drop of water causes a thousand ripples..one voice turns to many…and it does matter.
I hope so Lizzie, truly I hope so.
Thank you for posting this. I am with you completely. We have been overtaken by stupid and I don’t know how to help. I know the media is garbage and everyone pays to have it slanted. Some things are hyped and some never mentioned. And I see the bulk of people buying every second of it without a thought of his/her own. It sickens and infuriates me.
Overtaken by stupid, that is it exactly isn’t it. There isn’t an easy way to avoid it anymore, no matter where we turn, there it is. Worse yet, others are deciding what is important to us and as you say, most people are deciding what is relevant and important. Like you, it sickens and infuriates me.
#BringBackOurGirls
Indeed. Over and over again, and not enough times.
This story about the 300 abducted girls in Nigeria first crossed my radar when it was top story on Monday night on ABC News. If Diane Sawyer mentioned they’d been missing since April 15th, I missed that fact; I cluelessly thought it must have happened over the weekend. That ferry tragedy in Korea got a lot of press, why not this? It is as disturbing as that horrific snafu. One thing I seem to recall on ABC is that group also abducted 15 Nigerian boys in January. I have heard nothing about them since. It seems third world horror rates third rate coverage over here. That’s the scariest thing of all. Who knows what happened to those kids, including the boys, in all this wasted time?
They didn’t abduct 15 boys, they murdered 50 boys. Some of those boys they burned alive. Some of what this group has done has been horrific, none of it has been reported. I can only imagine why. Actually, I don’t have to imagine, I have said it as plainly as is possible.
It is a terrible world we have created.
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Well said, as always, Val. We are obsessed here in the U.S. OF A. with the wrong damn things.
Yes, that is one problem. But I think it goes beyond obsession I think it is blindness. I think it is being led. I think it is proof positive we have been overtaken by stupid. Money does talk, it walks and it has hypnotized us, no matter what side of line in the sand we are on, we have allowed ourselves to be led.
I am absolutely sickened by this proof we do not value life, women and young girls and most especially those who are not ‘Christian, lily white and of a particular class’. My heart is cracked.
Yes.
I don’t know what we would do without the blogs, actually. They are the only ones who have been covering this — and they have for about two weeks.
WONDERFUL IMAGES…..SINCERELY ANDREA:))
Thank you. The are difficult to look at.
Reblogged this on It Is What It Is and commented:
This is an excellent post ….. Please, take the time to read it. Different perspective but right on the money!!
I am honored and humbled. Thank you
Excellent job! Can’t wait to get home & read on the PC. Right now on cell.
Dearest Valentine!! Excellent job …. Couldn’t have said it any better. Reblog … Hugs!
So many have done such an excellent job of covering this, finally. My perspective? Our collective failure for so very long. I am ashamed of us, all of us. It cracks my heart.
I share your outrage. It upset me so much to just hear about this story two days ago, see nothing about it in USA Today (the paper I read) until this morning, and then learn that it happened back in April! What? How is that possible? If 300 American or French or English girls had been abducted with threats of being sold or married off to the people who took them, the uproar would be deafening. I discussed this with my teen boys at dinner last night, because this should be an everybody issue.
Thank you for the article and for providing those links.
I started to see bits and pieces of the story back in April but didn’t put it together, perhaps I too was to dense to understand. I saw it in the sources I read and follow outside of the US, even they didn’t carry the full horror of what was happening though.
You are right Carrie, if this were 300 American girls, or even 3 the entire nation would be up in arms demanding immediate action. That is what is so terribly sick.
Reblogged this on The ObamaCrat™.
As I always do, I thank you.