Letter of the Month – Surprise Winner
May 10, 2012 11:11 by Simon Plosker
The emailed letter to the editor is still the classic way to make yourselves heard and maybe even get published. These days, however, social media offers many alternative ways to deal directly with media outlets and the journalists themselves. That’s why our latest Letter of the Month isn’t a letter at all but a tweet.
Our winner goes by the Twitter name of @nushuktan. He decided to tweet New York Times correspondent Jodi Rudoren directly over her recent article concerning Palestinian hunger strikers, sending her the link to HonestReporting’s critique.
Although we were less than impressed with her “could have done more” comment, Jodi Rudoren actually responded, proving that Twitter offers another effective vehicle for holding the media to account.
Congratulations to @nushuktan, who will be receiving something from us in the mail very soon just as soon as we find out who the person is behind the Twitter alias!
Remember to keep writing those letters and contacting the press and let us know if you are published!
Ben
2:45 pm
May 10, 2012
Well done mate, keep up the good work!
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Nushuktan
2:49 pm
May 10, 2012
Thanks Ben. Next year in Jerusalem.
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Dorit Sauer
3:32 pm
May 10, 2012
This is the letter I wrote… I have written so many to the NYtimes I doubt they will publish me again:
Jodi Rudoren,
Your article on prisoners starving themselves is biased and ridiculous!
These people are TERRORIST! Do you know what that means?
Do your homework on what you write about or add in your report that you SHARE the same value
system as these people that have NO regard for human life.
Did you interview any Israeli’s that suffer the lose of family members because of these prisoners???
Shame on you and the New York Times to have such articles!
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Al Neuman
4:32 pm
May 10, 2012
Rudoren is just another tool for the NY Times disgusting and blatant anti-Israel agenda. She is, as the Nazi’s claimed @ Nuremburg, “just following orders”, with regard to the Times’ obligatory bashing of Israel and dishonest denial of Islamic terror and murder.
The Times’ clinging to this extremely 1-sided and fundamentally dishonest narrative about the Mideast is a major disservice to their readers as well as to themselves by continuing to weaken their already frayed credibility.
Pathetic really what’s happened to the NYTimes!
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Michael Lewis
4:33 pm
May 10, 2012
Rudoren is just another tool for the NY Times disgusting and blatant anti-Israel agenda. She is, as the Nazi’s claimed @ Nuremburg, “just following orders”, with regard to the Times’ obligatory bashing of Israel and dishonest denial of Islamic terror and murder.
The Times’ clinging to this extremely 1-sided and fundamentally dishonest narrative about the Mideast is a major disservice to their readers as well as to themselves by continuing to weaken their already frayed credibility.
Pathetic really what’s happened to the NYTimes!
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Michael Lewis
4:42 pm
May 10, 2012
By what distorted “standards” did Rudoren write this absurdly 1-sided and inherently dishonest piece? Is there a “rulebook” @ The Times which stipulates “Thou shalt always bash Israel, the facts be damned”, or what?
Rudoren’s response to a Tweet critical of this bit of Palestinian propaganda is nothing short of pathetic–”could have done more”–like what, tell the truth about why those Palestinians are actually incarcerated? About the inhuman murderous terrorism they’ve carried out, including slitting tht throats of babies as part of their jihadist hatred?
It’s clear that The Times has abandoned all pretenses of objectivity in their incomprehensible embracing of the highly distorted Palestinian propaganda message and near total ignoring of the main source of all Mideast violence, i.e., relentless murderous hatred from the Islamofascist side.
Hard to know what the Times’ underlying motives are for this agenda except to say that it just another chink in the armor of a once widely respsected newspaper, which is now increasingly viewd as little more than a mouthpiece for a way Left and often completely dishonest narrative.
Sad indeed.
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Daniel O'Neill
4:54 pm
May 10, 2012
Rudoren turns out to be just another lying NYTimes hack, intent on hewing to the paper’s monotonously predictable antiIsrael and pro-terrorist agenda. Unfortunately for the Times perseverating with this slanted version of Mideast reality forces them to publish some very distorted, fundamentally dishonest articles such as this ridiculously biased piece by Jody Rudoren who seems to have internalized the Times’ “playbook” on Israel very quickly.
Not only does that make her a poor excuse for a “journalist”–she’s butt ugly too!
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BethesdaDog
8:59 pm
May 10, 2012
I do use twitter from time to time, mainly just to read what other people are saying. I don’t like to use it on a regular basis, since I find it generally one of the worst examples of social networking and one of the most annoying developments in public communication. It’s limited character design seems like it was designed for severe ADD. Besides, so many people write every stupid thing that comes to mind, as though the rest of us are interested in their narcissistic outpourings.
Nevertheless, it seems that responding on Twitter to otherwise unaccountable journalists might be useful. I am not very twitter-literate, does a message to a journalist on twitter automatically become public to everyone who visits the person’s twitter site? If so, perhaps it forces the journalist to answer for their objectionable work when they might otherwise be able to ignore your comment, or at least they have to blow you off publicly.. Do most journalists provide their twitter address along with the on-line version of their articles?
Thanks for any ideas in response to my inquiries.
This seems like a very useful technique to hold these irresponsible miscreants’ feet to the fire for their smears and slanders.
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