Reacting to Dave Bossert's editorial this morning condemning the Signal for reporting on the "Innocence of Muslims" film, a reader had this to say:
I'd only add that the LA Times was also reporting the location of the movie shoot just a few hours after the Daily News did. And then the Hollywood Reporter not only named the film site but tried to get comments from its owner.
For years we've heard conspiracy theories and complaints from SCVers that the City & LASD whitewash and dissuade reporting on crime in this valley. Now we have a case where a crime wasn't even committed, but the City and LASD try to squelch coverage of it after the barn doors are completely blown off the barn and the horses are galloping free.
I understand the City's reticence and fear about this story; I had second thoughts about posting the details as well. But when the Times, Daily News, and Hollywood Reporter all blast the location of the film shoot to their hundreds of thousands of readers, squelching the news in the Signal, KHTS and SCV Beacon is hardly going to put the genie back in the bottle.
One wonders if public safety wasn't their only motive.
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Authorities pressured local media to not report Muslim film details ctd.
Dave is a pretty smart guy, but he comes at this issue with far too narrow a viewpoint.
Around 9PM Pacific Time on the date the 4 Americans were killed in Libya, the San Gabriel Valley Tribune and its sister publication, the Daily News, posted the story online about who produced the movie and where it was filmed. Though we don't know how the reporters and the editors at that publication were put on the trail of the story that the movie was made in L.A. County, they reported that the City Manager of Duarte told the reporters that the Sheriff's Office told him the movie was filmed at a specific movie ranch in the Santa Clarita Valley. (No telling who alerted the Sheriff's Department.)
That evening, as soon as I saw the online story, I spent about an 30 minutes looking to see if other "national" publications or television news outlets had the story referring to the movie ranch. They didn't. However, when I did an internet search of the movie ranch's name, the first website which came up was the City of Santa Clarita's website touting individual local movie ranches and places for filming. The website showed photos of the "Afghanistan Town" where the filming presumably had occurred.
By the end of the next day, the national news outlets seemed to know where the movie was filmed. Even later, reports from outside of the Santa Clarita Valley stated that the interior filming was done at a specific movie lot in the City of L.A. As I write this, CNN is interviewing an actress from the film, and showing photos of the Afghanistan Town.
The Signal was reporting what other online news outlets already had made available to the world. Any internet savvy jihadi could follow the trail to the Santa Clarita Valley without The Signal's help. The Signal article added nothing to what was previously available online, from L.A.'s second largest newspaper.
So Dave is wrong on this issue. Too often, over the last 10 years The Signal has been an active co-conspirator in covering up "what really happened in Santa Clarita". The details of the shoot out which killed "Deputy Jake" is a perfect example. The Signal shut down their fact-specific coverage as soon as the details began to embarrass the management of public safety agencies.
Idealistically the purpose of a local newspaper is to inform those not in the "local in-crowd" about what is going on in their community. The Signal should be praised in this situation for not sweeping some unpleasant details under the rug.
I'd only add that the LA Times was also reporting the location of the movie shoot just a few hours after the Daily News did. And then the Hollywood Reporter not only named the film site but tried to get comments from its owner.
For years we've heard conspiracy theories and complaints from SCVers that the City & LASD whitewash and dissuade reporting on crime in this valley. Now we have a case where a crime wasn't even committed, but the City and LASD try to squelch coverage of it after the barn doors are completely blown off the barn and the horses are galloping free.
I understand the City's reticence and fear about this story; I had second thoughts about posting the details as well. But when the Times, Daily News, and Hollywood Reporter all blast the location of the film shoot to their hundreds of thousands of readers, squelching the news in the Signal, KHTS and SCV Beacon is hardly going to put the genie back in the bottle.
One wonders if public safety wasn't their only motive.
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