‘The internet” cannot victimize anyone. Most people are good, decent and out hearts and prays go out to Lara and all other Egyptians injured or raped. Yes, an element of the Internet is also vile people with sad lives who blame others who have success and good looks. Easier to blame others for your own bad choices or pathetic issues. That’s always true.

You should also look at all the support that goes out to her, it is the majority. Lara’s one of the best journalists, and thousand of strangers are praying for her and all others injured or tortured in Egypt. To focus on the jerks is to forget about the vast majority who appreciate her work, her courage, and wish her the best. It’s easy to let the sickos and jerks grab the attention. But, I think it’s amazing to think how many prayers she’s receiving from around the world. And you are so correct, jerks are in both genders for sure.

@lane: Unfortunately, the jerks are very loud and though I don’t have any stats, but it be almost unprecedented how many sites chose to moderate or disable comments on their initial stories.

@loriNKY: Well said. Considering some of the comments, it’s surprising that attractive women ever leave the house or that any female can have a career. Kudos for the post.

Blah…Blah…Blah

“The main points of blame are that she’s too pretty, too white or too blonde to be covering dangerous stories in the uber sexist middle east”

To state those facts is not an attack on her, but deal with the reality of how pretty, white, blonde women are treated in that region. It’s not her fault she was sexually assaulted. The animals who did it are to blame.

But you can’t excuse or ignore personal responsibility AND knowledge/precautions for your environment wrt your safety in ALL situations. Sure, she has every right to do her job. She has every right to go where men go, even if that includes wandering into the middle of thousands of excited, volatile and (proven) dangerous (because of prior attacks on reporters) men.

You can’t ignore how women are viewed in that region. Women are told how to dress and how to behave when visiting the middle east. Don’t go alone, cover up, dress modestly, wear a head scarf, respect their customs, etc. There are tons of stories online from blonde women about how they were treated, groped, grabbed, stared at, while visiting the middle east. And those are for people just going on holiday. Why are women issued these warnings/advisories?

Sure, you have every right to slather yourself with blood, sound a bull horn, toss in a bunch of chopped up fish bait, and jump in the middle of shark infested waters…..but is it safe?

And yes, I am comparing sharks to a groups of thousands of men who have been protesting/rioting for weeks, who have attacked numerous reporters, who are for the most part quite sexist, and have proven to be dangerous, and who have expressed anti-American views (i know she isn’t american, but i doubt they knew that).

“that she should have known better than to go there, she shouldn’t have left her children to do her job, and among the most heinous, that she deserved what she got for some alleged infidelity”

She didn’t deserve it, these attacks are heinous. However, I don’t think that is the same thing as discussing the particular dangers women face in that region. And Americans, as evidenced by the attacks on the reporters, men and women. I know my initial reaction, after expressing horror and empathy, was that she should not have been there. And as I said in another thread – we all say things like that in hindsight, “she shouldn’t have been there!” or “he should have worn a seatbelt!”.

You can’t control the behavior or actions of anyone, but yourself.

And you are right, there were some disgusting comments made.

I blame CBS for reporting the claim of sexual assault in the first place, it unnecessarily become the story.

Even you selectively quoted CBS’ statement, you chose A “brutal and sustained sexual assault”
They said A “brutal and sustained sexual assault and beating.”

CBS could have explained the situation of their reporter by say a brutal and sustained beating.

Did the sexual assault put her in the hospital or was it the brutal beating? CBS did a disservice to their employee by leaving it so vague and open to interpretation.

sarainitaly said:
“The main points of blame are that she’s too pretty, too white or too blonde to be covering dangerous stories in the uber sexist middle east”

To state those facts is not an attack on her, but deal with the reality of how pretty, white, blonde women are treated in that region. It’s not her fault she was sexually assaulted. The animals who did it are to blame.

But you can’t excuse or ignore personal responsibility AND knowledge/precautions for your environment wrt your safety in ALL situations. Sure, she has every right to do her job. She has every right to go where men go, even if that includes wandering into the middle of thousands of excited, volatile and (proven) dangerous (because of prior attacks on reporters) men.

You can’t ignore how women are viewed in that region. Women are told how to dress and how to behave when visiting the middle east. Don’t go alone, cover up, dress modestly, wear a head scarf, respect their customs, etc. There are tons of stories online from blonde women about how they were treated, groped, grabbed, stared at, while visiting the middle east. And those are for people just going on holiday. Why are women issued these warnings/advisories?

Sure, you have every right to slather yourself with blood, sound a bull horn, toss in a bunch of chopped up fish bait, and jump in the middle of shark infested waters…..but is it safe?

And yes, I am comparing sharks to a groups of thousands of men who have been protesting/rioting for weeks, who have attacked numerous reporters, who are for the most part quite sexist, and have proven to be dangerous, and who have expressed anti-American views (i know she isn’t american, but i doubt they knew that).

“that she should have known better than to go there, she shouldn’t have left her children to do her job, and among the most heinous, that she deserved what she got for some alleged infidelity”

She didn’t deserve it, these attacks are heinous. However, I don’t think that is the same thing as discussing the particular dangers women face in that region. And Americans, as evidenced by the attacks on the reporters, men and women. I know my initial reaction, after expressing horror and empathy, was that she should not have been there. And as I said in another thread – we all say things like that in hindsight, “she shouldn’t have been there!” or “he should have worn a seatbelt!”.

You can’t control the behavior or actions of anyone, but yourself.

And you are right, there were some disgusting comments made.

Good post sara.

Regarding nasty internet comments, I think NPR has good guidelines for posting on their site, and a moderator there made a good point. Before you post something, think about whether or not you’d post it with your real name. Some people here could learn from that.

A Luckier Woman Covering Cairo
It wasn’t celebratory that night Lara Logan was attacked. It was terrifying.
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/a-luckier-woman-covering-cairo/?singlepage=true

paulmdoro said:
Good post sara.

Regarding nasty internet comments, I think NPR has good guidelines for posting on their site, and a moderator there made a good point. Before you post something, think about whether or not you’d post it with your real name. Some people here could learn from that.

thanks, and i agree. that’s why i always post under my name and photo. i stand by what i say.

I’m not saying the crap being flung at her is fair, but its funny how you rush to the defense of a fellow liberal. Yet, when conservative women are under attack, Mediaite jumps in and dishes out its own.

sarainitaly said:
thanks, and i agree. that’s why i always post under my name and photo. i stand by what i say.

Same here (though I have no photo, it’s my real first name, middle initial, and last name). It’s easy to hide behind the anonymity that the web allows, but I’d bet that most of the nasty posters here wouldn’t post the same things if there real name had to go with it.

Dronetek said:
I’m not saying the crap being flung at her is fair, but its funny how you rush to the defense of a fellow liberal. Yet, when conservative women are under attack, Mediaite jumps in and dishes out its own.

Logan is liberal? Because of her voting record or who she works for?

paulmdoro said:
but I’d bet that most of the nasty posters here wouldn’t post the same things if there real name had to go with it.

it sure would clean it up, wouldn’t it!

sarainitaly said:
it sure would clean it up, wouldn’t it!

Sure would. And people wouldn’t be ridiculed over their religious beliefs, etc.

@sarainitaly: This isn’t actually directed toward you, but I wanted to point toward the larger conversation and differentiate this comment from being directed toward the OP.

As I’ve said a couple of times in comments on this subject, thus far, we haven’t seen or heard any complaints or regrets from Ms. Logan. I’m sure she wouldn’t have chosen to be attacked, but she had already suffered some mistreatment from Egyptian authorities; she was aware of the attacks upon other journalists and she’s practically lived in Afghanistan since the beginning of the war. Therefore, she made an informed choice to return to Cairo and one must assume that she considers personal danger and all that entails to be one of the risks posed by her job.

@Nacho: When CBS first released the statement, it was assumed that someone had the story and were about to run it. In all my surfing, I have seen one specificity that hadn’t been previously reported which was quickly edited-out, so I don’t know if the blogger was making an assumption or if they were the ones who were about to report, but it seems that CBS’ statement got so far in front and stirred enough sympathy that if someone did have it, their exclusive became unusable and its subsequent printing would’ve been considered bad taste.

Nevertheless, one of the most high-profile war correspondents suffering such an attack and receiving medical treatment isn’t something that would remain secret. Perhaps CBS used unfortunate wording, but I lean more toward them trying to take the air out of someone’s bubble.

Purely from a security standpoint, mistakes were made. Sometimes reporters put the story ahead of security concerns, which, while displaying admirable dedication to the craft, can cause bad things to happen to you. She’s lucky she didn’t get killed.

She is an outstanding, tenacious reporter. I wouldn’t begin to suggest that she shouldn’t be out there doing her job. But she should exercise more caution and more awareness of her security situation, and I suspect she will in the future. The lady ain’t stupid.

When I first read of Ms. Logan’s attack, I went on youtube and clicked on Charlie Rose’s interview with her. The first comment in line was a deeply ugly, pornographic hate speech – a cyber rape. I felt threatened and attacked by the comment as well, and very protective of Ms. Logan. Many comments below it had been removed due to content, and I’m sure that one was soon deleted as well. It is hard for me to understand the depth of misogyny, expressed as sexual violence, in that note. Ms. Logan is an astonishingly brave woman and I admire her courage and passion. Her attack should be discussed, not hidden, because it happens to so many. She continues her fearless commitment to the truth in reporting it. I wish her a full recovery, and much love and support.

Negative comments regarding Lara Logan’s attack while covering the events in Cairo are noting short of sexist. If she were a man, they wouldn’t make them. Women reporters who volunteer to go in harms way to cover a story are little different from women in uniform who volunteer for combat duty. I believe most of the reporters covering events on Tahrir Square were surprised by the turn of events, had they anticipated them they would have exercised greater caution. Nevertheless, Logan was doing her job and should be admired for her courage and professionalism.

http://www.ewross.com/women_in_combat_the_long_term_implications.htm

If commenters need to “hone up” on their vocabulary, then maybe you should bone up on your idioms.

I also think you should think twice about which columns you link to in your writings. The piece by Petri may be making an interesting or useful point about sexism, journalism, etc., but it does so with an ethnocentric and simplistic analysis which I found extremely distasteful. She writes, ” Living in the United States, I take for granted my ability to walk unmolested in the street. I don’t believe this could have happened here.”, as if women in the US do not experience sexual harassment and groping in their streets, and as if women in crowds here are not raped (e.g. Woodstock ’99). This not only denigrates Egyptian society and Arabic / Middle-Eastern societies generally, but it downplays the suffering and danger women in the US experience as a result of misogyny, sexism, etc.

Magister said:
@lane: Unfortunately, the jerks are very loud and though I don’t have any stats, but it be almost unprecedented how many sites chose to moderate or disable comments on their initial stories.

Jerks proliferate in darkness, and anonymous postings make it easy for them. There’s posters on this site that I never read their posts, vile natures are simply not worth anyone’s attention.

As to woman, you really do have to protect yourself. Attractive woman are more likely to be attacked. People get raped at the mall parking lot or on bike trails, its a real threat. To blame her for her choices is simply ridiculous. The CBS security and management should definitely analyze why security failed here.

sorry @magister. Sorry to screw up the blockpost ending tag and put my musings in with your post. Apologies!

sarainitaly said:
A Luckier Woman Covering Cairo
It wasn’t celebratory that night Lara Logan was attacked. It was terrifying.
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/a-luckier-woman-covering-cairo/?singlepage=true

Great link, Sara. Maybe if Lara had gone out with an Egyptian crew rather than a CBS crew with less language skills….who knows? The camera/light guy knew when to pull the plug on the Tahrir night operations….!

Also, I post under my name and second the emotion that a lot of the nasty crap from the other side is cowardly because hidden behind a wall of anonymity. Like, who is TRRK? And BFD? They’re cowards and moral lepers, that we know, but they hide and that just proves the point.

Urz said:
It is hard for me to understand the depth of misogyny, expressed as sexual violence, in that note.

urz, I lived in the Middle East and speak Arabic. So, not hard for me to understand. Arab males are generally second-class humans when it comes to male/female relations, with a few rare exceptions. “Honor Killings” are simply one oxymoron which demonstrates this fact.

It’s “disturbing,” but not surprising. There are zillions od little scumbag men on earth who derive an inner joy from such evil happenings to women. They are all around you, make no mistake.

There is an important element to this story that the press either prefers to ignore or is totally ignorant of. That is the position of women in the Islamic culture and most particularly that of Infidel women in relation to this culture. First of all under Sharia law a woman has few if any rights compared to a man. That is why in the case of an affair the woman gets stoned to death while nothing happens to a man. Or in a court case her word counts for nothing against a man, or a man can divorce his wife by simply repeating the words I divorce you three times while a woman cannot divorce a man unless he gives permission. The second part of this is that Christians and Jews are infidels and thus automatically have no rights under Islamic law. Every year there are literally hundreds of rape cases in Europe and in the U.K. involving Islamic men and western women. They feel no scruples about this because of the way western women dress and the fact that they are women and infidels. Therefore the press instead of hiding reality should use this case to warn western women of the element of risk that exists anywhere where Sharia law is the law of the land.

@lane: I got what you were saying, but thanks.

Internet anonymity may be one factor in the level of discourse and requiring real names is something that has been debated in media circles for years, but it has been shown that such a move would reduce comments, thus pageviews and it could prevent some less popular ideas or tidbits of insider information from finding their way into the debate.

I personally would oppose such a move and I would likely stop commenting someplace that wouldn’t afford me some measure of anonymity, plus there’s really no way to enforce such a requirement.

There are other ways to “tame” commenting communities. I’ve thrown a couple out in comments to this blog over the past year and I think maybe even an email or two, but one of the easiest to implement would be requiring bloggers to read, police and even interact with the comments to their own posts. Anecdotally, you can just look around this site and when one of the bloggers comment, things generally calm down at least until becomes apparent that they’ll never return.

As for the more specific subject of the internet reaction to the attack on Lara Logan, the OP calls out a Twitterer who has been roundly admonished — though he now has achieved greater fame and has considerably higher name recognition than he had, when he was a niche psuedo-celebrity with just 2000 followers — and he was posting under his real name with his employer clearly identified.

It looks more to me that the commonality between the Mr. Rosen and anonymous internet commenters may be the political and to some extent, media divide that has come to dominate debate.

For example, Mr. Rosen has apparently opposed Ms. Logan politically because he feels she represents a “shill” for the military-industrial complex. Pro-military ideas are ordinarily associated with the more conservative side of the aisle and this seems to be underlined by the right-leaning blogs that first fanned the flames of disgust, while a little higher in this thread, @Dronetek calls her a “liberal”.

Which is it? She can’t be both. As @paulmdoro said, we really don’t know her voting record and I’ve watched her for her war reporting, which she has done under at least two Presidents from different parties.

Perhaps she does lean one way or the other on the political dial, but that doesn’t make her fair game. Instead, what seems to have fed the internet hate was some leftover (moralistic) opposition to personal choices she has made in the past, the fact that her experience fed into the Muslim Brotherhood meme and she works for one of the alphabet networks, which are seen as the root of all evil in some quarters.

With or without commenter names, the political stances would have come out and though we know her name many (named and unnamed) commenters may have not been looking at her as a person, rather they were more intent on using her story to advance whatever political agenda they could find.

Lori, what an excellent piece you’ve written for Mediaite! I’m very proud of you, my friend! Fantastic job on such an unfortunate and important issue.

Dronetek said:
I’m not saying the crap being flung at her is fair, but its funny how you rush to the defense of a fellow liberal. Yet, when conservative women are under attack, Mediaite jumps in and dishes out its own.

Yes, it’s hysterical. An utterly pointless and useless comment that should read “Hey! Im a righty and think Mediaite sucks so there!”

The crap being flung at IS fair. If she is that stupid to put herself in that situation once, she will probably do it again and again. But the next time my just be the last time. Let her go back there again if she wants, I don’t need reports from the middle of a mob to know that those people are savages.

treecutter said:
The crap being flung at IS fair. If she is that stupid to put herself in that situation once, she will probably do it again and again. But the next time my just be the last time. Let her go back there again if she wants, I don’t need reports from the middle of a mob to know that those people are savages.

No. It might be fair if she was out there begging for sympathy. I haven’t heard that’s the case at all. For whatever reason, she determined it was useful or necessary for her to go into the crowd for her reporting. That’s a journalistic judgment call. I have no doubt she knew the risks, and has experienced harassment there before.

I want to address this idea that what she did was “stupid.” Journalists have been covering dangerous stories for decades. That’s why we have some of the provocative pictures and video and stories we’re all familiar with today. YOU may think it’s stupid and dangerous, but it’s not your place to judge her for it. If it’s not something you do, then fine, but I fail to say why her decision is any of your business.

make that “fail to see”

Mike Sampat said:
I also think you should think twice about which columns you link to in your writings. The piece by Petri may be making an interesting or useful point about sexism, journalism, etc., but it does so with an ethnocentric and simplistic analysis which I found extremely distasteful. She writes, ” Living in the United States, I take for granted my ability to walk unmolested in the street. I don’t believe this could have happened here.”, as if women in the US do not experience sexual harassment and groping in their streets, and as if women in crowds here are not raped (e.g. Woodstock ‘99). This not only denigrates Egyptian society and Arabic / Middle-Eastern societies generally, but it downplays the suffering and danger women in the US experience as a result of misogyny, sexism, etc.

I was referring to the reader comments themselves, not the actual content of the Petri piece. I agree it was simplistic and I didn’t particularly care for it. It just happened to be one of the first pieces I read with offensive comments, which is why I mentioned it.

You know, I applaud her bravery and commitment to journalism, but I have to say, when I read that she’s a mother to two children, I had to side ultimately with those who say she’s being irresponsible.

She’s not to blame for being attacked certainly… but especially after already being detained once, and having had other threatening experiences in other wars, she knows what she’s getting into… yet chooses to do so, putting at risk her children’s loss of a mother.

I think that’s completely irresponsible and selfish. It’s her right to make that decision certainly… but that’s the problem with this country. People put themselves first… above the needs of those they are responsible for.

And btw, I think the same holds true for parents too.

It’d be different if this is the only job she could do… or if her services couldn’t be fulfilled by others. But there are plenty of other reporters without kids who could do this… I think she’s wrong to risk her life when her first commitment should be to raising her children until they are adults.

(Correction: Meant to say “I think the same holds true for parents of both genders too.)

With respect, I don’t think that’s fair. To me that’s like saying parents can’t be cops or firemen, which I’d consider just as dangerous. I don’t know how to fairly compare them and figure out percentages, but in all of those fields there’s a better than average chance you won’t live through the day.

As far as what’s good for the kids, everyone has their own yardstick on this. But I think you can argue kids should see their parents do what they think is right, rather than what is safe.

Good for you, Ms. Wagner. Excellent piece.

Amid the bitching about how pretty (and she is), blonde and white Ms. Logan is, it’s worth pointing out that’s she’s South African. Many seem to think she’s either American or British. Not only is she not American, she’s not even western. In addition to being beautiful, some things Lara Logan IS: a wife, a mother, courageous, eloquent, compassionate, strong. Nobody seems to be mentioning any of that–except to use the fact that she’s a mother to disparage her.

Laurie Beth said:
it’s worth pointing out that’s she’s South African. Many seem to think she’s either American or British. Not only is she not American, she’s not even western.

Do you think the men that attacked her knew that? My guess is no. She works for CBS, was called a Jew, and is an English speaking white woman. My guess is they assumed she was American, or British. Many Americans have accents, too.

I don’t have a guess. She’s very famous; I’m not familiar with how much US-based news is shown in Egypt. They have Internet access. They may have known exactly who she was; they may have known nothing.

Anyone who blames Logan is an idiot!

CBS is not a favorite of mine but, from what I’ve seen and heard from her, Logan is. She is a brave journalist who was just trying to do her job. To suggest otherwise is like the old false argument that a woman was only raped because “she asked for it.”

And who is anyone else to judge her choice of profession and where and when she works? That’s only for her and her family to decide.

she should not have yelled that indignent “no” for that she very much should be blamed and she should appologize. as for the way they seemed to be trying to kill her that is unconcionable and any who participated in that should be heavily punished. as for the groping and stripping, the only bad part is there arn’t any pictures of videos of it.