Bowling for Columbine...

[monolith94]

it's a bastardized version of dahgannit

[Meticulous Man]

Originally posted by Olaf Hårfagre
In the house where I live now, a locked door wouldn't make any difference. A burglar could easily break a window on the backdoor, unlock it through the hole and walk right in.

[Carolus Rex]

Originally posted by monolith94
it's a bastardized version of dahgannit

Heh, heh! That tells me just as much...

Goddammit in some awkward way?

Carolus

[uggabugga]

Originally posted by Trajanus


...Even though quite biased, some examples were still quite freaky, the "gun-for-a-bankaccount" was very 'unusual' and I don't think it was a fake scene....

sorry, even that part was 'fictitious':

BANK: Moore says North Country Bank & Trust in Traverse City, Mich., offered a deal where, "if you opened an account, the bank would give you a gun." He walks into a branch and walks out with a gun.
ACTUALLY: Moore didn't just walk in off the street and get a gun. The transaction was staged for cameras. You have to buy a long-term CD, then go to a gun shop to pick up the weapon after a background check.

link

documentary my heinie!

[gsmoove23]

I think Michael Moore defends himself pretty well in this interview, too bad it only mentions two of the criticisms of the film.

http://www.splicedonline.com/02features/mimoore.html

All the people bringing up criticisms of the film, are they sure they aren't falling into the same trap of propaganda? I'm not saying these criticisms are wrong just that ones like the last one aren't verifiable or at least don't have a source. What did they do, call up the bank after the fact? Of course, after the movie their policy might have changed and they wouldn't admit to handing out guns. I don't know either way, I'm just seeing alot of sights where the arguements are as suspect as the movie.

[MRT144]

gsmoove, its not propaganda if you agree with it.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by gsmoove23
I'm not saying these criticisms are wrong just that ones like the last one aren't verifiable or at least don't have a source. What did they do, call up the bank after the fact?

I'm more concerned about the doctored speech of Heston's that appeared in the movie and if that is an indication of Moore's integrity wrt the truth.

[Carolus Rex]

Originally posted by gsmoove23

I don't know either way, I'm just seeing alot of sights where the arguements are as suspect as the movie.

Exactly my point when I did the international comparison above! The site says Moore's figures are wrong/biased, then presents others, which confirm Moore's original claim! Talk about shooting yourself in the foot... Being that sloppy in such a simple matter casts some serious doubt about the rest of its claims, which in some cases are more difficult to verify.

Carolus

[uggabugga]

er---from your link:

1. There’s a wonderful scene where Moore goes into a bank with an “Open an account, get a free gun” deal, opens an account, and is summarily awarded his new firearm. Sound too absurd to be true? Of course, it was staged. Not only would Moore have had to open up a long-term CD account with a considerable minimum deposit to get the supposedly “free” gun, but there would have been a long waiting period where the bank would have performed background checks both on Moore’s financial history and his legal right to own the gun. Moore, only then, could get his gun, but he still would have had to pick it up at a local gun store, not the bank. None of this is portrayed in the film; Moore simply thought it would be more convenient and cinematic for the bank to have a stockpile of firearms in the back that they hand out indiscriminately, so that’s what he invented.

it would certainly help to have a verifiable statement from an executive at the bank, but there are other sources claiming that part was staged:

And Moore's anti-gun fervor also trumps the facts. He stages an event at North Country Bank and Trust in Michigan's Traverse City, claiming that opening an account would entitle one to walk out of the bank with a gun in hand. The film shows him doing just that. But the key word is "staged." In reality, the bank does not provide guns for opening accounts, and you can't walk in or out of the bank with one-unless you're a security guard employed by the bank. The gun is one of several "giveaways" that can be chosen by customers in exchange for opening a CD account. In order to qualify for the gun, customers must open a 3-year CD with at least $5,000 and then must pass a background check for the gun, which can only be picked up at a licensed gun dealer.

But, there's more, a lot more, to this story. In an interview, Jan Jacobson, the woman at this bank shown in the movie, says they were filmed for about an hour-and-a-half during which she explained everything to Moore in detail. But, the way things were presented in the film, Jacobson says, it looks like "a wham-bam thing." She says she resents the way she was portrayed as some kind of "backwoods idiot" mindlessly handing out guns. She says Moore deceived her into being interviewed by saying of their long-gun-give-away program: "This is so great. I'm a hunter, a sportsman, grew up in Michigan, am an NRA member." She says: "He went on and on and on saying this was the most unique program he'd ever heard of."

Jacobson says the movie is misleading because it leaves the impression that a person can come in, sign up and walk out with a gun. But, this is not done because no guns are kept at her bank, although one would think so. She says that ordinarily a person entitled to one of the long-guns must go to a gun-dealer where the gun is shipped.

In fact, despite what BFC wants us to believe, Jacobson says there are no long-guns at her bank. The 500 guns mentioned in the movie are in a vault four hours away. She says that Moore's signing papers in the film was just for show. His immediately walking out of the bank with a long-gun was allowed because "this whole thing was set up two months prior to the filming of the movie" when he had already complied with all the rules, including a background check.

[yago]

What just bothers me in general with those proofs, that the Moore movie was actually faked is, why is no one sueing him ?

The film was a big blockbuster, why hasn't anyone sued ? There's plenty of $$$$$ to be made.

[monolith94]

Because no one was harmed by it?

[uggabugga]

i think it would be safe to say that the reputations of charlton heston, ex-pres. bush (#41- due to the doctored 'willie horton' ad- and the bank (and the featured employee) were harmed.

[monolith94]

The bank, of course, probably experienced business rise twofold, due to the increased publicity. And Heston can't really sue for anything. The willie horton ad thing you've got going is ludicrous at best.

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by Carolus Rex


My redneck vocabulary is a little rusty , what does gawdoggit mean?

Carolus

it is

a bastardized version of dahgannit

which is essentialy:

Goddammit in some awkward way

[uggabugga]

do you want to talk about potential harm or the potential to file a lawsuit?

two different things.

by 'ludicrous', are you saying it didn't happen, or that it's unfair to bring it up?

Moore's clever techniques of inversion reach an apogee with the Willie Horton ad. Political historians will remember that in the 1988 Democratic primaries, candidate Al Gore criticized Gov. Michael Dukakis for a Massachusetts furlough program under which Willie Horton — who was serving a murder sentence of life without parole — was given a weekend furlough, and raped a woman. During the fall campaign, the pro-Bush National Security Political Action Committee ran a Willie Horton commercial.

The official Bush campaign ran its own advertisement, "Revolving Doors," which attacked the furlough program but did not mention Willie Horton.

But Moore pastes text from the National Security PAC ad over film from the Bush commercial, thus creating the impression that Bush invoked Willie Horton. Moore falsifies the advertisement by pasting onscreen the text: "Willie Horton released. Then kills again." This libels Willie Horton, who perpetrated a rape but not a murder during his furlough. The audience already knows that it is supposed to be angry about the Willie Horton ad, because it was unfair and because it politically seduced gullible Americans. So Bowling does a "Willie Horton" of its own on the audience, making the film's version of the ad into a falsehood and so turning the audience into dupes of a Willie Horton ad — just like the 1988 dupes of the original ad. For good measure, the ad makes the audience believe that a black man is guilty of a crime he never committed; Bowling thereby perpetrates the same manipulation of racial fears which it accuses the media of perpetrating


hey, maybe willie horton can sue!