Killing President Bush

I read this morning about a British movie that portrays the October 2007 assassination of President Bush. Perhaps it's because I woke up with a Republican in my bed (and it's not me), or maybe because I can still remember the horror of the days JFK and Reagan were shot. I find this appalling and an abuse of free speech.  I am second to no one in my distaste for our incompetent and dangerous President.  But this is over the line.  Just because we can use computer-generated images doesn't mean it's entertaining, or appropriate.

Comments

[Ann Greenberg]

While I can sympathize with your emotions, I have to respectfully challenge your conclusion. Free speech needs to be protected even if it can be distasteful at times. Every day mere opinion is cloaked as "truth" throughout media. If we teach our children that "seeing is believing," than we run the risk of turning them into sheep easily exploited by fascists. Hitler was a master manipulator of media, as was the longest reigning dictator in modern history, Franco -- whom little know was a screenwriter.

If we don't educate about disinformation and how meaning is constructed than we run the risk of mass manipulation and subjugation by dictators via mass-media. After-all what falls outside of the frame is often more relevant to the "truth." If a 'documentary style' film depicts the assassination of someone we know to be alive, the premise itself teaches the fallacy of "seeing is believing." Even without seeing the film, and without endorsing it, I think that lesson is good.

If one believes in multi-perspective and a plurality of voices, than one isn't afraid to see laid bare what every documentary film-maker knows - that their art is a more exquisite "lie." And that the illusion of truth is a more potently destructive device.