Turbo Journalism

Today, I see the headline "Women must wear burkas - this is how Stortingets politicians (the legislative branch of our Government) defines radical islamism". I'm thinking "wow, that's pretty direct".

Turns out, it's actually just Dagbladet who have been calling random politicians and asked them for their opinions. Furthermore, the person who they paraphrased from, is a nobody, a random representative from FrP. In addition, the quote is taken out of context. What the representative is actually saying is "Radical islamism is the wish to bring Islam in, with it's Sharia laws, on top of Norwegian laws. They are fundamentalists, with their view on women. They demand that women wear burkas, and not show anything."

My translation might be slightly off, but I think I got the general jist of it. In any case, it's a ludicrous butchering of a quote, from a person who doesn't speak for any majority, is not the spokesman or woman for any party or movement, and it's blown way out of proportion.

Headlines are supposed to catch your eye, sure. But when the headline is this misleading, I almost want to report Dagbladet to PFU.

This is Turbo Journalism at it's worst. Creating something from nothing.