Herald Finally Acknowledges Controversial Nature of DVD Insert

On Sunday The Miami Herald was one of more than 70 publications that was paid to distribute a DVD of a controversial documentary about radical Islam called Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West. Yesterday, Riptide was concerned that, unlike many papers, The Herald had not printed a story acknowledging...

By Kyle Munzenrieder

September 16, 2008

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On Sunday The Miami Herald was one of more than 70 publications that was paid to distribute a DVD of a controversial documentary about radical Islam called Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West.

Yesterday, Riptide was concerned that, unlike many papers, The Herald had not printed a story acknowledging the controversial nature of the documentary.

Today, the Herald finally got around to doing just that, and interviewed members of the local Islamic community.

Riptide had warned that critics felt the documentary "does not do enough to differentiate between radical Islam and mainstream Islam". The Herald interviewed Altaf Ali, Florida chapter director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations and paraphrased him as saying the documentary "does not do enough to differentiate between terrorists and mainstream Muslims".

Ali also feared that the DVD would "incite more hate and bigotry against our community."

A fear that might have been lessened if more papers acknowledged the controversial nature of the documentary on the day they distributed the DVD. In The Herald's case we suppose it's better late than never.

--Kyle Munzenrieder

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