[Media-watch] Vigil outside the BBC, Bush House, Aldwych, London. 2nd December between 5:30pm and 7:00pm.

[Antony Wright]

Dear friends,

A group of us are organizing a peaceful candle light vigil in front of 
the BBC to protest at their failure to let antiwar voices onto their 
network.

If you share our concerns over this bias, as recently illustrated by 
their appalling coverage of Fallujah, then please help.

The best way you can do this is of course to come to the vigil, you can 
also forward this email onto as many people as you can, put it on your 
organisations website, or Send an endorsement to us at 
acallforlight at mail.com

Thank you very much for your help.


In solidarity,

Antony Wright


(For HTML Version visit: www.acallforlight.org )

A Call for Light.
Vigil outside the BBC, Bush House, Aldwych, London.
Thursday, 2nd December between 5:30pm and 7:00pm.

The first barrage of modern warfare is not heard on the battlefield. 
Instead, it thunders forth from our TV screens and leaves trails of 
fiery words across the printed page.

It is often said that 'the first casualty of war is truth', but we 
rarely reflect on the bloody reality of these words. During war, more 
than at any other time, language is twisted, stretched, and degraded. 
'Precision airstrikes', 'collateral damage', and 'friendly fire': all 
phrases thrown over a tragedy like a blanket over a corpse; to blur 
uncomfortably sharp edges and make tolerable the ugly truth beneath.

The corpses are piling high in Iraq. A conservative estimate calculates 
100,000 since our invasion; most killed by 'coalition' forces and most 
of them women and children (Iraq Mortality Survey, The Lancet, 29 
October 2004). Our media continues to bury their bodies.

Who will speak for dead Iraqis when our media will not? Denied their 
voice, our dead brothers and sisters are 'unpeople': like our own fallen 
soldiers, just more lives lost to the fires of a 'war' that the UN 
Secretary-General condemns as 'illegal'. Almost as lost are the voices 
who oppose this bloody crime: 57%, according to a recent survey in the UK.

As George Orwell once wrote: 'Freedom of the Press, if it means anything 
at all, means the freedom to criticize and oppose.' A healthy democracy 
needs a free and investigative media, willing to view our own government 
with the same scepticism it accords official enemies. Objective 
reporting requires balance; not only between warring factions, but also 
between the powerful and the powerless. Our media must be held to this 
standard, so that no body is hidden and no voice unheard.

Join with us, if you can, and help us shine a light on Iraq, on this 
'war', and on ourselves.

All are welcome

* Please bring your family and friends.

* Please stand in silence, to mark the silence of the unreported and of 
the dead.

* Please come with candles, to light the truth and your own placards, to 
commemorate the dead in Iraq.

* Please come as an individual, leaving symbols of party or organisation 
affiliations at home.

Endorsements
============

Howard Zinn, Historian
Author of "A People's History of the United States"

William Blum, Historian
Author of "Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions Since World 
War II"

Mickey Z, Author and Activist
Author of "The Seven Deadly Spins: Exposing the Lies Behind War Propaganda"

David Barsamian, founder and director of Alternative Radio (Boulder, 
Colorado)
Author of "The Checkbook and the Cruise Missile: Conversations with 
Arundhati Roy"

Norman Solomon,
Writer, co-author of "Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You"

Stephen Soldz, Coordinator, Psychoanalysts for Peace and Justice
Editor, Iraq Occupation and Resistance Report"

David Miller, Editor at spinwatch.org
Author of "TELL ME LIES: Propaganda and Media Distortion in the Attack 
on Iraq"

David Cromwell, Editor at medialens.org
Author of "Private Planet: Corporate Plunder and the Fight Back"

Joanne Baker & Abdul-Haq Al-Ani, founders of Child Victims of War

Gabriele Zamparini & Lorenzo Meccoli, Filmmakers
Producers and Directors of the documentary "XXI Century"

Globalecho, Open Publishing for Independent Journalists