Sarcasm doesn’t go down well, though.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: As Americans marked their independence with a day chock full of fireworks, libations, and fun in the sun, Qatar-based media company Al Jazeera released a video via its social media site AJ+ that took a tongue-in-cheek approach to congratulating the United States on its national day of celebration.
The video is sarcastically titled “Americans Show Why USA Is The #1 Country In The World,†and skewers the nation for some of its pitfalls after a quick introduction commending it as a world leader in Olympic medals, Nobel laureates, and billionaires.
“Not to brag, but we have the most incarcerated people in the world,” a woman in an American flag and bald eagle t-shirt says. “God bless the prison-industrial complex.”
A man waving a small flag informs the audience, “When it comes to obesity … a third of us can’t even see our own toes.”
“Americans consume 80 percent of the world’s painkillers,” remarks a different woman. “Makes sense though, right? I mean racism in this country is a big pain in the ass,” she continues.
While some reactors have lauded Al Jazaeera for dredging up the topics that oft go un-discussed, many have also expressed their discontent with the web production.
“This sort of seems mean spirited to be honest,†Benjamin Buzbee wrote on YouTube. “It’s important to keep perspective and some of these are important issues, but the spirit of this video is to dump on the US the day before independence day – seems more sensationalistic than journalistic. Can’t say I approve.â€
Meanwhile, Al Jazeera America is facing two lawsuits from former employees. Former Al Jazeera America senior vice president Shannon High-Bassalik filed suit in June accusing the company of discriminating against female and non-Arab employees and in April a former employee alleged that he was subjected to “anti-American†and “anti-Semitic†remarks in the workplace and that executives were discriminated against women.
Someone should ask Al Jazeera America what it’s like to be the #1 US channel sued by its own executives for misogyny, Yair Rosenberg mocked on Twitter.
AJ+ executive producer David Cohn responded to one commenter who said they were unsubscribing from the channel by stating, “”Sorry to hear that. You should keep in mind the spirit of this video is not necessarily ‘liberal’ or ‘conservative.’ It’s both meant to be a bit of fun (light humor) as well as criticism. But criticism of our country isn’t a bad thing. In fact, you can argue it’s patriotic. Hope all is well.”