Onion counterexample

[jack]

Betteridge's_law_of_headlines says that you can save time by assuming that any news headline that ends in a question can be answered "no". As he put it, "The reason why journalists use that style of headline is that they know the story is probably bollocks, and don’t actually have the sources and facts to back it up, but still want to run it."

Obviously there are some exceptions. But it occurs to me that a probable corollary is that, in a satrical newspaper, the intended answer can probaby be taken as "yes":

"Could The Use Of Flying Death Robots Be Hurting America's Reputation Worldwide?" Onion video

Comments

[pseudomonas]

I found http://squid314.livejournal.com/338607.html interesting as a thought-experiment.

[jack]

Yeah, that's what instigated this. I need a serious post on the subject.

I got into an argument on the previous post with someone who was generally in favour of killing illegal combatants who were acting outside the geneva convention, and I thought he had a point, but I still thought (a) there were significant practical and moral problems even if you think the aims of drone assassinations are reasonable and (b) it may not ever lead to a peaceful resolution.