Saber recently participated in Organizing For America’s Health Care Reform Video Challenge, a contest to create a 30 second video ad in support of reforming America’s health care system. His entry depicted him painting an interpretation of the American flag being overwhelmed by the language of his personal struggle with our country’s system of medical care. “Basically the video is a visual metaphor of my battle with epilepsy.”
Saber’s entry, subsequently featured as one of the top 20 finalists, attracted a lot of negative attention by right-wing conservative media for what they called its defacing of the American flag. According to Saber “It was never my intention to insult or disrespect anyone. The decision to paint the flag was to show it as a living, breathing, changing organism, that represents me as an American trying to manage this lifelong disease without heath care”
Fox “opin-u-tainment” Network aired portions of the video, even reediting it so that it appears the video ends with the flag being painted all black, which was indeed not the case, for in Saber’s version the flag comes back to life.
We call Fox “opin-u-tainment” for several reasons. First because we think it was disingenuous to reedit the video (come on guys, it’s was only 30 seconds long!). And secondly because we were under the impression that a “fair and balanced” news network would not have devoted that much time, money, and energy to any news story without contacting the individual in question for their statement. The conservative media’s coverage of Saber’s video entry would lead people to believe Sabers intentions were ego and/or politically driven, instead of the truth, that they are grounded in the frustration, pain, and fear of having no access to a Dr. or hospital.
For the record, Saber is a registered Independent and not part of the Democratic Party. He isn’t even on the OFA’s mailing list. It was his fiancée who is on that list and was contacted when the contest was announced. The bottom line for Saber’s decision to become involved is simple: “Like many of my fellow Americans I don’t want to have to declare bankruptcy on the back of my medical debt, and more importantly I don’t want to die young because I have no care. I don’t understand why as it stands, this country is only concerned about the state of your health if you are under18 or over 65. What about the rest of us? And why isn’t every citizen 65 or older fighting for us all to be able to share in that security?”
*On Nov 17 2009 the winner, “I Deserve Health Care” was announced. We would like to send our congratulations to the producer of that clip.
-SABERONE.COM
“The American flag is a very powerful symbol of unity. It’s time to come together and fight for those of us who are too sick to fight for themselves.” –Saber
“The American flag is a very powerful symbol of unity. It’s time to come together and fight for those of us who are too sick to fight for themselves.” –Saber
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SABER, i kinda stepped back and took a look at the whole picture, and this is what i came up with.
1st/// off its a news station
2nd off/// they need viewers to keep it a news station
3rd off/// if theres no big news for the day they will make something bigger than it is to have people watch..
4th off/// have you ever seen HANNITY AND COMBS *or however u spell it* all they do is debate, people watch the news because someone is trying to push another persons buttons and trying to prove a point without rightful facts
5th off//// i watched a news show when they tried to blame NAS for murders in a city, and they kept tellin NAS that dont you feel guilty
? you rap about it people do it…? are you going to change your music? and they wouldnt let him get a word in.. everytime he spoke they tried to cut him off but since NAS is such a master of LYRICS he crept what he was trying to say and made the NEWS (DEBATOR) look like a jackass… cuz what he came back with was genius and it got played live across the nation…
its all about debating the news (AS WHACK AS it may seem)
JUST KEEP DOIN WHAT YA DO AND BLOWIN PPLS MINDS!! at least ya got media exposure, ya kno TOP 20… props props always KING SABER
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Just got your poster through the mail today, was stoked looks great! I’m from the UK too, so am even more happy to receive it.
Anyway it sucks about how Fox have decided to corrupt your message when i’m sure yours was the only video they chose to do so with. I mean they probably thought that a lot of people would vote for it because it actually was a GOOD video, I mean it made it in to the top 20 so it must have been!
They obviously would prefer to stay a corrupt media and portray a graffiti artist as the downfall of our system, by showing how you apparently defaced the American flag. When all the people really behind you knew that was never your intention. Did they even notice that you weren’t a part of the health care system too and you were doing this off your own back!? Didn’t think so.
If they can’t make you look good, they’ll make you look bad, I guess that’s just how the media works, it’s corrupt, but it still makes stories for the public to read about everyday. So to be perfectly honest, if Fox have re-edited your video though (as we all know they have!), then surely that’s not you defacing the flag it’s them. And who does that really make look bad, an innocent person who is trying to portray a message, or a corrupt media network who need to deface their own countries flag to make others look bad and get a story out of it. Go figure people, if you didn’t vote Saber, you voted the wrong video.
Viva Saber!
I had a hunch “I deserve health care” would be the winner, but kudos to the DNC for making Saber’s video a finalist. I bet it was up near the top of the final rankings.
I don’t believe anyone was really “offended” by his painting over a painting he made himself, all the venom Saber’s venom kicked up served it’s purpose. It got attention.
Too bad we can’t spray-can the “die, sick people, die” conservadems into submission…. then we might, finally, get universal healthcare… the Public Option just isn’t gonna make it.