CAIR Representative Calls Out Bill O'Reilly For “Old, Tired, And Really Bigoted” Segments That “Reinforce ... Stereotypes”

O'Reilly Admits To Factual Errors In Watters' World Segment On Dearborn, MI: “That's My Fault As An Editor” And “It Won't Happen Again”

From the October 8 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:

Video file

BILL O'REILLY: So what's the beef, Mr. Walid? 

DAWUD WALID: Well the show that you had Bill, just really shows old, tired, and really bigoted frameworks about the community here in Michigan and Dearborn in particular. And there were a number of factual errors that were in the story. For instance, the mentioning that the police chief was a Muslim when in fact Chief Ron Haddad is a Lebanese Christian. 

O'REILLY: But that was corrected though. I corrected that fairly quickly. 

WALID: OK, but then also [there] was misinformation put out saying that there was a Muslim woman who was killed simply for having condoms. That never happened. There was no honor killing or anyone getting stoned to death in Dearborn. It hasn't happened. And there are no honor killings taking place. 

O'REILLY: OK, and I think those are legitimate points that should have been clarified by Watters and weren't. So I will cede that those things should have had clarification there. Was a condom killing in Germany. And Watters didn't say that. That was said by some guy who didn't know what he was talking about. However, have you ever seen Watters' World before? 

WALID: I've only seen it about one or two times. 

O'REILLY: All right. How would you describe it? 

WALID: Oh, well how I'd describe it is it goes into particular communities and in some ways it makes fun of people or communities. But also, it reinforces or plays into stereotypes that people have about certain communities. 

[...]

O'REILLY: However, your points about honor killings and stonings and things like that, that's my fault as an editor. I probably... probably, I should have said you know what, if we can't back this up -- and believe me, I'm glad you contacted us because it won't happen again. That if there's any kind of accusation of violence or something like that, we'll check it out. And if it doesn't check, we'll cut it. But overall it was a gentle piece and you know it was gentle. Why are you so upset?