Still getting some comments. Deserves a repost.
I got a BA in this field called Journalism, and I must say that I am utterly disgusted. This whole field is pretty much gone in the West. I don’t think there is anything left of it. All there is is propaganda anymore. Investigative journalism? What the Hell is that? The search for the truth? Don’t make me laugh. Freedom of the press? Are you kidding? An unbiased and objective media, as expected under the system of liberalism known preposterously as “freedom and democracy?” Huh?
For every real journalist, there are probably 99 presstitutes.
There are still some real journalists out there, but there aren’t any in the major US press, large newspapers and newsmagazines, and large TV and radio news stations. The only real journalists are found in little presses, small radio stations like Pacifica, and on relatively obscure websites. In other words, for 95% of Americans, they are inaccessible.
I am not quite sure what the reason for this massive totalitarian sleaze-out is, but I can’t help thinking that corporate control over the media has something big to do with it.
For instance, the Washington Post just got bought up by ultra-sleazy billionaire Jeff Bezos. Obviously, Jeffy is only going to allow those stories to appear in his paper that reflect the views of him and his 1% pals in the government and corporate world. Anything that makes Jeffy and his buds look bad? Well, it’s just not going to show up!
What is starting to really terrify me is that I am seeing how most of the European media is about as dishonest, propagandistic and corrupted as American media. All this time I thought the European press was some kind of breath of fresh air. Turns out they are all corrupted beyond hope too.
There are a few exceptions. Every now and again the Telegraph or the Daily Mail runs a piece that goes against state propaganda.
I am starting to think that maybe under capitalism, the media will always be controlled by the leaders of the state, the rich, and the pillars of the corporate class, so the media under capitalism will always have a totalitarian, pure propaganda feel to it.
What system would yield true freedom of the press? Not sure, but capitalism it ain’t.
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Robert, you mentioned in the past how your grandmother had some memories about WWII propaganda, with a particular note about cartoons depicting Stalin and Hitler greeting each other with knives in their backs, representing how the non-aggression pact was a 10 year “ceasefire” of sorts before the fights.
Do you have more anecdotes to share? I ask mostly because I wondering how you would compare WWII-era propaganda with the current propaganda we are seeing from Westenistan.
I would say that modern propaganda is far worse, considering how Big Data, modern media systems, and more advanced psychological techniques along with almost 100% control of the media in their territories allows for more outlandish and over the top stories, whilst also being able to shove them in their citizens’ throats much more frequently than they could in the past.
I think we are seeing a pretty funny twist of events. One of the stereotypes they establish about countries that don’t vow to their wills is that of “the dictatorship.” Those rogue regimes have 100% of the media on the control of the state. The citizens are given non-stop propaganda all the time from loudspeakers and any medium they can transmit. Any dissenting views, however slight, are punished with jail time or even possibly death.
The worst part about the situation in Argentine is not that there was an attempted assassination on Cristina Fernandez, but how their media handled it. The best friend of the would-be assassin (who was not directly implicated, but more or less was aware and approved of his doing it) was interviewed after the event. The friend lamented how he failed to kill her, and said he should have practiced some more, with the reporter only doing a slight “You shouldn’t say those things, that’s bad,” to the friend.
So, yes, a person can publicly advocate a political assassination without not only acquiring any legal repercussions, but on top of that, the reporter not doing much to call that shit out. I don’t know how to translate it in English, but his tone of voice was sort of matter-of-fact like if you where talking about your friend being about to win in some competition only to lose in the end because she made a small mistake at the tail end.
The only reason why Cristina is not dead is due to a mechanical failure of the gun caused by negligence on the part of the gunman to set up his gun properly. To show how irresponsible Argentinian and Spanish media are, they started posting infographs showing with text and pictures how to properly operate this sort of firearm so that it fires properly. Y’know, so the next murderer doesn’t make the same mistake. This was done almost as soon as it was reported that the gun didn’t fire due to a failure.
This is the modus operandi of the Far Right. I think you’re familiar with it from watching Trump. First, the politicians and media of the Right start demonizing a certain person/group on the Left, fomenting non-stop hate. Once one or a group of their followers attempt something act of political violence against the Left, successful or not, they immediately backtrack and cover themselves by saying that the attacker was just some crazy acting on their own committing spontaneous lone wolf acts that weren’t influenced by the people on the Right.
In other words, hate is freedom of speech.