cheetah

I think the point is not what kind of stories the media reports on and how biased they are (that's just one tiny symptom), but that the media doesn't even question war as a valid thing at this point. When they try to say anything of the sort, they are shut up at press conferences. Usually, though, they don't even try. It's a case of not seeing the forest for the trees. They are too worried about where the marines are entering next, etc., to wonder if they should even be doing it and why. The media jumped on the war bandwagon ASAP and has not varied from it one bit. That's what's biased about the media. And yes, I agree it's because it and the government are controlled by corporate elites.

emphryio

I'm not a master on the workings of the propaganda model (it isn't a simple concept) but I think I would have said they would have reported it.

Because soldiers accidentally killing 7 civilians does not challenge any fundamental premises. It was simply an accident, not a big deal. But there are many cases that it is hard for me to see exactly how they will cover. And I bet even Herman or Chomsky or Parenti or Alterman can't exactly predict how things will be reported.

As far as me convincing Pug of the propaganda model, if reading the book didn't do it, I certainly won't. Maybe someone else could. Moon talked quite eloquently about it in some past threads.

Hey Cretinist I hope you do read it.

Anyway here's an attempt at a quick summary:

Manufacturing Consent by Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky

The Ultimate Propaganda System.

�We have long argued that the �naturalness� of these processes, with inconvenient facts allowed sparingly and within the proper framework of assumptions, and fundamental dissent virtually excluded from the mass media, (but permitted in a marginalized press), makes for a propaganda system that is far more credible and effective in putting over a patriotic agenda than one with official censorship.�

What, a conspiracy?

�Institutional critiques such as we present in this book are commonly dismissed by establishment commentators as �conspiracy theories,� but this is merely an evasion. We do not use any kind of �conspiracy� hypothesis to explain mass-media performance. In fact, our treatment is much closer to a �free market� analysis, with the results largely the outcome of the workings of market forces. Most biased choices in the media result from the preselection of right-thinking people, internalized preconceptions, and the adaptation of personnel to the constraints of ownership, organization, market and political power. Censorship is largely self censorship, by reporters and commentators who adjust to the realities of source and media organizational requirement, and by people at higher levels within media organizations who are chosen to implement, and have usually internalized, the constraints imposed by proprietary and other market and governmental centers of power.� (page lx MC)

But doesn�t the mass media disagree about all kinds of things? Don�t they uncover all kinds of scandals committed by the powerful?

�The mass media are not a solid monolith on all issues. Where the powerful are in disagreement, there will be a certain diversity of tactical judgements on how to attain generally shared aims, reflected in media debate. But views that challenge fundamental premises�. will be excluded from the mass media even when elite controversy over tactics rages fiercely.� (page lx MC)

Fundamental premises more or less include:
1. �Communism is bad! Capitalism is good!�
2. �America is not imperialistic.�
3. �The IMF, World Bank, etc, are not imperialistic.�
4. �Never ending sanctions against Cuba are the way to go. No need to even examine the issue.�
Etc, etc, etc.

As opposed to outright control there are a number of filters news must pass through to be reported:

1. Concentrated ownership of corporate for profit media.
2. Advertising
3. Reliance of government and business �experts.�
4. Flak
5. Anti communism rhetoric.

1. Concentrated ownership.
As corporations are in competition with other corporations, media organizations are highly concerned with making profits. This has resulted in continuing mergers and increasing �bulk� production of news. In the mid 80�s there were 24 companies effectively owning the entire US mainstream media. In 2003 there are only 5.
These corporations are interested in profits. They are often tied into other companies. They often have a number of board members that are from manufacturing companies or the government. Compared to the average person these people are more interested in having very little government regulation of business. They are interested in lower tax rates for rich, etc. They are often quite interested in maintaining the status quo..... (Throughout large parts of the world.)

So they don�t exactly hire reporters that are communists. They hire people who economically are anywhere from just barely liberal to extremely conservative. When it comes to social issues, they usually don�t really care all that much. Why would they? And excuse me for mentioning this, but reporters are usually of above average intelligence, and that means they are more likely to be socially liberal. (The II discussion board is an example of this in and of itself.) Whether or not there is a social liberal bias is not something that I'm aware of ever being examined beyond anecdotally.

2. Advertising
This is pretty obvious and there are many examples of it out there. Strangely enough, corporations really don�t like to give advertising money to other corporations who are bad mouthing them or doing anything that could eventually hurt their profits. The results are that more pro labor media or any media that dares to do investigative reporting against the �establishment,� usually ends up out of business. Either this or they end up only able to reach a much smaller audience.

3. Reliance of government and corporate �experts.�
First of all, simply turn the damm TV on. Look at all these people they have talking. Of course right now we have a ton of government officials, or retired military, often we have this or that person from the Cato Institute, or Heritage Foundation, or the AEI. These think tanks exist thanks to the donations of billionaires and corporations. These guys aren�t exactly arguing for a communist revolution.

So why do they rely on these �experts� instead of doing their own investigative reporting? They do this partly because of the remaining filters, but also because it is simply far cheaper to do so.

4. Flak
The most easy piece of flak ties into filter 2, which is losing your advertisement funding. Other examples include:
a. Getting permanently ignored by politicians because you asked the wrong question or gave an unflattering story.
b. Literally getting sued for saying something unflattering about the powerful. Even if you didn�t actually do anything wrong, the attacked corporation may have tons of money to spend on lawyers. A news organization can't afford to constantly be defending itself from such attacks.
c. Getting attacked by corporate think tanks. This is a big money business. Try going to a large bookstore. Pick up the titles that say something about �lying liberals� or �liberals hate America� or Vision of the Anointed etc. Find out how these books got published. Of course the same thing could happen in reverse. Except you�re right there at the bookstore. Is it happening in reverse? What �.labor think tank supports Michael Moore? Noam Chomsky?
d. How about simply getting fired? You occasionally hear about a Peter Arnett. But what about the first year interns etc you never
hear about? (I assume they surely exist but don�t really know.)

So of course the number one result of flak is people learn to self censor themselves.

5. Anticommunist rhetoric
I�m a little shaky on this one. During the Cold War, this was definitely a filter. There were many stories that either got heard or squashed based on whether or not they correctly served the purpose of this filter. Anticommunist rhetoric has also been used extensively as a method in controlling what gets through the other 4 filters.


There are smarter people than me, out there. Better spoken people also. I'd strongly recommend reading the book. I don't think I do it justice.

Monkeybot

Nancy Franklin, writing in the current issue of the New Yorker, has articulated my biggest problem with the US media's coverage of the war:

As I read Franklin's article, it struck me that this is exactly my problem with war coverage; we're being shown the trees, but not the forest. Information is worthless unless one is asking the right questions.

jneedham

It is strange how the US sanitizes war. People don�t like to see the blood and guts of war. There is no sanitized war. People who support or oppose the war should see what war produces. News networks that try to sanitize the images of war distort what war is really like to the people back home. How can people make informed decisions about war if they aren�t shown what it is really like?

yaktldg

Noam Chomsky -- Iraq is a trial run (excerpt)

In the last few months, there has been a spectacular achievement of government-media propaganda, very visible in the polls. The international polls show that support for the war is higher in the United States than in other countries. That is, however, quite misleading, because if you look a little closer, you find that the United States is also different in another respect from the rest of the world. Since September 2002, the United States is the only country in the world where 60 per cent of the population believes that Iraq is an imminent threat - something that people do not believe even in Kuwait or Iran.

Furthermore, about 50 per cent of the population now believes that Iraq was responsible for the attack on the World Trade Centre. This has happened since September 2002. In fact, after the September 11 attack, the figure was about 3 per cent. Government-media propaganda has managed to raise that to about 50 per cent. Now if people genuinely believe that Iraq has carried out major terrorist attacks against the United States and is planning to do so again, well, in that case people will support the war.

This has happened, as I said, after September 2002. September 2002 is when the government-media campaign began and also when the mid-term election campaign began. The Bush Administration would have been smashed in the election if social and economic issues had been in the forefront, but it managed to suppress those issues in favour of security issues - and people huddle under the umbrella of power.

themistocles

Yeah, well Noam Chomsky also predicted that Afghanistan would produce 3-4 million dead innocents.

yaktldg

I assume you refer to that. Not only is that not Chomsky's prediction, it has no relevance to my previous post even if it were.

Blake

The media in the US is entirely balanced and unbiased; we have both CNN and Fox News. CNN carries State Department propaganda; Fox News carries Defense Department propaganda.

Two totally different things.

themistocles

http://kt.zork.net/kernel-traffic/chomsky.txt

No, I'm just dismissing Chomsky as a habitually inaccurate purveyor of reality.

Frankly, I don't much recall Chomsky ever making "predictions" per se, but he certainly conveys projection often with a statement like this, particularly so when the basis of his straw man (which is prior to my quoting of it) is rather a bizarre round-about reasoning which supposes a straw man argument. In other words, it's bullshit, he's predicting 3-4 million dead innocents. Christ on a stick, you could make an Chomsky dictionary for doublespeak logic. It's almost of the humorous level to deserve a drinking game to read Chomsky.

John Hancock

Pug questions
The claim that the US news media is nothing more than a propaganda machine for the government has been repeated quite a few times in this forum.

Direct From The Pentagon... ...It's The Nightly News

Another major conclusion from the FAIR study is that in early February, when 61 percent of U.S. respondents were telling pollsters That more time was needed for diplomacy and inspections, only 6 percent of U.S. sources on the four networks were skeptics regarding The need for war.
__________________________________________________ __
AND

TP.c: You don�t use the P-word in your report, but let�s look at a dictionary definition of propaganda (from the American Heritage Dictionary): "The systematic propagation of a doctrine or cause." Do your findings suggest that the media are -- consciously or unconsciously -- engaging in what amounts to propaganda?

Jackson: When you have news sources who are nominally independent and they use their platform, they use their bullhorn, if you will,to represent overwhelmingly the voices of the White House,
overwhelmingly the voices of the administration, I think then you have to talk about Propaganda. When they are not only giving such loud voice to one side -- the official voice of Washington, D.C. -- but they�re at the same time excluding, marginalizing any voices which are critical or skeptical of the White House, yes, we have essentially a press corps who, while they don�t have to do it, they are free to do other things and to be more independent, they are not using that freedom. They are in fact simply parroting and echoing, in large part, the White House. I�m comfortable calling that propaganda.

Martin Buber