Assuming you are addressing me and not John Mace (you appear to be confusing the two of us):
The point of your Bay Guardian link can be boiled down to: The Pew Charitable Trust is evil because it doesn’t give a bunch of money to news organizations to do investigative reporting, but instead focuses on “civic reporting” which the Bay Guardian thinks is unforgiveably bland, and further attacks through innuendo: “Welcome to civic journalism, sponsored and paid for by Pew – the legacy of the ultraconservative patriarch of the Sun Oil fortune, whose heirs and assigns are now using oil wealth to promote an ambitious agenda of privatization and corporate control of public resources, all under the guise of citizen participation initiatives.” Of course, nothing is cited in any detail sufficient to prove this thesis.
And I’m a little confused here. Surely the Wall Street Journal must be the deadly spider in the middle of the corporate media web: if it is raising questions about Pew, might it believe that there’s overall an anti-corporate agenda? We don’t know, since there’s no link to the Journal article (by the way, Kimstu, the second part of your excerpt above relating to the S.F. Chronicle and Pew’s supposedly never challenging “powerful interests” comes from the Bay Guardian, not the Wall Street Journal as you perhaps inadvertently make it appear).
Curiously, the Bay Guardian also takes time to take a whack at Pacifica Radio, which it implies is in the pocket of various corporate interests due to receiving grant money. Man, you just can’t trust anyone these days to advance the cause of the People.
Or else the Bay Guardian is crazier than a shithouse rat.
Wow. Okay, well, um, I shouldn’t have phrased it “more thoughtful responses,” I guess. Perhaps I should have been more clear and said “more thoughtful responses such as yours” or “more responses that are as thoughtful.”
I’m here to discuss, not bash.
At any rate, I haven’t read all the responses. I will, and I will respond some more, I just needed to make that clear when I saw your comment there.
Jackmannii:Assuming you are addressing me and not John Mace (you appear to be confusing the two of us):
Whoops! Sorry.
The point of your Bay Guardian link can be boiled down to: The Pew Charitable Trust is evil because it doesn’t give a bunch of money to news organizations to do investigative reporting, but instead focuses on “civic reporting” which the Bay Guardian thinks is unforgiveably bland
Actually, I think their objection is not so much that “civic journalism” is “bland”, but that it doesn’t explore issues in depth or challenge powerful interests.
the second part of your excerpt above relating to the S.F. Chronicle and Pew’s supposedly never challenging “powerful interests” comes from the Bay Guardian, not the Wall Street Journal
Right. I thought that was clear because the WSJ reporter’s quotation marks ended with the first part of the excerpt, but I apologize if it looked misleading.
Curiously, the Bay Guardian also takes time to take a whack at Pacifica Radio, which it implies is in the pocket of various corporate interests due to receiving grant money. Man, you just can’t trust anyone these days to advance the cause of the People. Or else the Bay Guardian is crazier than a shithouse rat.
Why is it necessarily “crazy” to be concerned that cash-strapped news organizations—private or public, right-wing or leftist—might be susceptible to muting or changing their agendas in order to get hold of some donor money? Do you imagine that there’s some kind of magical unbreakable journalistic-integrity charm that automatically prevents a leftist media outlet like Pacifica or Mother Jones from selling out even the teensiest bit? If there isn’t, why shouldn’t we be concerned about the possible influence on them of private funding agencies?
Shoot, Pacifica and Mother Jones (and, I’ll bet, even the Bay Guardian) pay at least some of their employees in cash money. You think those workers would dare report on anything the head honchos at those places might disapprove of? Maybe there’s all kinds of skullduggery and corporate fawning going on at those places, and the worker bees don’t dare let us know?
Or maybe all such speculation is worthless in the absence of hard evidence.
All kinds of entities, from corporations to government to community organizations to political groups of every stripe are out there constantly trying to influence the news to their benefit. And there are constantly screwups and whistle-blowers among all of these entities.
If the sinister higher-ups in corporations or their slaves in “corporate media” are constantly perverting and suppressing the news to benefit Daddy Warbucks and his minions, there should be reams of material leaked out over the years to prove it.
Jackmannii:All kinds of entities, from corporations to government to community organizations to political groups of every stripe are out there constantly trying to influence the news to their benefit.
Very true. So I don’t see why it should be unreasonable to think that maybe the entities with the most influence or power over the news organizations would tend to have the most success.
If the sinister higher-ups in corporations or their slaves in “corporate media” are constantly perverting and suppressing the news to benefit Daddy Warbucks and his minions
Aren’t you possibly being a little melodramatic? Remember, I’m not suggesting that anybody should take highly-colored conspiracy theories seriously, especially not without ample supporting evidence. I’m asking questions about what effects particular changes in news organizations over the last few decades might have on their news coverage.
This study is interesting in that it documents TV war coverage and concludes that most sources on American TV news shows used a high degree of offical sources, and aired few anti-war voices. In fact, not one anti-war guest was asked to come in for a sitdown interview. Not one.
And, I only use this study because this war is fresh on our minds, and the media coverage was slanted toward the administration view. Official sources give official views. And, if you choose to air mostly those views, you are setting the parameters of the debate.
Now, ask yourself why not one network broke from this trend. Is it because Americans don’t want to hear the other side of the debate? It is the lazy American’s fault? I don’t think so. In this instance, I think it’s the corporate media’s need to continue with the “U.S. fights for freedom” theme, because it’s important to Big Business to dominate foreign markets. Iraq is a nice piece of real estate.
From John Mace:
See, it’s not that they’re not covered at all. In fact, there’s a number of newspapers around the nation that have investigative reporters that will cover stories not touched by most of the mainstream. What’s interesting is when those stories aren’t picked up by AP or another wire service, or never make it to the evening news. It’s the fact that the stories do get minimal play in the mainstream press that allow you to argue this. But, really, what’s a little story here or there in a few different cities, if there’s no follow-up, no continued coverage? The issue goes away.
El_Kabong said:
Yeah, the numbers can be debated on the death totals, but UNICEF has estimated that more than 500,000 children have died due to sanctions. Many experts believe that the sanctions damaged Iraq profoundly and allowed Hussein to get a stronger grip on a crippled nation. They certainly didn’t help get him out of power, and they harmed the people that the U.S. government said it was interested in “liberating.”
But, when I say “U.S. sanctions” caused the problem (you’re right in questioning the literal truth of that statement), I write that because the U.S. specifically bombed Iraqi infrastructure, such as waste treatment plants, during Gulf War I; then, knowing that the nation was vulnerable to health outbreaks as a result, also pushed for the U.N. to include water treatment products and equipment from the list of sanctioned items.
This article in the Progressive goes indepth about the subject, quoting official U.S. documents about our government’s policy concerning sanctions against Iraq. Interesting that it wasn’t covered much at all by the corporate media. Some snippets:
Anyway, when there’s more than 500,000 children dying due to my government’s policies, I want more indepth coverage into the issue. If the media had treated this as the human rights disaster that it was, I think the policies could have been reversed. We’ll never know, since this didn’t happen.
Please get back to us when you have the answers to fit the theories - which are, in large measure, phrased in a conspiratorial manner and not justified by evidence.
There is no conspiracy. That’s not even an argument. There’s no conspiracy theory in this thread, there’s no conspiracy being hinted at, there’s nothing of that type of thing.
If you reread the OP, and especially the article in the link, it’s very clear on that point.
This doesn’t preclude that corporate media report from a certain point of view that is kept within certain parameters set up through a system built through the years for the benefit of corporate America.
I think it was Kimstu who pointed out that you rarely read labor news in the media. There’s lots of “business” news, but where’s the “laborer’s” section? Hell, the business reporter at my old newspaper wouldn’t even report about a strike going on at a major manufacturer in our town. Didn’t want to “give those guys any publicity.” So, I did the friggin’ story, because it was news and should be reported. Just because you disagree with someone, that doesn’t mean they should be ignored.
Btw, about this:
The capital of Missouri is Jefferson City. And, I loved my editor, and still do, though we happened to disagree at times. I can be at odds with someone philosophically and still like them. What I don’t like is people who try to belittle others who happen to have divergent views.
No, I’m belittling an argument of corporate media bias based on a “weary look” you got from your editor. Divergent views are fine when they are based on something of substance.
Other examples of a lack of substance in your arguments include the claim that labor unrest is “rarely” covered in the mainstream media. Strikes, threatened walkouts, dangerous workplace environments etc are all the subjects of frequent stories in the media. Again, for backup, we are left with a vague allegation from your newspaper days (I was a reporter in a larger market and did not experience what you’re claiming).
From your OP: “MediaLens is our response to the unwillingness, or inability, of the mainstream media to tell the truth about the real causes and extent of many of the problems facing us, such as human rights abuses, poverty, pollution and climate change”
Sorry, but this reeks of conspiratorial nonsense.
So we have claims from you that the “corporate media” won’t tell us about labor problems (wrong), clams up about previous U.S. support for Saddam (wrong) and hides any news/opinion about U.N. sanctions promoting deaths in Iraq (wrong). Planning on retracting these sweeping misstatements any time soon?
By the way, one viewpoint you don’t often hear stated in the major media regarding sanctions: given that Saddam and his henchmen killed hundreds of thousands of their countrymen (mainly those unfortunate enough to be of different ethnic/religious backgrounds) and many more through his wars, what’s the estimate on how many thousands of lives were saved in Iraq and neighboring countries through sanctions, which degraded Saddam’s warmongering and genocidal capabilities?*
I think the blame for that view not being expressed more falls on our anti-corporate media.
*and before you leap to more unfounded conclusions, I have also been consistently against the latest Iraq war.
You still talking about my anecdote? What about the FAIR study above that documents that TV news basically ignored the anti-war crowd? Why is that not significant?
Again with the bashing of my anecdote in a broad sweep at the argument. Congrats on your position as a reporter in a larger market. I’d like to know, please, did that newspaper have a Labor Beat? Did it have a Business section? What was the focus of its Business section? How often did you do labor stories? Only if there were labor disputes? How often did you do business stories? Only if there were labor disputes?
Sorry you feel that way, but if you read more of the link that I cited, you might understand. It’s not a conspiracy theory. It’s talking about framing the public debate. The findings of the FAIR study is a good example of this. The TV debate during the war had nothing to do with whether this should be going on. It was whether the U.S. was fighting the war correctly. Why? Why was the debate framed that way?
Plan on actually getting my argument? It’s not that nobody reports these things. It’s that the debate is framed, and these facts are rarely reported. Some major newspapers run stories about these issues, and they do make it onto some TV shows, such as 60 Minutes. But, it takes more than a few scattered stories to bring a point into the collective consciousness.
If there’s only official sources on TV, for example, and no anti-war voices, then how often do you hear the horrors of U.S.-supported sanctions?
Cute. But it ignores the fact that the sanctions could have been effective in limiting Saddam as a military threat, and at the same time allowed Iraq to provide its citizens with food and treated water. The U.S. chose the path most injurious to the people of Iraq that we’ve supposedly “liberated.” While Bush was talking liberation, why was our nation’s past history regarding Saddam and Iraq brushed over by the national media?
Well, good. We have common ground. So, you didn’t have a problem with the media coverage leading up to war?
This is just simply not true. I don’t know which TV news programs you watch, but every cable news chanel had analysts on who were anti-war. Keep in mind, that once the war started, the concept of whether or not it was right to go to war becomes less of a news story. Just as the huge protests we saw in the US before the war, were not repeated after the war started. But even then, CNN, FOX, MSNBC all had their share of anti-war folks on and they continue to have discussion about lack of WMDs and whether not finding them means the war was unjustified.
If you rely heavily on unsubstantiated anecdotes, expect them to be questioned.
**
You know, I felt a twinge of guilt about initially drenching your poorly presented OP with sarcasm (there have been, as El Kabong pointed out, lots of previous dingy expositions of the “corporate media” hypothesis on this forum, for which of course you can’t be held responsible. But since then you’ve come out with so many patently false self-serving statements and shown such unwillingness to acknowledge error, that it appears the tone was justified.**
What a truly thoughtful way of expressing your feelings about Saddam’s mass murders and his willingness to sacrifice the lives of his countrymen in ignoring and evading U.N. sanctions.
I sincerely hope you’re not still in the news biz. You strike me as the type of reporter who thinks he’s failed if every story he writes doesn’t contain an overt indication of his personal opinions.
*and before that chip on your shoulder gets any bigger - I referred to reporting in a larger market to indicate a possible reason my experiences might be somewhat different from yours. News outlets in small markets can be subject to pressures from a variety of sources that larger (i.e. “corporate”) media can more easily resist. For instance, a local restaurant can threaten to pull its advertising if the Daily Bugle runs a column containing health inspection reports. The N.Y. Times can afford to shrug off such a challenge.
And belated apologies for not knowing the capital of Missouri. I always mix you guys up with Illinois.
Just so there’s no misunderstanding, I do think the arguments as to the relative influence of corporatism in journalism are highly interesting and worthy of discussion. It’s my view, however, that Chomsky tends to make rather facile arguments that fall apart under scrutiny. Also we’ve had so many of his acolytes come in here witnessing for his views that I’ve gotten a bit gun shy when his name comes up.
IMO, as Lissa put it, the corporate media are delivering more or less exactly what people want. We’re shooting the messenger here; most people seem to detest being challenged on their beliefs and assumptions, and will simply turn away if the media they do follow try to stuff information into their ears that they don’t want to hear. Bashing the ‘corporate media’ for supposedly clouding men’s minds is pointless, because, IMO they are actually for the most part effectively serving the public interest, as stupid as some of those interests may seem to some of us.
Since there has been much discussion of Iraqi war coverage, I’ll use an example already discussed here to illustrate the point. Clucky mentioned:
If true, yes, a great humanitarian tragedy. Why was this point not leaned on more on in the run-up to the war? To be brutal, because the average American didn’t give a shit. This (Iraq) was a country that had expended hundreds of thousands of lives in obscenely mismanaged conflicts launched against both Iran and Kuwait, and a declared enemy of the US. The Iraqis, as a people, may be viewed as hapless victims of a corrupt dictator, but it is also fair to say that they are generally perceived as having brought these tribulations down on themselves by their own failure to resist their oppressor (whether they should have been fairly expected to do so is of course something else entirely).
The problem with assigning charges of bias to the ‘corporate media’ is that the bias seems to be laughably inconsistent. Think back to the first days of the invasion; how much handwringing about the wisdom of the invasion was there on all the major media outlets when it began to appear, for a day or so, that the Iraqis and weather were successfully holding up the advance? How about right now: the major media are certainly not holding back, in any way, shape or form, on the costs, both human and financial, of the occupation. So, sorry, but I still fail to see the point of argument here.
In the end, the quote by Chomsky at the end of the OP says if all: if the presumed bias does not derive from a conspiracy or self-censorship, then what is it? Well, it seems to me, it is nothing more than a failure by the largest organizations to express news with a different bias, one more favorable to those of a specific left-wing political stance. If I’m seeing this wrong, please explain why.
I think this also brings us to a point, btw, where we would be interested to hear from the OP, assuming the ‘corporate media’ are guilty as charged, what he/or she thinks the specific solutions to this problem may be. That is, should the current media organizations be disbanded, for example? Should the government subsidize all declared media organizations equally? You know, things like that.
Jack:Please get back to us when you have the answers to fit the theories - which are, in large measure, phrased in a conspiratorial manner and not justified by evidence.
Fine by me; as I said from the beginning, I’m not asking anyone to believe any theories without adequate evidence. I only wish many conservatives peddling their own conspiracy theories about alleged “liberal bias” in the media would be equally conscientious.
Still, there was still many anti-war demonstrations around the world. And, most of the sources of the TV news were “official,” and not anti-war. Not one sitdown interview with an anti-war protestor.
At any rate, I have a hard time believing that anyone can feel that the anti-war perspective received fair time in the media before the war. In fact, many notable people who had anti-war perspectives were slammed by media members.
Why isn’t the media all over this? That’s the question. I think basically because our media outlets take their cues from the military/government when there’s events unfolding overseas. The Jessica Lynch story is an example. Still a poignant one, because it showed how unsubstantiated stories can get into major newspapers, as long as the sources are “official.” The Post seemed eager to run that story, and it took the BBC to show that it was propaganda before the Post did its backslide.
Seriously, does anybody think the media did a really good job leading up to the Iraqi war? Yes, a few articles here in there in major newspapers talking about the ill effects of U.S. policy concering Iraq. But, where was the questioning of Iraq’s links with al Queda? Where was the questioning of Iraq’s potential to attack the U.S.? There was no link between Hussein and terrorists, and yet Bush still made those claims over and over. He led many Americans to believe that Hussein was involved in 9-11. The media shouldn’t allow something like that. They really should spread the facts as well as possible when facing war.
So called “Smart Sanctions” were practically the first foreign policy initiative of Bush the Younger. casi a group opposed to sanctions (smart or otherwise) has an overview. The dividing line between the genocidal starvation Iraqi babies and supporting the puppet government of Saddam via the sale of chemical weapons is a hideously fine one. Yet even CASI admits that Bush and Blair were taking steps away from the previous “most injurious” policy. Perhaps, just perhaps, the inefficiency and clumsiness of the sanctions was a result of these sanctions being the result of a committee. If you are fond of conspiracies one could even go so far as to suggest that some members of that committee might have had agendas that were less than pure.
I believe that the primary reason that the media was able to convince 70%+ of the American people that going to war was a good idea was not that they presented too little of the anti-war side, but that the anti-war side that they did present, frequently and extensively, was quite frankly, far too much like yours. Those who claimed that sanctions rendered Saddam harmless and impotent were shouted down by those who claimed that the sanctions were chosen exclusively because they were “the path most injurious to the people of Iraq”. Not going to war required either containment, and trusting the world, or trusting Saddam not to do anything reckless after being handed the greatest upset victory in history, by murdering helpless babies.
So why not trust the world? Somehow Americans were convinced that the world hates us. Consent was manufactured by systematically convincing Americans that their every effort, no matter how noble the cause, no matter how clear the benefit to everyone, will be portrayed in the most cynical hate filled manner possible.
Please. Enlighten me to my patently false self-serving statements, and we can maybe discuss the issue of corporate media.
And, then, this, which was really disgusting on your part:
You originally wrote:
See, the smilie face and everything. I replied:
My cute obviously referring to your reference to anti-corporate media.
Then, you come back with:
I really hate personalizing. I want to discuss the issues. But, this is despicable, taking me out of context to try to smear me. You strike me as the type of reporter who will twist quotes to meet your agenda.
Do me a favor and don’t respond anymore unless you want to talk about issues.
Well, there’s a difference of opinion as to what the Bush administration strived to achieve in proposing “smart sanctions.” One view was that the new proposal would have accomplished nothing, except to shift public blame for the Iraqi people’s plight onto Iraq. As casi points out: "In summary, smart sanctions fail to address those fundamental problems of the Iraqi economy that are a major cause for the impoverishment of the Iraqi people; the degradation of Iraq’s infrastructure. They tinker with procedures, but fail to deal with the underlying problems inherent in the sanctions. As the UK representative said at the Security Council in June 2001, ‘the status quo is not acceptable’. Smart sanctions reinforce that status quo. "
I happen to think that a different type of proposal aimed at improving the Iraqi water treatment/delivery system could have worked – as long as the U.S. and UK didn’t get to decide what was a “dual use” item, such as water-purifying chemicals.
At any rate, I still believe these types of involved issues, discussed periodically in some major newspapers, are pretty much ignored by most of the media, in favor of juicier soundbites from politicians. There’s the question of whether this is what U.S. citizens want to hear. I dunno. And, I don’t know what to do to fix any of this. I’m just here to discuss.
I’m a little confused as to what you mean here. But, hazard to say, I don’t think Bush and the media convinced most of the American public to agree to this war simply by exposing them to the wrong type of anti-war protestors. I’d sure like some cites that back up that point of view.
But, Kabong, this isn’t really inconsistent with the argument that corporate media frame the debate for us. If you look at the FAIR media study, it points out that any criticism during the war was by official sources worried that the war was being fought the wrong way. Some military men were causing much of this stir, because they didn’t like Rumsfeld’s strategy. Conservatives were very upset at this “hand-wringing” and made much of it, but the sources for this news angle were from the establishment, just as were the sources for most of the rest of the news leading up to war.
The question is whether the “leftist” stance is worthy of considering. Not, whether the news favors the leftist view, but whether it will even consider it.
Because, as we speak, the leftist stance doesn’t get any play in the mainstream media. I came on here to challenge people to think about the corporate media and its effectiveness in portraying events accurately. Why shouldn’t leftist critiques like this reach a wider mass audience through the mainstream media? Well, I think they should, but obviously the corporate mainstream media hasn’t framed the debate to include the leftist vision. Although, extreme conservative views are reaching homes just fine.
Dopers can reject my arguments. Fine. But, from the level of hostility I’ve received from some posts, and one poster in particular, I get the feeling that the very idea that we discuss this issue is of grave concern to some people.
Because the leftist view is not a widely circulated one, there’s a large learning curve just to get someone to understand the issues. While I know there’s stories in larger newspapers that focus on foreign policy issues – even our nation’s bad policies – how can somebody refute that those stories are fleeting? Do you have any idea about our nation’s support of brutal dictators around the globe? Simply put, the U.S. supports brutal dictators rather than risk nationalistic governments. Shouldn’t that be a mainstream news issue at some point? (Yes, I know, cite. I will. Not now, because I have to actually work at some point. I might start a new thread on this.)
Kabong, I don’t have answers, don’t pretend to have solutions. The government and corporations are much the same. That is, the government is interested in protecting and growing corporations. Anyone think that corporations support political campaigns out of a sense of duty? It’s very important for corporations to seek the status quo, to avoid radical changes in government. It’s important for a political candidate to attract the support of corporations. The Democrats and Republicans differ little in the grand scheme of things, and therefore there’s a narrow range of debate out there.
Under this environment, how could, or why would, government do anything to change the media? The Bushies showed that the media is ripe for delivering a message that can produce the desired results. The neocons attacked and took over a nation that didn’t possess the capabilities to attack the U.S. It was an illegal war of aggression. How is this possible? Supporting this type of war, while much of the rest of the world protests? It’s scary to me.
Why is it necessarily “crazy” to be concerned that cash-strapped news organizations—private or public, right-wing or leftist—might be susceptible to muting or changing their agendas in order to get hold of some donor money? Do you imagine that there’s some kind of magical unbreakable journalistic-integrity charm that automatically prevents a leftist media outlet like Pacifica or Mother Jones from selling out even the teensiest bit? If there isn’t, why shouldn’t we be concerned about the possible influence on them of private funding agencies?