Alberta, February-March 2007
16
ALTERNATIVA Latinoamericana
ENGLISH SECTION
EDITORIAL:
Noam Chomsky in "What
makes mainstream media,
mainstream", talks about it as
a process of indoctrination;
more recently the Cuban
leader, Fidel Castro, pointed to
the same indirectly, highlighting
the role of "the war of ideas" or
the importance of ideology.
Chomsky, in his article,
explains the role of mainstream
media in "thought control" and
also discusses his own interest
in this area as part of his
general interest in intellectual culture. He explains that
he found mainstream media a suitable subject of
systematic investigation and an easy one at that. You
can do systematic investigation comparing yesterday's
version to today's and you can also pay attention to
what is being said and what is not discussed to see
the way things are structured, he says.
Media as a Subject of Study
In discussing mainstream media as subject of
study, Chomsky argues that it can be studied not only
for content but also as an institution with its own
values. You want to know about its setting in the
broader society, he says, and about how it relates to
other systems of power and authority. Mainstream
media can be studied as any scientist studies a
molecule, he argues, taking a look at the structure and
making hypothesis as to what the media product is
likely to do; and then investigating the product one can
see how well it conforms to hypotheses made.
We find that there are different types of Media, he
explains. An elite media, "or agendasetting media",
that sets the framework in which everyone else
operates, for an audience mainly made of privileged
people -basically managers of one sort or another. And
a mass media, geared at most people focused on
diverting them and getting them interested in
professional sports, sex scandals or the personalities
and their problems. The elite media helps organizing
the thoughts and perceptions of privileged people and
defines the News. The mass media keeps most
people distracted with irrelevant issues, while elites
manage the country and the world.
Mainstream media is an institution with its
doctrinal system. It interacts closely with other
institutions and power centers, like government,
corporations and universities, and together they
validate each other. Individuals within these institutions
follow the established doctrinal system, if you don't
adjust to the structure, accept it, internalize it and
even believe it, you are likely to be weeded out along
the way. Elite institutions like Harvard, Cambridge,
Oxford, are very much geared to socialization,
Chomsky argues, most of what is going on in there is
teaching manners because in the end it is about how
to behave like a member of the upper classes and how
to think the "right thoughts". They are mainly filtering
devices that get rid of people who think independently.
Animal Farm, written by George Orwell in the
mid-1940s, is a good example, Chomsky points; few
people know that its author's original introduction was
suppressed. In it Orwell explains that although his
book is obviously ridiculing the Soviet Union and its
totalitarian structure he sees England as not all that
different. We do not have the KGB on our neck, Orwell
said, but the end result is pretty much the same:
people who have independent ideas or the wrong kind
of thoughts are cut out. In the introduction Orwell
explains briefly that this is because the press is
owned by wealthy people who only want certain ideas
to reach the public.
If it is true, Chomsky argues, that journalists
often say: "Nobody tells us what we have to write", it is
also true that they do not have to since they would not
be there unless they have already demonstrated that
nobody has to tell them what to write for them to write
the "right thing." They would not be where they are, he
further adds, if they have decided to tell the "wrong
kind of stories" at some point in their lives. The same
is mostly true of university faculty in the more
ideological disciplines, he argues; they have been
through the doctrinal system too.
In addition, he says, the political system doesn't
favor mass participation. The majority of citizens'
political participation is reduced to voting every couple
of years. Chomsky describes mainstream media as
nothing but corporations selling an "audience" to other
corporations. The audience is the product although it
rarely knows it. Naturally, he adds, media products
reflect the interest of buyers and sellers, and of the
institutions and the power systems around them.
There is no critical thinking about all this, he
adds, as the topic itself is taboo. It is not discussed
within the public relations industry, in the schools of
journalism, or by what we call public intellectuals or
big thinkers; it is not even discussed within the
academic stream that is, that part of political
science which is concerned with communications and
information. All of them, one way or another, he says,
see the general population as ignorant, "meddlesome
outsiders" incapable of understanding the
"complexities" of managing society. They all want
them out of the public arena, perceived either as "too
stupid" or as too "ready to cause trouble." In their view,
he argues, the job of the majority is to be spectators,
not to be participants. They are allowed to vote every
so many years, he says, so they can pick out "one of
us smart guys" but then they are expected to go
home and do something else -watch football or
whatever, but leave the business of managing
government in the hands of the better prepared elite.
The Propaganda Machine
Chomsky argues that this gigantic propaganda
industry is an American and British invention that
evolved out of the First World War a first time for
highly organized state propaganda. The British
Ministry of Information was successful in controlling
thought, or they would have lost the First World War.
After the Second World War, the U.S. more or less
took over the world and filled in the British's shoes.
The main figures of American propaganda emerged
from the Creel Commission -or the Committee on
Public Information as it was called, he says.
Edward Bernays,its main figure, wrote a book
called Propaganda around 1925 the term didn't have
negative connotations until it was connected with
Germany and the Nazis. Bernays became famous for
getting women to smoke; he headed a huge campaign
for Chesterfield where models and movie stars lighting
cigarettes made cigarettes more attractive. His new
techniques to "regiment the public mind" as the army
regimented bodies, he suggested be used by
"intelligent minorities" to keep the rest of the
population "on the right course". Bernays was later
the engineer of the public relations effort behind the
U.S. backed coup which overthrew the democratic
government of Guatemala.
Walter Lippman, the most respected figure in
American journalism, was another member of the
Creel Commission. Lippman wrote many progressive
essays on democracy; the idea of "manufacturing
consent" is his. Chomsky and Herman discuss this
idea in their well known book Manufacturing Consent.
Academic social science and political science,
Chomsky explains, emerged from the same
background. Harold Glasswell is the founder of
communications and academic political science; his
main achievement is a study of propaganda.
Soon, political parties will see the potential of
propaganda too; they will realize that with growing
democratization they could no longer run the country
as a private rich white men's club without applying
propaganda principles to control people's minds.
Naturally, none of this is discussed openly,
Chomsky says, as nobody goes to college to read the
classics about how to control people's minds or as
nobody is encouraged to read what James Madison
said during the constitutional convention those words
about how we have to protect the minority of the
opulent against the majority of the population.
More recently, Stephen Lendman in The spirit of
Tom Paine (Countercurrents) focuses on how the
propaganda model has been used by the U.S.
government to program the public mind in favor of the
rich and powerful and against public well being.
Control in the service of corporations, he says, is
favored from the state. In the case of television, for
example, the control is through the Corporation for
Public Braodcasting (CPB). CPB pressures others,
like for instance the Public Broadcasting Service
(PBS), in favor of more conservative programming.
Keneth Tomlinson, in charge of CPB until November
2005, was also director of US propaganda and in
charge of Voice of America. He oversaw most
government propaganda broadcast to foreign
countries, including Radio
Free Europe (for Eastern
Europe), Alhurra (for Arab
world) and Radio/TVMarti
(for Cuba). Tomlinson was
eventually forced to resign
due to allegations of
corruption for trying to
politicize the agency
through hard tactics and
unethical practices.
In the case of radio
the control takes place
through the National
Public Radio (NPR), which is as tainted and corrupted
as its television counterpart. NPR, Lendman explains,
gets a substantial part of its funding from corporate
donors who demand growing influence. NPR's current
president, Kevin Klose, like Tomlinson, used to be
director of all major worldwide US government
propaganda dissemination broadcast media -Radio
Liberty, Radio Free Asia and Radio Free Europe,
Worldnet Television and Radio/TV Marti.
In 1982, Ben Bagdikian published The Media
Monopoly, where he reports that 50 corporations own
half or more of Mainstream media. Media ownership
was in the hands of about 20 corporations by 1990.
By the end of the 90s no more than 10 corporations
were mentioned -New York Times Company, Herald
Media Inc., Viacom Inc, Hearst Corporation, Sunbeam
Television, News Corporation, Tribune Company, Clear
Channel Communications, Greater Media, and
Phoenix Media/Communication Group. A very recent
study by Granville Williams (from Campaign for Press
and Broadcasting Freedom, UK) includes a chart of
main owners, numbers are down to six and include:
Vivendi Universal, the complex AOL/TIME/WARNER,
Disney, Bertelsmann/AG, Viacom and News
Corporation.
Alternative Media
Increased concentration of mainstream media
led to heightened awareness about the need for
alternative media. In his article -What makes
Alternative Media, Alternative? - Michael Albert
argues that alternative media cannot be defined by its
product alone, no matter how good. The project itself
needs to follow a process different from the one
mainstream media follows. Albert points that
Alternative Media cannot be about making money and
it needs to follow more egalitarian structures. Also, he
says, it needs to question dominant hierarchies in
social relations while keeping as much independent
as possible from corporations. Often, he adds, fear to
take positions beyond "being liberal" has prevailed and
has at times led to opportunism. A wish to question
everything has at other times become a limiting factor
for opportunities for solidarity within and between
projects. Examining alternative media should not be
destructive, he points, but favor instead mutual
support and solidarity.
Some practical points from experience, he adds,
are: the need to encourage egalitarian salaries and
working conditions, the need to work towards the
elimination of hierarchies of power and influence and
the need to favor informed and democratic decision
making processes. He also points out a need to work
towards inclusion and in favor of visions that are
feminist and that confront racism and classism. Albert
discusses also the need to favor relationships with the
audience that focus on social relevant goals and
values. He also points that we should not reproduce in
our projects the oppressions we are fighting to
eliminate in the larger society. Finally, Albert argues in
favor of working together, or a federation of alternative
projects that without being purist helps participant
projects to clarify goals while providing support and
resources needed for the long journey.
Prior to November 1999 in Seattle, journalists
and activists in the US had created the Independent
Media Center (IndyMedia), which provided valuable
space in the Internet during the protests in Seattle.
The idea had come from Dan Merkle and it was
implemented with 30 thousand dollars and equipment
donated. It was a complete success: the internet
emerged in this way as a key player in the
dissemination of alternative information. IndyMedia
has continued to work and it is now present in about
20 countries in 6 continents, still focusing on breaking
the blockade on information imposed by the dominant
media.
In Latin America, in 2005, Telesur was born with
a similar mission -to develop an alternative paradigm
in communications. Telesur is becoming an alternative
to the monopoly on information established by CNN in
Spanish and Univision which together control 93% of
the audience in Latin America. Telesur was formed by
The dominant world and the future of alternatives
.
By Nora Fernández