Turn off the TV and read
posted by Daven @ 7:59 AM
"If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper you are misinformed."
-Mark Twain
"Television is altering the meaning of 'being informed' by creating a species of information that might properly be called disinformation… Disinformation does not mean false information. It means misleading information – misplaced, irrelevant, fragmented or superficial information – information that creates the illusion of knowing something, but which in fact leads one away from knowing."
-Neil Postman
Yellow Journalism: sensationalist news reporting; a style of journalism that makes unscrupulous use of scandalous, lurid, or sensationalized stories to attract readers.
-Encarta World English Dictionary
"We come with a strong point of view and people like point of view journalism… We've created this cottage industry in which it pays to be un-objective. It pays to be subjective as much as possible. It's a great way to have your cake and eat it too. Criticize other people for not being objective. Be as subjective as you want. It's a great little racket. I'm glad we found it actually."
-Matt Labash, Senior Writer for the Weekly Standard
I'm hearing it regularly. Every day. People are burned out by the constant barrage of the media's flimsy political and economic coverage. They are tired of seeing the same political theatre and hearing the same political libel that has been fed to the American public for over a year. Yet the media keeps pumping it through corporate television and corporate newsprint. Why is that?
Corporate media continues to print and televise irrelevant and fragmented information because we, the public, demand it. It is clear we wouldn’t have it any other way. We live in a society of entertainment. What does not entertain us is not worthy of our time. Everything, including the news, must entertain us. You can see this mentality on any corporate news network. CNN, MSNBC, Fox News. None of these networks provide unbiased, informative coverage. They provide entertainment and theatre; they cover only that which the public wants to hear. Look at their top commentators: Glenn Beck, Keith Olberman, Bill O'Reilly. (Their estimated annual salaries, respectively: $10,000,000; $4,000,000; $9,000,000). They get the ratings they want; they make the money they want. They don't report anything substantial. The American public is "disinformed." And it continues.
Never have I seen a more transparent example of this fragmented media theatre than two weeks ago. I was reading a few articles online after work on The Local (a Swedish media outlet printed in English) and the BBC. I came across a blurb regarding lipstick on a pig and an old fish wrapped in paper and I had a quick laugh. A generations-old phrase used to describe something old pretending to be something new. A phrase uttered by Obama describing the McCain/Palin campaign of "reform." The verbatim phrase McCain used to describe a proposed Clinton healthcare plan last year. I then read an article about a televised McCain-approved advertisement in response to the lipstick on a pig line, in which Barack Obama was criticized as being a "smear" candidate and a sexist. If you don't know the definition of irony, now would be a great time to look it up.
What dumbfounded me was the intense media coverage that followed. For three straight days, the top story on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News was lipstick-related. Two months before the US Presidential election. Argued by some to be "the most powerful position in the world." Certainly one of the most powerful positions in the world. Yet two months before this election, the best thing corporate media could cover was lipstick on a pig. For three days.
Apart from lipstick lines, what else could have been covered throughout those three days? Here's a brief list:
US Embassy bombings in Azerbaijan and Yemen and their regional stability impacts
Georgian-Russian relations
Turkish influence on regional stability
Kosovo and Serbia
The Missile Defense Shield in Eastern Europe
Faltering Russian-West relations
Lebanon and Syria
Israel and the Palestine Territories
Iraq
Iran
The PKK
Saudi Arabia
Libya
Algeria
Somalia
The Sudan
Chad
Kenya
Zimbabwe
South Africa
Afghanistan
Pakistan-Afghan border
Pakistani-US clashes
The Marriot Hotel bombing in Islamabad
Kashmir
Sri Lanka
Burma
Thailand
Nepal
Tibet
Chinese human rights
Chinese support for Burmese and Sudanese governments
Cuba and its future government
North Korea and its future government
Ousted US ambassadors in Bolivia and Venezuela
Colombia and the FARC
Climate change
The energy crisis
The Kyoto Protocol
Conservation efforts
Natural disasters in the Gulf Coast and in Haiti
Flooding in the Midwest
Deteriorating domestic education standards
The stumbling economy
JP Morgan's history of capitalizing on economic recessions
The Congressional banking bailout
The private banking components of the Federal Reserve
Domestic unemployment
Proposed healthcare plans and their pro's and con's
Domestic oil
Offshore drilling
The connection between the domestic economy and foreign policy
And on
And on
And of these issues that actually have been addressed at some point, which of them are understood by the public at large? Does the corporate media really help the American public to understand the longstanding tension between Georgia and Russia and its direct North American implications? Or the fact that the Federal Reserve is primarily composed of private bankers and is loosely regulated by the federal government, or JP Morgan's 100 year history of buying up faltering banks in times of economic crisis? Does the American public honestly have an understanding of how much or how little oil is underneath the ANWR? But the public certainly knows half a dozen opinionated responses to the phrase "lipstick on a pig."
The point is not to list two hundred topics that need to be addressed tonight. The point is to expose corporate media's apparent inability to provide relevant information to the American public—the main source from which a vast majority of American voters receive their information.
Instead of tolerating televised news, we should demand something better. Something informative and scholastic. Something enlightening and journalistic. If corporate media can't provide it, we need to seek it out independently. Competent journalism is out there, on the bookshelf.
As Neil Postman mentioned, corporate media has created in the American public "the illusion of knowing something, but which in fact [has led us] away from knowing."
If you truly want to have a better understanding of what the candidates are saying, distance yourself from yellow journalism and pick up a few books. You'll be amazed at how different your perception of current events will become.
-Mark Twain
"Television is altering the meaning of 'being informed' by creating a species of information that might properly be called disinformation… Disinformation does not mean false information. It means misleading information – misplaced, irrelevant, fragmented or superficial information – information that creates the illusion of knowing something, but which in fact leads one away from knowing."
-Neil Postman
Yellow Journalism: sensationalist news reporting; a style of journalism that makes unscrupulous use of scandalous, lurid, or sensationalized stories to attract readers.
-Encarta World English Dictionary
"We come with a strong point of view and people like point of view journalism… We've created this cottage industry in which it pays to be un-objective. It pays to be subjective as much as possible. It's a great way to have your cake and eat it too. Criticize other people for not being objective. Be as subjective as you want. It's a great little racket. I'm glad we found it actually."
-Matt Labash, Senior Writer for the Weekly Standard
I'm hearing it regularly. Every day. People are burned out by the constant barrage of the media's flimsy political and economic coverage. They are tired of seeing the same political theatre and hearing the same political libel that has been fed to the American public for over a year. Yet the media keeps pumping it through corporate television and corporate newsprint. Why is that?
Corporate media continues to print and televise irrelevant and fragmented information because we, the public, demand it. It is clear we wouldn’t have it any other way. We live in a society of entertainment. What does not entertain us is not worthy of our time. Everything, including the news, must entertain us. You can see this mentality on any corporate news network. CNN, MSNBC, Fox News. None of these networks provide unbiased, informative coverage. They provide entertainment and theatre; they cover only that which the public wants to hear. Look at their top commentators: Glenn Beck, Keith Olberman, Bill O'Reilly. (Their estimated annual salaries, respectively: $10,000,000; $4,000,000; $9,000,000). They get the ratings they want; they make the money they want. They don't report anything substantial. The American public is "disinformed." And it continues.
Never have I seen a more transparent example of this fragmented media theatre than two weeks ago. I was reading a few articles online after work on The Local (a Swedish media outlet printed in English) and the BBC. I came across a blurb regarding lipstick on a pig and an old fish wrapped in paper and I had a quick laugh. A generations-old phrase used to describe something old pretending to be something new. A phrase uttered by Obama describing the McCain/Palin campaign of "reform." The verbatim phrase McCain used to describe a proposed Clinton healthcare plan last year. I then read an article about a televised McCain-approved advertisement in response to the lipstick on a pig line, in which Barack Obama was criticized as being a "smear" candidate and a sexist. If you don't know the definition of irony, now would be a great time to look it up.
What dumbfounded me was the intense media coverage that followed. For three straight days, the top story on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News was lipstick-related. Two months before the US Presidential election. Argued by some to be "the most powerful position in the world." Certainly one of the most powerful positions in the world. Yet two months before this election, the best thing corporate media could cover was lipstick on a pig. For three days.
Apart from lipstick lines, what else could have been covered throughout those three days? Here's a brief list:
US Embassy bombings in Azerbaijan and Yemen and their regional stability impacts
Georgian-Russian relations
Turkish influence on regional stability
Kosovo and Serbia
The Missile Defense Shield in Eastern Europe
Faltering Russian-West relations
Lebanon and Syria
Israel and the Palestine Territories
Iraq
Iran
The PKK
Saudi Arabia
Libya
Algeria
Somalia
The Sudan
Chad
Kenya
Zimbabwe
South Africa
Afghanistan
Pakistan-Afghan border
Pakistani-US clashes
The Marriot Hotel bombing in Islamabad
Kashmir
Sri Lanka
Burma
Thailand
Nepal
Tibet
Chinese human rights
Chinese support for Burmese and Sudanese governments
Cuba and its future government
North Korea and its future government
Ousted US ambassadors in Bolivia and Venezuela
Colombia and the FARC
Climate change
The energy crisis
The Kyoto Protocol
Conservation efforts
Natural disasters in the Gulf Coast and in Haiti
Flooding in the Midwest
Deteriorating domestic education standards
The stumbling economy
JP Morgan's history of capitalizing on economic recessions
The Congressional banking bailout
The private banking components of the Federal Reserve
Domestic unemployment
Proposed healthcare plans and their pro's and con's
Domestic oil
Offshore drilling
The connection between the domestic economy and foreign policy
And on
And on
And of these issues that actually have been addressed at some point, which of them are understood by the public at large? Does the corporate media really help the American public to understand the longstanding tension between Georgia and Russia and its direct North American implications? Or the fact that the Federal Reserve is primarily composed of private bankers and is loosely regulated by the federal government, or JP Morgan's 100 year history of buying up faltering banks in times of economic crisis? Does the American public honestly have an understanding of how much or how little oil is underneath the ANWR? But the public certainly knows half a dozen opinionated responses to the phrase "lipstick on a pig."
The point is not to list two hundred topics that need to be addressed tonight. The point is to expose corporate media's apparent inability to provide relevant information to the American public—the main source from which a vast majority of American voters receive their information.
Instead of tolerating televised news, we should demand something better. Something informative and scholastic. Something enlightening and journalistic. If corporate media can't provide it, we need to seek it out independently. Competent journalism is out there, on the bookshelf.
As Neil Postman mentioned, corporate media has created in the American public "the illusion of knowing something, but which in fact [has led us] away from knowing."
If you truly want to have a better understanding of what the candidates are saying, distance yourself from yellow journalism and pick up a few books. You'll be amazed at how different your perception of current events will become.
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