Propagandized Media Lies and Brian Williams
Here's the thing that has been bothering me about the entire Brian Williams story. There is much hullabaloo about how Williams lied about his experience on a chopper in Iraq and his potential lies about Katrina. That kerfluffle misses the real issue. Brian Williams is simply one now very public symptom of our propagandized media and the selling of news as infotainment. By focusing upon Brian Williams' lies, the media purposely diverts our attention away from the bigger picture of the lies of propaganda that all the media has been feeding us for decades.
Today there was a terrific diary posted at GOS that probably could use some love. I found it linked in a comment on gjohnsit's latest diary.
The first diary was inspired by an article in Salon which is also a must read. The two diaries linked above along with the article below prompted me to write this diary to add my own thoughts about what the real issue is for me.
News has become pre-digested pablum that has been regurgitated in a sanitized and entertaining manner for mass consumption. There is no truth or reality to any of it, and it is dangerous. While Fox is the most obvious purveyor of manufactured truth in which one small grain of truth is taken and twisted to create a pseudo reality, all of our media and their talking heads are doing the same exact thing. Perhaps the other media outlets are a little more subtle than Fox, but what they all sell are still propagandized lies. And we the people are lapping it up.
Just as our education system is being converted into factories to turn out little unquestioning cogs in our jobless economy, so the media is turning out lies that no one dares question. Critical thinking and questioning has been co-opted by the focus on news as entertainment. Media personnel are no longer journalists, but are finely coiffed and groomed personalities who read the carefully crafted propaganda each night on the teevee. The main role of an anchor and the reporters is to create an aura of unquestioned believability. And those who do it best are rewarded with the mantle of "most trusted." Real journalism is long deceased, but propaganda is alive and flourishing.
The infotainment presented each night on teevee allows the viewers to feel good about themselves and our wars. It presents war as sanitized and devoid of the real killing and damage we do to other human beings. The people we kill are presented in a demonized cartoonish way which allows the viewers to not see them as fellow human beings. News presentations are all about our white hats fighting for "truth, justice, and the American way," whatever that is. It allows us to cheer our good guys versus their "bad guys" in a far away place. And we can do that safely from our couches without ever feeling any remorse or sense of moral outrage.
There were so many great paragraphs in the Salon article, but this one stood out for me.
But what happens when we define physical courage—in the absence of moral consideration—as our highest good is that we deplete our capacities for mercy. This, in turn, allows our leaders to peddle any invasion or torture program or drone strike, no matter how ill-conceived, no matter how destructive to other human beings, no matter how degrading to our basic sense of decency, as necessary to “the national interest.”
On a personal note for those who may not already know, I am an active participant in a weekly Peace vigil. My personal purpose in doing so is to try to engage people I meet in a real conversations about these useless wars we are currently engaged in.
Comments
Good post gulfgal.
I feel absolutely the television media should be boycotted, all of it. Any self respecting activist in anything should recognize by now how
dangerous the state/corporate/ruling class media is to our society.
I've changed some in that respect because notice I said television, not print. Since I started writing again (after having been discouraged from that by Daily Kos), during my research I've had to delve into the mainstream print media. I've had to go see what the NY Times is saying, or Forbes or CNN. I need to know what they're saying to put the entire picture together. Not only that, there can be valuable information, with the propaganda, that is useful and important.
For example, the article I wrote about the NY Times admitting oil prices had been manipulated by Saudi Arabia for geopolitical purposes, i.e., to hurt Russia and Syria. That was an important admission, gets it out in the mainstream. But the article also was a disinformation piece in that it did not mention the U.S. role, and Israel's role, instead placing the focus on Saudi Arabia.
So I don't advocate a boycott of the print media, but yes to a television boycott. Anything on TV can be read later in print.
I agree about the print media
There are enough writers out there that we can still sort through it all and determine what is probably close to being true. I think there are two main reasons for the print (not all) generally being more reliable than television media. (1) It is more difficult to convert print media into the type of infotainment that the nightly new broadcasts have become because you do not have a good looking personality staring back at you while delivering the message in print. (2) People who get most of their news via print tend to be readers and are generally better informed. They also will tend to read a variety of sources for their information and then use their critical thinking skills to sort through what they have read.
I get all my information via reading. We pulled the plug on our satellite dish nearly five years ago, so we do not even watch the teevee news at all.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
I haven't watched either, probably
a good five years now. I don't even peek. I do have a dish but I just watch sports, others in the house watch what they want.
It's funny, I have turned on CNN a couple times during a couple major events over the last few years., not for very long.
It's kind of like after you quit drinking soda then you try one a couple years later and wonder why the hell you ever drank that stuff. It
was almost comical how differently it came across to me.
Good points on the print media.
Agree with you and Big Al on "print media."
We no longer watch cable or major network news. (Except, perhaps, on election night.)
But we use news feed aggregators, and read as much as time permits. Several good news sources are necessary (including foreign) to get an accurate picture of most issues.
Hat Tip to Joe and JTC (and Agathena, 'el,' Tim, and all the other excellent contributors at EB) for the wonderful news bin links that they make readily available!
Oh, instead of junking up with another comment, below are the screenshots of several Tweets that Nancy and Joe might find interesting, since they were discussing Bibi's visit.
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Netanyahoooo can bring it on.
He's going to make a fool of himself, a fool of Congress and Obama and a mockery of the ruling class.
He's a desperate psychopath that is going to meet his fate soon. They all do.
Agree, he is the perfect example,
or so it seems, of the conservative mindset that never backs down.
You know, Democrats (including on the Sunday Talk Shows) have all but begged him to not show up.
And, a couple of national reporters (on XM) mentioned his Tweets (most of his Tweets are not in English, except for these few), and naturally, I was curious as to what exactly he said.
It could be total 'BS' that he will show up. Or, it could be that he believes that he can negotiate something with PBO, if he keeps up the threat--dunno.
Believe me, I'm not a fan of his.
What I can't figure out is how this dude stays in power!
UL
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
The derivation of Netanyahoo
would seem to be "not a yahoo". Of course, my basis is Germanic languages. Yiddish bebelfish says it means, "hyperbolic asshole".
Megayahoo has alot of mannerisms that remind me of BillO.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
I've been ignoring TV "news" for years except the local
stuff, like weather and such. Haven't missed it.
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
I watch Univision soap operas while listening to music
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
I don't even watch it for the weather
You can get the same or even better weather info on your local National Weather Service website. The same agency that Rick Santorum tried to get de funded. And it is minus the hyperbole and inane bantering, as well as commercial breaks, that the TeeVee weather foists on us.
Not only that, but tv weather forecasters and AccuWeather for that matter, use all the same information and weather models, cribbed from the National Weather service. If you want to go in depth regarding the scenarios behind weather forecasts and alternative weather outcomes, each local NWS office posts a detailed forecast discussion on their site several times a day and sometimes even more often when significant weather events are forecasted or ongoing.
Weren't his lies basically the same
as the ones Hillary told about being shot at in Serbia?
It's funny how this would destroy his credibility but lying about being shot at by snipers wouldn't destroy her credibility.
I guess it's because she's a politician
We expect that from them. But she and her campaign managers are probably in deflection mode trying to make sure it doesn't come up.
Not that we don't expect the lies from the TV talking heads.
The entire thing is absurd.
I expect it from everyone, honestly
And I think these things are mostly overblown. I think Williams almost certainly does remember getting shot at by and RPG, even though it never happened. What we remember often doesn't conform to reality. Even I do it. Look at what most people remember from the run up to the war in Iraq. Either most people were for it or most were against it, when the reality was that support was pretty evenly split until the invasion started and then people supported it.
If he had lied about something he was reporting on, or if Hillary had lied about something that happened last week, then I could see the case for hounding them out of the public eye, but remembering a stressful experience incorrectly is just human.
i expect more from a journalist...
it seems to me that someone who chronicles things by keeping extensive notes and records of things as they happen and reports them to others has a duty to keep facts straight. i certainly have compassion for someone in a stressful situation not perceiving something correctly, but, it strikes me that there were other people in the situation that could have helped him to verify those facts during or shortly after the event in order to improve the accuracy of his reporting.
frankly, if i were flying with a bunch of experienced soldiers and i heard something that sounded like gunfire, i think that the first words out of my mouth would be something like, "holy shit, are they shooting at us?"
Hear, hear!
Mr Mr and I mostly cast votes on two broad categories of issues--domestic (especially economic/social insurance) and foreign policies. IOW, we don't vote for conservative fiscal or war hawks.
In addition to those broad issues, "character," as it pertains to the general integrity of a politician, is the third cog in the wheel [that we consider].
IMHO, what these two said would not qualify as 'white lies.'
(Now, whether or not one dyes their hair, or caps their teeth, might--unless, of course, you're misstating the facts to a hairdresser or dentist, LOL!)
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Tis true
But for me, the bigger issue is that his sin was a small drop in the bucket while the entire media was lying about the war all along. Personally, I do not care about what Brian Williams lied about or even what happens to him. But I do care about how the supposed guardians of the truth, the media, have been complicit in the lies that our government has promoted to justify empire building. Brian Williams' personal sin is simply symptomatic of the propaganda machine. By focusing on him personally, they are hoping we will forget all the lies that they have been telling us for decades. He will be a sacrificial lamb and the propaganda machine will continue.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
nailed it, gulfgal
it's all so beyond absurd I dont even know what to say anymore. This and all the hullaballo with the anti-vaxxers stuff. Once you remove yourself from the media-propaganda bubble, when you pop back in it just all sounds like some awful B movie. That bad but also that ridiculous.
By focusing on a stupid exaggeration by a talking....
head, they make people think that they have uncovered the worst and that everything else is copacetic. I don't think a boycott of TV News is going to do anything. I'm pretty sure the only thing that will save this country is a huge disaster. Until that happens, they will continue to lie to us and steal from us and distract us and....
Great diary GulfGal!
There is nothing which I dread so much as a division of the republic into two great parties.. This...is to be dreaded as the greatest political evil under our Constitution.--John Adams
They're all liars, all corrupted
One of the saddest examples is Rachel Maddow. (I should point out that we got rid of cable when Keith Olbermann left MSNBC so we haven't seen any TV news in years...but I remember!)
She was a pretty good liberal, like most so-called liberals, when Bush was Prez. Then she became an apologist. We used to get a kick out of imitating her in her deflection mode. "President Obama today jailed all left wingers...but that's not good enough for Republicans!" Now it's not so funny anymore.
Why would someone like her not tell the truth as she sees it? Her salary is $7mil a year. She *owes* her bosses.
There's that old quip "how can you tell a politician is lying? His lips are moving." That applies to pretty much anyone on television.
He has gone off script
and supported some progressive causes. They need a reason to replace him with a more loyal sell out.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
At Crooks and Liars
today Susie Madrak has a great column that sums up the mess fairly well.
"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak." --Paul Wellstone
Hillary also said she and Bill were "dead broke"
They probably had huge legal bills to pay after Bill's presidency ended, but both Clintons had book deals lined up and Bill was about to cash in on the speaking tour.
She dug the hole deeper by calling that statement "inartful" but "accurate," which is a quintessential Hillary-ism.
Her 'dead broke' stumble
may cost her. To what degree, it remains to be seen.
If Repubs are resourceful, they'll be sure to run a slew of screenshots of her (and FPC's) 'speaking fees' from Goldman Sachs, etc., over the past several years, superimposed on the 'Dead Broke' video.
I suspect that her vast personal wealth will put them under considerably more scrutiny this time around, than it did in 2008. IOW, charges of coziness with Big Business, Wall Street, and the One Percent will be more difficult to fend off.
A quick glance at the Top 50 Wealthiest Lawmakers shows that out of the top twenty, it was a tie: 10 D's, 10 R's.
http://media.cq.com/50richest2013/
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
It's about the money
It's always about the money.
People need to work for what they get. The wealthy are tired of carrying the 47%. Their children earned everything they have.
I have an idea! Let's make an estate tax that with an inheritance cap. I suggest ten times the social security wage limit. If the uber wealthy want to leave more to their children, they will need to pay more into social security. Raise the income limit to $500K and you can leave Chip and Buffy $5M.
The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. - Friedrich Nietzsche -
"Tax reform" will put an end to concerns about the 47%
post haste. Many reporters are speculating that this should be done by Fall if they use regular order, and in Lame Duck this December, if lawmakers decide to cry "hostage taking."
This topic is one of my main concerns.
From what I've been able to discern from Congressional hearings, it will be yet another massive transfer of wealth upwards.
PBO assured Repubs two years ago (per The Financial Times) that any corporate tax reform would be 'revenue neutral.' Any rhetoric, otherwise, is Kabuki.
And Dems and Repubs have already reached a preliminary agreement on a much flatter tax code in 2014, which Senator Wyden predicted would be passed by October 2015.
I'm going to do my best to start clipping some of these tax hearings, and posting the most salient clips.
It seems that in some instances (at certain blogs, LOL!), MSM 'print stories' are just not that convincing--maybe actually watching lawmakers debate these "reforms" will do the trick.
The major "tax overhaul" being considered will not only be a major transference of wealth upwards, it will also be a major step toward transference of the tax burden onto seniors on fixed incomes, and working adults without children.
Of course, many MSM economic writers say that all of the proposed 'tax hikes' on the wealthy are DOA, and I tend to agree with that assessment.
Oh, regarding the inheritance tax, don't count on it.
In March of 2013, the (Mark) Warner Amendment passed in the Senate that would drastically cut 'the death tax,' or eliminate it altogether--IN A FISCALLY RESPONSIBLE WAY, of course. It passed 80 yays, to 19 nays.
UL
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
Mollie, you hit that nail squarely on the head
I remember reading several years ago that Obama favored flattening the tax code to take the top marginal rate down to 28%. That is ridiculous!!!
The excuse for doing so was to remove many of the tax breaks that the upper incomes now use. That is pure unadulterated bullshit. And everyone knows that the more the tax code becomes flattened, the more it benefits the highest income earners.
Don't even get me started on corporate welfare. It is criminal that some of the biggest and most profitable corporations in the US pay little or no taxes and some like GE get tax rebates. Freaking tax rebates when 50% of the people in this country are in or precipitously on the edge of poverty.
I am looking forward to what you will write on this issue.
Do I hear the sound of guillotines being constructed?
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable." ~ President John F. Kennedy
Thanx--mostly hope to 'let videos speak for themselves,'
since I am not particularly adept at articulating some policy.
Unfortunately, since so many MSM economic reporters write mostly "spin," it is difficult to find an accurate representation of what lawmakers are truly proposing.
(Which is not to say that occasionally one can't find that. But, more often than not, it's in foreign press like "The Financial Times," or even "The Guardian").
It was in Reuters that I found the Op-Ed piece [which I've posted so many times] by Rep Jan Schakowsky, "The Sham Of Simpson Bowles" [sic]--telling the truth about the Bowles-Simpson Commission's proposed cuts.
The only thing that I can think of--let lawmakers' own words speak for them.
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
The Financial Times
is full of great news, tid bits and sources.
We subscribed to the print version for several years when delivery first came to the US. It was delivery problems more than anything that led us to give it up.
"Never separate the life you live from the words you speak." --Paul Wellstone
Agree, but have only subscribed online for that same
reason. By the time it could reach us, it would be 'old news.' Their online PDF version newspaper was pretty nice and handy.
We're presently only using the "ft.com" free service, with its very limited allotment of monthly articles. But we're considering resubscribing--at least for the year leading up to the 2016 campaign cycle/election.
Mollie
Everyone thinks they have the best dog, and none of them are wrong.
heh...
Hmmm...
I wonder whom Williams pissed off...