"The media's selection and description of particular events - far more than their editorials - help to create or promote national issues, to shape the minds of the Congress and public, and to influence the President's agenda and timing."
Theodore C. Sorensen, John F. Kennedy Speechwriter
Really? That the media do shape the minds of the public is true, but that they shape the minds of, in our case, the legislature and Prime Minister is pure hogwash. An example of how this statement is true can best be illustrated in the words of John Rendon, founder of the Rendon Group, a Washington PR firm, who in 1996 told the Us Air Force Academy:
"....when victorious troops rolled into Kuwait City at the end of the first war in the Persian Gulf, they were greeted by hundreds of Kuwaitis waving small American flags. The scene, flashed around the world on television screens, sent the message that U.S. Marines were being welcomed in Kuwait as liberating heroes. “Did you ever stop to wonder,” Rendon asked, “how the people of Kuwait City, after being held hostage for seven long and painful months, were able to get hand-held American, and for that matter, the flags of other coalition countries?” He paused for effect. “Well, you now know the answer. That was one of my jobs then."
And politicians do not manipulate the news? Yeah, right. What is presented to us today as 'news' is not 'fair and balanced'; it is most definitely 'one-sided', almost what could be termed 'advocacy- journalism'. The media have become part of - and the tool for - what may be termed 'perception management', the latest 'art form' currently being practised by our politicians. As an example I offer the 'Localism' aspect of the Coalition's process for the devolution of power to the people. From the Department of Communities and Local Government website it is possible to access the 'Plain English Guide' to this Localism thingy. Whilst the media did report the right to local referendums, I do not recall them providing as much space to the fact that local authorities can disrgard the result of a referendum if they so wish. As I wrote yesterday, if the public do not receive all the information required for them to make an informed decision, then there must be some form of censorship being practised.
If censorship 'per se' is not being practised, then mind-control most certainly is - and two examples. First Autonomous Mind posts on the misrepresentation of facts and lies being presented as truth. I would query AM's statement that the Express should ensure it's journalists understanding of the EU and the control it has accumulated over this country by pointing out that the content of journalistic efforts generally reflect the 'line' media proprietors wish 'pushed' - but I digress. Second, Richard North, EU Referendum, posts on the fact that Cameron has spent £2million of taxpayer's money on the formulation of his 'Happiness Index' questionnaire. The purported questions are 'mind conditioning' in that they are designed to focus the public's minds on matters of no real consequence, rather than on matters the public do have views - and in some cases, very strong views.
Besides being subjected, physically, to the will of our 'elected dictators', it must now be apparent so are we mentally. The control of our freedom and thought, coupled with the way history taught in our schools is being 'rewritten', means that in our journey down the Orwellian Big Brother path, it can't be long before we are provided with the all-seeing, all-hearing tv sets - or have we already?
2 comments:
The "media" have been manipulating public opinion for a very long time, though I suggest, in the last fifty or so years there has been a subtle shift in the ideological presentation. The Fabian Society was formed in order to bring about a socialist dispensation in Britain in the late 19th Century. Most of our leading philosophers and educationists have been members or influenced by the writings of members. Our education establishments become the natural home of the Fabian's disciples in the 1960s and since then their pupils and students have become the media hacks and presenters of today.
The UK media is particularly badly infected, as any reading of any report of the same events in a newspaper or on a television broadcast in a non-UK based paper or country very quickly reveals.
When it comes to education our children are not taught the achievements of our history, but fed a diet entriely focused on the 'abuses' and 'failures' and given a distorted version of the supposed 'victims' history, often fabricated to suit the ideology.
As I said, these manipulations are not new, as far back as the Napoleonic wars, the media were distorting facts, spreading blatant propaganda and it probably reached its peak in WW1. The PR men and women make the news these days, but rather than focus on the fact that it is being manipulated - a given since that is the nature of the beast - we should rather ask what ideology is being promoted by it.
Which brings me to the next important point in all this. The balances of trade are swinging away from Europe, the UK, the US and other "European" or "Western" nations. Demographically we are declining populations - by 2030 Europe (including the UK) will be just 6% of the world population - and this has major implications for us as a power bloc, as a trading bloc and in terms of our ability toinfluence and direct events in the world. This is one reason why our politicians and corporatists are so keen to push the "globalisation" agenda, it ensures that they retain some control of the economics involved even as our national status declines.
It should come as no surprise that the "swing vote" to use the American expression, is so heavily influenced by the media manipulators, Kinnock lost because of it, Blair won through it, Brown lost to it.
As a certain aristocratic meerkat is wont to say - "Simples." But the ideology of the writers, presenters and educators should be of concern to all of us - they have a very subtle agenda and have changed our thinking and expectations far more than I think is recognised or acknowledged, and they have done it in a very short period.
TGM: Interesting comment and thank you. I don't necessarily agree that a small population means less productivity and knowledge - not if the 'basics', education, apprenticeships, manufacturing industries are in place......?
Is the idea not to feed ourselves, rather than be Father Christmas to the world?
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