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If you travel abroad and have time to listen to the news, it is eye opening. The perspective of the newscasters / commentators can be quite different from that here. The locals believe that different perspective - as we do ours. It is not that others are getting better information - just different information. They too are influenced by the TV wasteland. So, instead of 1 brainwasher, we have many. For a power like US, it is not good news since it makes it difficult to control / influence others. At times like these, having a coherent foreign policy (and not country-by-country ethics) is the best defense. If we are truly who we say we are, others (despite propaganda from other countries) will generally recognize that and it will be good for us. If we have poor diplomacy, information wars will just be like putting lipstick on a pig - I would rather put it on a prettier face.
I recomend a 1970's book titled "The Control of OIL" (I forgot the author's name) that describes the first 100 years of the petroleum business and has predicted the last 40 very accurately. We have based far too much of our domestic and foreign policy on protecting the petroleum industry from low prices than from anything else.
There really isn't much difference between watching TV and "viewing" a computer screen. I've gotten rid of my satellite and now struggle with sitting too often in front of my laptop (where you can watch many TV programs still). Surfing the internet is just as bad as watching television - but (unlike satellite TV) I refuse to give up my internet connection.
I tend to disagree because I can't just turn my TV on and listen to RT or Al Jazeera or any of the countless other news sources from abroad. I cannot interact with my TV, like sitting here at this forum discussing things with other people, it is a static one way form of communication that pipes what it wants to you and you get to decide to watch from the choices others offer you. In other words there is no exchange of information, it merely tells you.
Do you think CNN, FOX or MSNBC ran this segment of Clinton begging for propaganda dollars on US media? THAT is the difference.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GregW
As both of the Clinton's are wholly owned subsidiaries of the international petroleum cartel, as well as being shills for Megacorp in general, I figure she will get the money needed to try and convince the world that American corporatism is good for them. Unfortunately for the propagandists the world citizens are not all dumb.
Operation Mockingbird was shut down, according to the government, and I believe it was in a manner of speaking. It was shut down by adopting it as standard operating procedure and incorporated into the norm.
Judith Miller come to the white phone...
People aren't thinkers who feel, they are feelers who on occasion think and mass media has well learned what bait catches the most fish and it doesn't use a dolphin safe net either.
I dumped my TV many years ago, haven't had one since, and don't miss it at all. I work in a hospital where I can watch some TV in the waiting room. When alone (which is often) I surf the 50+ channels. Mostly mind numbing pablum. CNN and MSNBC can be watched for about 10 minutes, then the 'news' stories repeat for hours. The stories are very limited, only 4 or 5, all day.
My hero is former FCC chairman, Newton Minnow, who, in a speech in 1961, stated that TV is a vast wasteland. Pardon my english, but I think the wasteland has just become vaster.
For news I use the internet to view New York Times, Chicago Tribune, but, more informative, the English version of France24. I understand German so I also check out the online German newspapers.
If you travel abroad and have time to listen to the news, it is eye opening. The perspective of the newscasters / commentators can be quite different from that here. The locals believe that different perspective - as we do ours. It is not that others are getting better information - just different information. They too are influenced by the TV wasteland. So, instead of 1 brainwasher, we have many. For a power like US, it is not good news since it makes it difficult to control / influence others. At times like these, having a coherent foreign policy (and not country-by-country ethics) is the best defense. If we are truly who we say we are, others (despite propaganda from other countries) will generally recognize that and it will be good for us. If we have poor diplomacy, information wars will just be like putting lipstick on a pig - I would rather put it on a prettier face.
An excellent point and one clearly seen by the female news reader adding her two cents in the RT video posted in the OP. If I were Russian, I wouldn't take what RT says as gospel anymore than I would Fox or MSNBC. You are absolutely right that each place has its own version of events, and what I find most fascinating is that many people on this forum (as an example) will cite how biased Al Jazeera is for instance but at the same time fail to realize their own media is biased in favor of their government. There is a disconnect of logic and reason, and one of the reasons these stations play so hard towards emotions.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GregW
I recomend a 1970's book titled "The Control of OIL" (I forgot the author's name) that describes the first 100 years of the petroleum business and has predicted the last 40 very accurately. We have based far too much of our domestic and foreign policy on protecting the petroleum industry from low prices than from anything else.
I recommend signing up for the American Empire Project, which once in a blue moon sends an email containing articles from authors writing on the subject of the American Empire, and the one I received the other day was the following.
The Collapse of the Old Oil Order by Michael Klare.
Quote:
For a century stretching back to the discovery of oil in southwestern Persia before World War I, Western powers have repeatedly intervened in the Middle East to ensure the survival of authoritarian governments devoted to producing petroleum. Without such interventions, the expansion of Western economies after World War II and the current affluence of industrialized societies would be inconceivable
Location: In a Galaxy far, far away called Germany
4,300 posts, read 4,408,773 times
Reputation: 2394
[quote=TnHilltopper;18130534]I tend to disagree because I can't just turn my TV on and listen to RT or Al Jazeera or any of the countless other news sources from abroad. I cannot interact with my TV, like sitting here at this forum discussing things with other people, it is a static one way form of communication that pipes what it wants to you and you get to decide to watch from the choices others offer you. In other words there is no exchange of information, it merely tells you.
Do you think CNN, FOX or MSNBC ran this segment of Clinton begging for propaganda dollars on US media? THAT is the difference.
I see what you are saying (in regards to news and issues) and I agree.
I dumped my TV many years ago, haven't had one since, and don't miss it at all. I work in a hospital where I can watch some TV in the waiting room. When alone (which is often) I surf the 50+ channels. Mostly mind numbing pablum. CNN and MSNBC can be watched for about 10 minutes, then the 'news' stories repeat for hours. The stories are very limited, only 4 or 5, all day.
My hero is former FCC chairman, Newton Minnow, who, in a speech in 1961, stated that TV is a vast wasteland. Pardon my english, but I think the wasteland has just become vaster.
For news I use the internet to view New York Times, Chicago Tribune, but, more informative, the English version of France24. I understand German so I also check out the online German newspapers.
Three basic methods are employed to promote a given message or talking point in the press and media.
Content, that which media chooses which stories to discuss. An example I often use with my friends is that this forum will often have more news bits from a wide range of sources that aren't seen on the main TV stations, but should be. If you are given a choice between A, B, and C, you are missing DEFGHIJK... so your view is narrowed for you.
Repetition, how often does one of the choices of A, B, or C run? As you point out, constantly. Pick a few points and run them over and over and over so that they sink in and people then go to the water cooler at work and discuss, A, B, or C only.
Guests, want to make a point supported, then you get two neatly dressed handsome guest and one geeky, poor speaking counter point and let the other two run rough shod over them. This gives the viewer the appearance that the counterpoint is weak, inviable and wrong. Also, find guest who sound authoritative, such as 'ex-generals' telling us how we need to invade or intervene, and then just leave out how they have personal financial stakes in doing so or that they are paid by the very media company running their interview to say what they are saying to you.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bulldawg82
I see what you are saying (in regards to news and issues) and I agree.
I pine for the days of Walter Cronkite's 20 min of 'what happened today', absent of his personal views.
Cancel my Satellite service and get rid of the television. I don't watch TV much as it is and after a series of discussions, then watching this clip from RT News, something just clicked.
A couple of things of note on this clip. Notice that even Clinton points out the inane banality of US media and why it isn't helping the US government win the war of minds abroad, because our media is now so idiotic that even the third world countries shake their heads at its level of stupidity.
Now it seeks billions of dollars in State Department funding to spread the gospel of America BS to the rest of the world.
I conclude that at current, the only place actual free information, be it sound or fluffy, credible, incredible or bunk, is on the net. It is the only place I can go and pick the information or entertainment I want instead of what others choose for me. So other than PBS, LINK, Turner Classic Movies, I must say goodbye Bill Maher, Bill O'rielly, Maddow and Hannity, goodbye to all, I'm claiming my mind back and I taking the first months Satellite savings and treating myself to a fat steak dinner.
Now I'm off to shop for a new bookshelf to replace the empty space where my TV once was.
My TV hangs on the wall - still room for a bookshelf
I got rid of cable as well. But you still can rent good
movies at the library and watch it on your TV
Clinton has gotten very weird lately. I saw her on
C-Span giving a speech at Columbia, talking about the
internet freedom e.g. security etc.. Somehow I don't
trust her intentions. Any time a politician talks about
freedom - I begin to think the opposite is going to
happen
What hasn't helped us abroad is our foreign policy.
No amount of US delivered propaganda TV/internet can spin that anymore - in a good light.
Last edited by pollyrobin; 03-04-2011 at 09:30 AM..
It is simple; the US media is a joke. If you want to hear the truth, you must listen to non mainstream media.
The corporate owned media in the US lies to the degree that it is about as accurate as Cold War era Soviet propaganda. It is all BS
One interesting point was that CNN got 3+ million views while RT got over 300 million views (as a global whole)
Considering that CNN pioneered the 24/7 global news cycle, this alone speaks volumes. Maybe not here in the US but on the global front, absolutely.
What I find odd however is that during the great decline of newspapers and US media in general, our media and press have went further batty and become more profane, inane, and sensationalized. Of all the people in the world who should "get it", they don't, which also says a great deal.
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