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PUBLIC DISTRUST US AND UK MEDIA
The US government is manipulating the media to convince people that the war on Iraq is justified, and the public is exposed to a constant stream of intense war-time propaganda suggesting that that the military campaign is making good progress.
"And make no mistake: the news media are being used -
in more ways than they realize. When Secretary of
Defense Donald Rumsfeld first announced that reporters
would be welcome in the trenches, members of the media
were suspicious."[1]
The American people are generally well-informed, and many are genuinely concerned about the motives and wisdom of the war. The US government has arranged artificial pro-war demonstrations in an attempt to undermine the authentic public protests against the war.
"Who has been organizing those pro-war rallies? The answer,
it turns out, is that they are being promoted by key players
in the radio industry - with close links to the Bush
administration."[2]
People have learned not to trust everything they hear from politicians or the conventional media. In the information age, people have increasing access to alternative news services on the internet.
The public are tired of hearing the same old propaganda from both sides in this war, and they are going online in search of independent, accurate, spin-free news and information to supplement the mainstream news.
"In a shift that appears to reflect a growing distrust of mass
media, the most popular Web journals to emerge in recent
days are simply reporting the news."[3]
If you are reading this, you have already joined a growing community of free-thinkers[4] who are changing the way in which the public obtain their information.
SOURCES:
[1] New York Times (US), "Using the News as a Weapon", 25 March 2003.
[ http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/25/opinion/25TRUS.html ]
[2] New York Times, "Channels of Influence", 25 March 2003.
[ http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/25/opinion/25KRUG.html ]
[3] New York Times, "Reporting Reflects Anxiety", 25 March 2003.
[ http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/25/international/worldspecial/25MEDI.html ]
[4] Moscow Times, "Fueling the Information War", 1 April 2003.
[ http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2003/04/01/007.html ]
More and more people are dissatisfied with the view of the world
propounded by their national mass media. At the same time,
alternative sources of information are increasingly available.
FURTHER READING:
ITV News, "We dropped a few civilians", 5 April 2003.
[ http://pilger.carlton.com/print/132878 ]
Once the official "line" is agreed and manufactured at
the Coalition Press Information Centre in Kuwait and
the $1million press centre in Qatar, it is submitted to
the White House, to what is known as the Office of
Global Communications. It is then polished for British
consumption by Blair's staff of propagandists in
Downing Street.
Moscow Times, "Unpleasant Surprises Ahead", 8 April 2003.
[ http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2003/04/08/009.html ]
It was not the world that changed, however, but widely
accepted perceptions of the world. For those who accepted
on faith the picture of the world created by the mass media
in the 1990s, the war in Iraq has been the source of many
revelations.
Unfortunately, Washington is interested in Iraqi oil, not
Iraqi freedom.
They say that truth is the first victim of any war. But war
also exposes lies: reports of cities taken by allied forces that
are disproved the following day; promises that Baghdad
would fall within a week made ridiculous by the five-day
battle for the port city of Umm Qasr. Discrepancies like
these speak for themselves.
And yet the biggest sensation of the Iraqi war may still lie
ahead. In the Western press, no one has even entertained the
thought that the United States could lose this war.
The Observer, "Why isn't the truth out there?", 5 October 2003.
[ http://observer.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4766017-102273,00.html ]
The willingness of journalists to accepts the establishment's view of the events of, and after, 9/11 is truly staggering, says Paul Donovan
One of the major weaknesses of journalism today is how easily some are seduced by power. The premier role of the journalist should be as a check on power, however, many seem to turn this dictum on its head and get greater job satisfaction as parrots of the official truth.
Nowhere is this tendency more prevalent than amongst Parliamentary lobby correspondents in Westminster. It has been the supine nature of many of these individuals that has allowed the likes of Alastair Campbell and co to become so powerful in spinning their version of events to the wider world.
There is much rubbish talked about spin when what it really amounts to is putting an emphasis on a story that is favourable to a valued contact and acceptable to the owner of the media organisation concerned. The easiest spinning comes of course when the interests of the source and the owner coincide.
The Independent (UK), "Inquiry calls for open government to end 'era of
spin'", 20 January 2004.
[ http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=482917 ]
A Government-ordered inquiry urged ministers yesterday to use the
Freedom of Information Act, which takes effect next January, to end the
"culture of secrecy" and "era of spin".
A review of the Whitehall communications machine called for sweeping
changes to tackle a "three-way breakdown of trust between government and
politicians, the media and the general public".
The group, chaired by Bob Phillis, the chief executive of the Guardian
Media Group, said Lord Hutton's inquiry had demonstrated the speed and
thoroughness with which information could be made available through the
imaginative use of its website. It said ministers should implement the new
Act liberally to bring in "a culture of openness".
While admitting some people in the Government feared greater freedom of
information would give the press more ammunition with which to attack it,
the Phillis group argued that the best antidote to partisan reporting was
openness.
...
ALTERNATIVE IRAQ WAR NEWS:
"The Insider" - News Headlines
[ http://www.theinsider.org ]
"The Debate" - Iraq War Motives
[ http://www.thedebate.org ]
"Yellow Times" - News from the Front
[ http://www.yellowtimes.org ]
"The Insider" mailing list article, 26 March 2003.
Tags: iraq, war, propaganda, iraq, war, pictures, alternative, news, , conspiracy theories.
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