rant
I'm afraid I have a bit of a narrow view of the media.
The function of any journal: be it
Foreign Affairs or
The Economist or
The Sun or mass media like the CBC or CNN is to propagate its proprietor's views while earning enough revenue to qualify as something other than idiosyncratic folly.
'Journals' â “ broadly, including print, electronic, broadcasting and narrowcasting â “ have two forms: information or entertainment - most often, some combination of both.
The primary function of
journalists is to fill up the white spaces not sold to advertisers with something which will attract customers: sports, sex, scandal, murder and mayhem work best, given the nature of mankind. This applies, equally, to
public broadcasters and the most respected private journals â “ all are propagandizing, some with a fair degree of
balance but, in most cases, including e.g. the CBC, with a one sided message. Sometimes (e.g.
The Economist and, to its credit, TORSTAR) the editorial board is up-front in announcing its biases, in other cases,
The New York Times and our own
CBC the editorial boards take pains to try to hide their biases â “ they lie to their audiences in the firm, well founded hope that the audience â “ being largely
informed by TV, is to ill informed to notice.
We know that most Canadians (like most Americans and Brits and Germans and, now, Arabs, Indians and Chinese, too) get most of their
information from television â “ which, I guess, explains a lot.
Although we like to blame it, the
mass news media usually follows social trends; they (the trends) are led from elsewhere â “ an educated
elite and the
entertainment industry. I think that Samuel Goldwyn, Louis B. Meyer and Lowell Thomas had a far greater influence on American (and Canadian) social and political
values than did C.L. Sulzberger or Peter C. Newman. So, too, did the people who financed their enterprises.
I am harping on this, a bit, because of,
inter alia a piece in today's
Globe and Mail at: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050521.wsaddam0521/BNStory/International/ (You don't need a subscription to read it so I will not copy it all.)
Two things stand out:
1.
Ziad al-Khasawneh, a member of Mr. Hussein's defence team, said he planned to sue The Sun for publishing the photos, alleging that they were "an insult to humanity, Arabs and the Iraqi people."
I don't know about humanity but, it seems to me, that the proprietor of both
The Sun and the
New York Post (Rupert Murdoch) hired publishers who shared his global social and political views. I believe he is content that his newspapers are displaying contempt for Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi people and the Arabs. That may not be good 4th generation warfare, etc, but it is his
right: freedom of the press belongs to those who own one.
2.
"People the world over, whether they detest Saddam Hussein or not, will see this as yet another abuse of a prisoner in U.S. custody and that cannot bode well for the United States," said Mary Ellen O'Connell, an expert on the law of war at Ohio State University.
She said that publishing the photos was "irresponsible" because the Geneva Conventions makes it clear that PoWs should not be shown in a demeaning fashion. "I think that obligation extends to everyone in society, including journalists," she said in an interview from Columbus, Ohio. "I think humiliation is a form of abuse of prisoners."
This line:
"I think that obligation extends to everyone in society, including journalists," is arrant nonsense. Prof. O'Connell's appalling lack of scholarship explains why we end up doing dumb things as Victor Davis Hanson explains in the article a-majoor posted at: http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/22129/post-217925.html#msg217925
We, in the modern, secular,
civilized, englightened, liberal West may, mostly will and always should shrug our shoulders and laugh when e.g
The Sun goes over the top, again, and celebrates sex, scandal and human degradation â “ all that's left to fill up the white spaces now that Lady Di's lovers are out of the spotlight. The fact that other people, in other, dark, illiberal, medieval theocracies will take all this seriously merely illustrates that they are unable cope with the modern world â “ the one into which they were born. That inability spells their doom. It may be a violent, bloody doom but there is no hope for them.
/rant
