The War You Don't See

[jumpy]

http://www.itv.com/itvplayer/video/?Filter=198443

http://www.youtube.com/user/TheMediaCorruption#p/p (youtube)

John Pilger investigates the media's role in war. He traces the history of 'embedded' and independent reporting from the carnage of WWI to the current wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

(25 days left to view)

Not a country bashing thread, people.

This says and confirms much of my own feelings and thoughts toward the war in the ME and our reasons to be over there, political or otherwise.

Like many in the UK, I was all for invasion of iraq - saddam was a ruthless dictator, but much of what was offered from government, disseminated by our media, was a lie and a deception.
Much of what is/was reported has been very misleading and in some cases utter falsehood portrayed as fact, incontrovertible and unassailable - to question it is to be labelled as un-patriotic, amongst other things.

If even half of the figures quoted in the program are only half true, they are some shocking statistics.

This is a trend in our media that extends beyond issues like war, but to more recent civil disturbances at home - the student protest here and the slant presented by the BBC (in particular the BBC), the killing of jean charles de menezes, the shooting of 'terrorist suspects' in their own homes who turned out not to be anything of the sort.

All these 'threats to our way of life' are more obvious targets for misinformation (you can argue the culture of 24 hour news reporting incomplete knowledge as fact, or that there's a deliberate collusion of state and media to portray events with 'spin') but if this is endemic within reporting of terrorism at home or abroad, how far does it extend to domestic news, like the economy or political debate?

To be honest, I found the whole program to be very disturbing; not necessarily the war reporting side (though this is harsh in itself) but the questions it raises about the independence of reporting in national and international media and the wikileaks thing and the moves to control, by any means, information distribution over the internet and from other outlets.

Wikileaks is a good current example of this and the lengths governments will go to silence information sources they do not sanction (leaving aside the motives for releasing the information on wikileaks), using pressure on businesses, financial institutions and the foundations of law in foreign and domestic situations and media smear campaigns. I don't doubt that the US state will make new laws in order to bring Assange to their justice, claiming precedence over the laws of other countries, directed towards a man who is not a citizen or denizen of the US - arguments of international co-operation and extradition orders explain away many things - but do not hide the fact that great pressure is being directed against an individual who has broken no laws of the country in which he resides.
This to me seems very wrong and is suggestive of the political and state attitude of many countries, including my own, when it comes to maintaining the status quo.

Getting back to the media. I have long held a suspicion of reporting; and with access to the internet have tried to view as many separate reports of certain events by as many outlets as possible. The difference in some of my own country's news reporting is often quite subtle but can also be very blunt. Take the Daily Mail (fail) and other more obvious tabloids like The Sun newspapers - they are quite direct in their prejudice, even proud of it, whereas with the BBC, it's always more about what they don't say or report that is the most telling in their 'reporting' of events.
Some of the interviews in the link (like the ones with the bbc) raise terribly important questions, which in some ways are dismissed with 'impartiality bias' (as I like to call it) - how far are the media failing to do their job of asking difficult questions, explaining this question away as 'semantics' and such like?

We look back on what we call the 'propaganda' of the 40's and 50's - simplistic manipulation of the populace in time of war, yet we seldom question the subtlety, sophistication and depth to which the modern propaganda (media) extends in our lives. Had the facts been impartially reported in our british press, there's no way tony blair could have convinced our nation to embark on a war with no national imperative or clear goals. As it, was most of us fell for it hook, line and sinker, proving beyond doubt that we are all vulnerable to being manipulated toward somebody else's agenda and reluctant to question what we are told. After all, how could we be lied to so blatantly and not spot the lie, surely we are more intelligent than that? I think that is the essence of the trap we fall into believing... that we are smart enough to see the truth/lies told to us by our leaders.

Most of the time we are ignorant and it is only much later, when events have turned and information is leaked, do we have possession of both sides of the facts in order to see the truth/lie revealed. By which time it is always too late. Sometimes individuals will be held to account as scapegoats (like our expenses scandal in parliament - it took an outside leak to make our elected representatives act on something they all viewed as common knowledge), but the apparatus remains untouched, to continue as before.

Some of you might laugh or say 'so what? the world is a rough place, what do you expect?'. Well for a start, having the hypocrisy of government acting in our name revealed for what it is - to be 'accountable to each other' (to quote the film). It would be a good place to begin, but beyond that I have no more answer than you, other than to say 'it should be better than it is, and if we give in to the reality as inevitable and unchangeable, then we are lost to it'. We don't live in '1984' but sometimes I do wonder how close we really are to it.