There are many countries throughout the world where the media is very directly controlled by the government and this is well documented. Some of these countries include North Korea, China, Eritrea, and Russia to name just a few. What about the countries that are not as obvious about their censorship? Is using the media as a weapon against the populace not the same? Lets talk about the Authoritarian Theory of Mass Communication and its concepts. So the basic jist of the whole thing is that the media is subservient to the state as the state is more important than the individual which is true in a dictatorship, but also somewhat true even in democratic governments. Now not to veer to far into conspiracy theory land of course, but the U.S. preaches about its freedom of speech but yet there is quite a lot of censorship to go around. Based on the fact that news outlets have a political skew is one such example, this political skew means that any news will be biased as it is under the whims of those controlling it. FOX news for example is a famously right leaning news outlet, so would it not be fair to say that they would not be as forthcoming with left leaning news if it went against their own bias? If something from the left directly and factually contradicted the right leaning narrative can we trust them to accurately report it without bias? The Same can be said of CNN and its left leaning skew. So are we really democratic or are we just a different kind of authoritarian media?
Based on the above chart where does your news outlet of choice sit? Is it what you thought or not what you expected? So similar to authoritarian news media, whether its left or right, these biases lead to the same results, just aimed at their political beliefs and not the state, these outlets cant blame or harass their leadership, their stories are controlled by rich old men/powers that be, they cant complain about their own side of the government but the opposite side is fair game, they censor any news that doesnt go with their own beliefs, either side is not to far from being propaganda sometimes. Now id hate to be that guy but hitler himself said “All propaganda should be popular and should adapt its intellectual level to the receptive ability of the least intellectual of those whom it is desired to address." in his book
Mein Kampf . Taliban governments practiced authoritarian media for many years, roughly ending about 2011, and this is also applied in developing countries and right here in the U.S. under the guise of the National Security Act. The Fact that their are banned book lists is a sign of censorship, its like saying "think for yourselves just not too much" and then they say "well you are allowed to say whatever you want its in out constitution". The news is used to manipulate the masses by using bias as a tool to get someone to go "yea that sounds like something I believe!". The Fact that there were book burnings is another example of censorship here in the U.S.
The media is said to be our tool of free speech but is usually used to attack freedom of expression of those it does not agree with, also done by either side. Its been going on for hundreds of years, kingdoms spreading rumors or lies via word of mouth, and especially the propaganda like use of the printing press when it was first invented. All this points to the fact that authoritarian control of the media even happens in countries that are not authoritarian. "power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely" - Lord Acton.
Comments
Post a Comment