Media Lens
Excellent UK-based media analysis
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Media Lens: Comment Is Free But Freedom Is Slavery – An Exchange With The Guardian’s Economics Editor
In the dark days before Media Lens existed, and before Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger stopped responding to our emails, he actually granted us the courtesy of a chat by telephone. The interview was notable for its long gaps, its ums and ahs, as Rusbridger responded amiably to our questions about the news propaganda role of… Continue reading
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Media Lens: Captive Nation – Egypt And The West
What an extraordinary spectacle it is – a dictatorship behaving as though an entire people were its personal property. Henchmen aside, the people have spoken, almost as one, and their demands are very clear. The blunt government response, in effect: We react as we want. If we don’t want to, we don’t have to. Why?… Continue reading
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Media Lens: Collateral Damage – WikiLeaks In The Crosshairs
Speech that incites violence against individuals at home is unacceptable. Speech that incites mass death and destruction against entire nations is met with indifference, and/or high office and awards! Continue reading
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Guest Media Lens Alert – Tilting Towards Israel By Jonathan Cook
Towards the end of last year, we sent out two media alerts – Put The Palestinians On A Diet and Too Toxic To Handle? – about the corporate media’s failure to report the release of documents detailing Israel’s deliberate policy of near-starvation for Gaza. “The idea”, explained a senior Israeli official, “is to put the… Continue reading
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Media Lens: What Happened To Academia? – Part 1
We have long been fascinated by the silencing of academe. How does it work in an ostensibly free society? What are the mechanisms that bring the honest and outspoken to heel? The late historian Howard Zinn described how the well-intentioned desire to work for progressive change “gets tangled in a cluster of beliefs so stuck,… Continue reading
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Media Lens: Too Toxic to Handle? Follow-up Alert on Israel’s Policy of Near-Starvation for Gaza
On November 17, we sent out a media alert that highlighted the corporate media’s lack of interest in official documents revealing Israel’s deliberate policy of near-starvation for Gaza. We, and many of our readers, emailed broadcasters and newspapers asking why the release of these documents was not reported in October. Were journalists simply unaware of… Continue reading
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Media Lens: “Put the Palestinians on a Diet”
Israel has been forced to reveal what Palestinians and other observers on the ground have known for a long time: that the blockade of Gaza is state policy intended to inflict collective punishment, not to bolster Israeli “security”. Continue reading
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Media Lens: WikiLeaks – The Smear And The Denial – Part 2
The UK and US media smears described in Part 1 should be kept in mind when considering the gravity and importance of the latest WikiLeaks. In addition to thousands of previously unreported civilian killings, the leaks revealed more than 1,300 claims of torture by Iraqi police and military between 2005 and 2009. But these are… Continue reading
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Media Lens: Wikileaks – The smear and the denial – Part 1
The rising level of dissent really is wonderful news. It is a sign that a public empowered by the internet is beginning to seriously challenge the propaganda, lies and smears of the “responsible” media that make mass killing possible. Life will never be the same again – the Burnses, Baronets and Rifkinds +are+ going to… Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: HOLLYWOOD – WEAPONISED DREAM FACTORY
Because we locate some of our identity in what we read – some sense of who we are as intelligent, caring people – we may react with rage when the newspapers we take are criticised. To suggest that “my” newspaper is biased and superficial can seem to imply the same of “me” and “my” beliefs… Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: DEATHLY SILENCE: OBAMA’S LETTER, NETANYAHU’S REJECTION AND THE MEDIA’S NON-RESPONSE
Earlier this week, independent journalist Jonathan Cook reported facts that blow a hole through the standard deceit that the United States is an “honest broker” for peace in the Middle East. Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: “VEILED THREATS” OF “INDUSTRIAL CHAOS”
On 19 September, the Sunday Times ran a major interview with Brendan Barber, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress (Andrew Davidson, ‘King of compromise alone on a tightrope’, Sunday Times, business section, 19 September, 2010; online article is hidden behind a pay wall). The bias was clear even from the text immediately following the… Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: A JOURNEY UNCHALLENGED – ANDREW MARR INTERVIEWS TONY BLAIR
So why +does+ the BBC, a public service broadcaster, habitually turn to journalists who have previously declared their firm support for Blair’s militant Christian policies to interview Blair about those policies? The answer is that no-one outside the BBC has the remotest idea – there is flat-zero openness on this kind of choice; it is… Continue reading
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Media Lens: Beyond Hiroshima – The Non-Reporting Of Fallujah’s Cancer Catastrophe
Whereas the story of the maltreated cat received heavy coverage for almost one week across the UK media, we (and activist friends in the United States) can find exactly one mention of the Fallujah cancer and infant mortality study in the entire UK and US national press – Patrick Cockburn’s article in the Independent. The… Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: BOGUS PARALLELS – THE INDEPENDENT’S DONALD MACINTYRE RESPONDS
Does Macintyre really believe that our readers respond robotically to journalists without judging the arguments for themselves? Is it really lamentable for members of the public to take action in response to biased journalism when emboldened by the realisation that they are not alone in their concerns? Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: “PEACE ENVOY” BLAIR GETS AN EASY RIDE IN THE INDEPENDENT
The whole tone of the Independent interview was uncritical and respectful; a bland and meek summation of the sincere and well-intentioned thoughts of a man with the blood of untold numbers of victims on his hands: men, women and children in Iraq, Afghanistan, the former Yugoslavia and, indeed, in Palestine itself. Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: TECTONIC TILTING – Unlevel Playing Fields And The Rise Of Climate Scepticism
The media at least claim, albeit erroneously, to offer a balance in reporting and commentary, such concerns are deemed irrelevant to advertising. Adverts – arguably an even more powerful influence distorting public perceptions than factual journalism – +all+ promote mass consumerism. Why is it important for a democracy to have balance in reporting and commentary,… Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: MCCHRYSTAL – DEATH SQUAD POSTER BOY
In May 2009, Petras sampled from McChrystal’s CV. The general had played a central role in directing units involved in “extrajudicial assassinations, systematic torture, bombing of civilian communities and search and destroy missions”. He was “the very embodiment of the brutality and gore that accompanies military-driven empire building”. Continue reading
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MEDIA LENS ALERT: BROTHERS-IN-ARMS: CAPITALISM AND CORPORATE JOURNALISM
An essential role of corporate journalism is to shore up public confidence in an unjust, crisis-riven financial and economic system. Although plenty of gloom and doom is permitted, especially in the face of obvious crisis, the legitimacy of the system is rarely questioned. Continue reading
The New Dark Age 