The media’s watchdog role is an illusion. The latest scandal reveals just how dependent journalists are on government
Middle East Eye – 21 January 2022
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s head is on the chopping block. Each day, the media digs up more embarrassing details of parties hosted at his No 10 residence or other government buildings, in flagrant violation of strict lockdown rules enforced on the rest of the country.
A U.S. government-funded agency that claims to promote democracy but which helps undermine governments independent of Washington has moved decisively into Britain’s media space since 2016.
By Matt Kennard and Mark Curtis
Declassified UK
Issa Toumi [Photo courtesy of Issa Touma]PRINCETON, NEW JERSEY (Scheerpost) — Nils Melzer, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, is one of the very few establishment figures to denounce the judicial lynching of Julian Assange. Melzer’s integrity and courage, for which he has been mercilessly attacked, stand in stark contrast to the widespread complicity of many human rights and press organizations, including PEN America, which has become a de facto subsidiary of the Democratic National Committee.
The Media Navigator classifies 72 influential media outlets based on their political stance and their relationship to power. In many cases, the latter is more significant.
The US/UK Media Navigator (click to enlarge)It may seem like another world, but it was only a little over a decade ago that scholars were engaged in an energetic debate over the liberatory nature of the internet. Today, as millions of people spend hours a day on Zoom meetings, navigate their children through ‘online learning’, and write work emails late into the night, the notion that the internet was ever going to liberate us from capitalism seems naïve if not farcical. On the contrary, it has been the internet that has allowed, in the most troublesome sense, the world to go on amid ecological, epidemiological, economic, social, and political crises as we are told to wait out a pandemic by eradicating any remaining distance between work and home or public and private while wrecking our backs, necks, eyes, and sense of peace, autonomy, self-knowledge, and control.
November 16, 2021 (The New Atlas) – Reuters has been caught publishing photos depicting Thai protests that are confirmed to have been staged.
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Sifting through over 30,000 grants in the company’s database, MintPress can reveal that the Gates Foundation has bankrolled hundreds of media outlets and ventures, to the tune of at least $319 million.
When it comes to the Prime Minister’s allies, there’s a pattern emerging in Downing Street. When Boris Johnson doesn’t like the outcome of an official process, he tries to rip up the rules and start again.
MintCast
Higdon, Huff and MacLeod talk about censorship, fake news, disinformation and the prevalence of conspiracy theories in this free-flowing discussion.
On Tuesday I provided that the New York Times and CNN were spreading fake news about Taliban policy in Afghanistan by quoting a hoax tweet from an imposter’s Twitter account.
Forty-eight hours later both stories are still uncorrected despite the fact that many have have pointed out the ‘error’ in them.
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According to Daily Beast‘s Nick Schager (9/13/21), A La Calle “addresses the sad state of affairs plaguing Venezuela, a country ruled by a so-called ‘socialist’ dictator who refuses to acknowledge his anti-democratic nature.”
HBO Max began streaming a documentary on September 15: A La Calle (“To the Street”). It portrays US-backed opposition leaders in Venezuela as pro-democracy heroes battling a brutal dictatorship—a total reversal of the truth. A Daily Beast article (9/13/21) promoting the film is headlined “Capturing Venezuela’s Descent Into Socialist Hell,” which succinctly conveys the film’s slant, and suggests why it found a big corporate platform like HBO Max, a subsidiary of AT&T‘s WarnerMedia.
New York Times Magazine (4/18/93)
Janine Jackson: Benighted. Backward. Tribal. Corrupt. Inherently violent, yet somehow also docile unto imbecility.
Listeners will be familiar with the imagery that corporate media have long used to talk about Africa and Africans. Not just tabloids that blare their racism in crude cartoons–elite media have been key in promoting the narrative in which Europeans represent civilization, which they feel moved to provide, on their own terms naturally, to Africans that could never otherwise attain it.
Imagine a country where there’s no separation between the government, the military, and the media. A lot of Americans would think of China, Russia or North Korea, but it’s a perfect description of the United States today. And here in Washington, the think tank inside this nondescript building – Center For A New American Security (CNAS) – is the clearest example of just that.
“U.S. prosecutors didn’t get what they wanted in their vindictive Espionage Act prosecution against Daniel Hale. They wanted 9 years in prison, especially since he succeeded in convincing many he is a conscientious soul. But 45 months is still 45 months too many.” — Kevin Gosztola, “Shadowproof”
July 20, 2021 — Origin: Climate & Capitalism
Tyler Poisson is a public school teacher in Springfield, Massachusetts. He wrote this pamphlet for distribution in his community. We think other activists may find it useful: Click here to download a printable version (pdf) of the pamphlet.
MANUFACTURING CATASTROPHE
How and why mainstream media minimizes climate change
by Tyler Poisson
10 July 2021 — FAIR
In USA Today‘s print edition (7/6/21), this op-ed was headlined, “Teaching Critical Race Theory Is Patriotic, Not Anti-American.”
After working the right up into a lather over Black Lives Matter (FAIR.org, 5/27/21), Fox News and its conservative media allies have turned white rage onto a more actionable target: critical race theory. Though the theory is a longstanding and specific academic lens for understanding systemic racism, the right has transformed it into a catchall for anything that encourages talking about and addressing racism.
1 July 2021 — Big Brother Watch
Big Brother Watch Team
“Knowledge is power”, or so the old adage goes. Perhaps what the proverb overlooks is that those who facilitate the spread of knowledge hold more power than anyone. In human rights terms, freedom of expression is the right to impart and to receive information; and while a greater emphasis is often placed on the abilities of speakers to express themselves, what makes censorship so potent is that it is, in effect, the ability of an actor to exercise power over others by preventing them from receiving information.
1 July 2021 — — Origin: Media Lens
As we have pointed out since Media Lens began in 2001, a fundamental feature of corporate media is propaganda by omission. Over the past week, a stunning example has highlighted this core property once again.
19 June 2021 — MintPress News
In the Soviet Union, everybody was aware that the media was controlled by the state. But in a corporate state like the U.S., a veneer of independence is still maintained, although trust in the media has been plummeting for years.
by Alan Macleod
The New Dark Age 