-Caveat Lector- ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- Date sent: 30 Sep 1999 18:16:47 -0000 To: List Member <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> From: "Common Courage Political Literacy Course" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Inside the Trojan Horse of the "Free Press" Information about this email course is at the bottom. Myth: With so many news outlets and so many journalists looking for the next big story, you can't help but be informed. It's true: the number of TV and radio stations is growing and set to explode as the internet moves into its so-called broadband phase, where radio and TV can be broadcast over the net. But the concentration of media ownership continues, shaping what we learn and how it's presented. Consider the impact of just four aspects of mass media culled from Norman Solomon's "The Habits of Highly Deceptive Media:" 1) Advertising weakens hard-hitting journalism. Glossy full-page ads glorifying smoking adorn many magazines. Few media outlets do more than mention dry statistics on tobacco's effects. Children's TV programs include commercials pushing soda pop and junk food. Journalists are silent on the effects of this advertising on the nation's health. Sport events sell beer on TV. Who among us knows no one affected by cigarette-linked cancer, serious eating disorders or heavy drinking? While the media is not responsible for these ills, they are effectively promoting major risk factors--with little discussion of that fact in the media. 2) The media have grown so powerful that they are now given rights to billions of dollars worth of broadcast spectrum--for free. While journalists regularly laud the free market, few note the contradiction of this giveaway. 3) Powerful journalists ignore issues of conflict of interest. Covering a 1980 presidential debate, columnist George Will praised Reagan's performance against Carter. Now noted by The Wall Street Journal as "perhaps the most powerful journalist in America," Will's role as debate coach for Reagan has come to light, including Will's reading of briefing materials stolen from the Carter White House. Meanwhile, serious investigative journalists like Gary Webb at San Jose Mercury News, who linked the CIA-backed Nicaraguan contras with the spread of crack cocaine in the early 1980s, were left to "twist in the wind," according to journalist Daniel Schorr. 4) Think tanks, whose experts populate the guest lists of the major news media, are increasingly oriented to promoting powerful corporate interests. They're sometimes even owned by those who own the media -- providing slanted information under the guise of expertise. According to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting, the Brookings Institution, the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute and the American Enterprise Institute all had over 1,000 citations in the media in 1995, 1996 and 1997. John Malone, head of Tele-Communications Inc (TCI), and News Corporation chief Rupert Murdoch grace Cato's board. It's little surprise, given these board members' interests, that Cato boasts of having "actively promoted the deregulation of television and telephone industries." With advertising's grip, and powerful media securing giveaways of broadcast spectrum (which is essentially taxpayer property), with big name journalists escaping consequences of blatant conflict of interest, and think tanks promoting experts as impartial while maintaining strong ties to the right, getting informed requires reading alternative sources. Have you ever had that icky feeling that some piece of news you're imbibing has a funny taste to it? For more information on disinformation, consult Norman Solomon's "The Habits of Highly Deceptive Media: Decoding Spin and Lies in the Mainstream News" http://www.CommonCouragePress.com/habits.html TOMORROW: Who owns Public Broadcasting? Hint: not you. This is the free Political Literacy Course from Common Courage Press: A backbone of facts to stand up to spineless power. Email 18, September 30 1999. Week 4: The News Media On Your Mind. Homepage: http://www.commoncouragepress.com To subscribe for free: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Chatroom: http://www.cartserver.com/bbs/a/3827/index.cgi Feedback/Title suggestions: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Missed any? Course archive: http://www.commoncouragepress.com/politlitarchive.html Feel free to forward so the list grows! ______________________________________________________________________ To unsubscribe, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED] A<>E<>R ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your common sense." --Buddha + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled one is truly vanquished. -Johann Christoph Schiller, German Writer (1759-1805) + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly. -Bertrand Russell + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + "Everyone has the right...to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." 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