[Media-watch] FW: Insignificant Strands Of Thought

[David Miller {FMS}]

 Latest from media lens

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From: Medialens Media Alerts
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Sent: 17/09/2003 14:20
Subject: Insignificant Strands Of Thought

MEDIA LENS: Correcting for the distorted vision of the corporate media

September 17, 2003


MEDIA ALERT: INSIGNIFICANT STRANDS OF THOUGHT

The BBC, Self-Glorification And Disaster


The Spokesman's Spokesman

What is news? And who makes the news? Perhaps BBC director of news
Richard Sambrook can help shed some light. Sambrook recently replied to
a Media Lens reader who had pointed out that BBC coverage accepts
without question that the US and UK "coalition" is attempting to bring
peace and democracy to Iraq. 

"We report what is said by Tony Blair and George Bush", Sambrook
replied, "because they have power and responsibility and their own
sources of intelligence." (Email from Richard Sambrook to Media Lens
reader, 9 July, 2003)

Sambrook wrote these words in early July. Since then, within the limited
terms afforded by the Hutton inquiry into the death of weapons inspector
David Kelly, the public has gained some insight into how western sources
of intelligence were ignored, manipulated, pressured and abused to
justify an illegal and immoral invasion of Iraq. Blair and Bush are
directly responsible. They have committed war crimes and abused the
power entrusted to them (or stolen, in the case of Bush).

Given that Bush and Blair have shown themselves to be untrustworthy and
irresponsible, even ignoring or overruling the advice of their own
intelligence services, should not the BBC now show extreme caution in
representing their views? Alas, we know that nothing will change - the
echoing of government propaganda is hard-wired into media institutions
designed to serve the same elite interests represented by Bush and
Blair.

The problem is that reporting official propaganda is not in fact
reporting, as veteran US journalist David E. Hendrix observes: 

"Reporting a spokesman's comments is not reporting; it's becoming the
spokesman's spokesman." ('Coal Mine Canaries', Hendrix, in 'Into The
Buzzsaw', edited by Kristina Borjesson, Prometheus Books, 2002, p.172)

In his response to the Media Lens reader, Sambrook was keen to portray a
healthy balance in BBC news coverage. The BBC's role is not just about
echoing the pronouncements of power: 

"We also report many other views, including those of Hans Blix and Scott
Ritter." 

True enough. But as we have pointed out many times, facts, analyses and
views that seriously challenge power are afforded minute amounts of
coverage. Stating that "we also report other views" is a technically
correct but conveniently meaningless response. Norman Solomon, Executive
Director of the US-based Institute for Public Accuracy, describes how
"scattered islands of independent-minded reporting are lost in oceans of
the stenographic reliance on official sources". (Solomon, Target Iraq:
What The News Media Didn't Tell You, New York: Context Books, 2003,
p.26)

Sambrook's assurances notwithstanding, the consistent marginalisation of
non-establishment views hardly constitutes 'balance'. The BBC's
Producers' Guidelines state boldly: "all BBC programmes and services
should be open minded, fair and show a respect for the truth. No
significant strand of thought should go un-reflected or under
represented on the BBC" and that "all relevant information should be
weighed to get at the truth of what is reported or described". 

BBC director-general Greg Dyke notes that: "We publish the Producers'
Guidelines, firstly so that audiences can read and understand the
editorial standards that we aspire to, and secondly so that they can
judge our performance accordingly."
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/info/policies/producer_guides/text/section1.shtml)

The Guidelines contain fine words, and they are breached by every BBC
news bulletin, every day of the year. This is not recognised by BBC
editors and managers, of course, who can always refer back to that key
word, "significant". Thus, a rational approach that takes Bush and
Blair's rhetoric on peace and human rights at face value, and which then
compares and contrasts it with actual western policy, can simply be
labelled an "insignificant strand of thought" and ignored. 

How can such obviously important issues be deemed "insignificant"?
Because, and here's the rub, they are not advocated by people with
"power and responsibility and their own sources of intelligence". This
is the kind of closed logical loop that keeps the media isolated from
the real world - and from the real innocents really being killed by
people with "power and responsibility".

Media professionals who have developed a disciplined mind in which such
labelling arises naturally are those most likely to enjoy a successful
career and to reap the rewards offered by state-corporate power.
'Honest, objective, neutral reporting', oddly enough, means working
within parameters that do not seriously challenge the status quo.

Transforming oneself into a 'responsible' professional is a particular
example of the societal process of assimilation into mainstream culture
that starts early in life and continues through school, college,
university and the workplace. Mainstream society and its institutions
are largely shaped by power, profit-seeking and deference to authority,
and so these are the values that are selected for among successful
professionals and ideological managers (leading politicians, corporate
chiefs, influential media voices and academic commentators).

The net effect is that societal forces without "power and responsibility
and their own sources of intelligence" are far less likely to be granted
mainstream media time and space. People like human rights activist
Joanne Baker reporting the reality of life in Baghdad:

"There is total incomprehension that America, the world's greatest
superpower, cannot provide in three months even basic services that the
government under Saddam was able to restore within one month (after the
1991 Gulf War)."

Baker continues:

"I am asked how I find Baghdad now. How has it changed? It is perhaps
best described as a city in trauma. Still reeling from the appalling
bombardment, it is now experiencing the shock of occupation and anarchy.
People are crying out for help with their personal tragedies 
but there is nowhere to turn." (Joanne Baker, Pandora DU Research
Project, Baghdad, June 30, 2003, quoted in Voices UK Newsletter 32,
August 2003, p.7)

The same honesty and compassion are hallmarks of the work of Denis
Halliday, former UN administrator of the 'oil for food' programme in
Baghdad, who gave up a long and successful career to protest UN
sanctions on Iraq. "These sanctions," he told journalist John Pilger,
"represented ongoing warfare against the people of Iraq. They became, in
my view, genocidal in their impact over the years, and the Security
Council maintained them, despite its full knowledge of their impact,
particularly on the children of Iraq." (John Pilger, 'Who Are The
Extremists?', Daily Mirror, 22 August, 2003)

Halliday continued: "We disregarded our own charter, international law,
and we probably killed over a million people. It's a tragedy that will
not be forgotten... I'm confident that the Iraqis will throw out the
occupying forces. I don't know how long it will take, but they'll throw
them out based on a nationalistic drive. They will not tolerate any
foreign troops' presence in their country, dictating their lifestyle,
their culture, their future, their politics."

Halliday concluded: "Every country that is now threatened by Mr Bush,
which is his habit, presents an outrage to all of us. Should we stand by
and merely watch while a man so dangerous he is willing to sacrifice
Americans lives and, worse, the lives of others." 

A crucial and defining quality of such honest testimony is its humanity
rooted in a willingness to pay the price required, no matter how heavy,
to help others. As the Indian sage Sakyamuni commented:

"Nothing prevents you from loving the young people of other kingdoms as
your sons and daughters, even though they do not dwell under your rule.
Just because one loves one's own people is no reason not to love the
peoples of other kingdoms." (Thich Nhat Than, Old Path White Clouds,
Rider, 1991, p.273)

And indeed there is no reason whatever not to love the young people of
Iraq as our sons and daughters. Their need and right to happiness and
freedom from suffering are identical to our own. 
Developing a strong sense of concern for others, based on an awareness
of the suffering in the world around us, is a powerful force. It is what
motivates, drives and sustains those who witness and resist the terrible
suffering around the world for which political and corporate leaders in
the west very often bear very real responsibility.

Contrast the selfless perspective of people like Baker and Halliday with
a defining characteristic of men like Bush and Blair: namely, an
unprincipled willingness to do whatever it takes to maintain personal
power camouflaged by endless rhetoric extolling their passionate love of
democracy, freedom and goodness. 

Blair, for example, proclaimed to the country in a televised broadcast
in March this year that "this new world faces a new threat: of disorder
and chaos born either of brutal states like Iraq, armed with weapons of
mass destruction; or of extreme terrorist groups. Both hate our freedom,
our democracy." ('Blair urges opponents of conflict to rally behind
forces in TV broadcast', Andrew Grice, The Independent, 21 March 2003)

That such lethally demonising, deceptive words could be granted
credibility by being broadcast and printed without challenge of the most
vigorous kind speaks volumes about the parlous state of the British
media today.

The author Robert Pirsig once noted: "Any effort that has
self-glorification as its final end-point is bound to end in disaster."

The self-glorification of Bush and Blair, endlessly assisted by
subservient journalists and academics, has already led to death and
destruction for countless invisible thousands in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Whether it will indeed lead to wider disaster depends very much on how
the rest of us respond now.


SUGGESTED ACTION

The goal of Media Lens is to promote rationality, compassion and respect
for others. In writing letters to journalists, we strongly urge readers
to maintain a polite, non-aggressive and non-abusive tone.

Write to BBC director-general Greg Dyke and BBC director of news Richard
Sambrook.

Email: greg.dyke at bbc.co.uk and richard.sambrook at bbc.co.uk

Feel free to respond to Media Lens alerts: editor at medialens.org

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