LEGACY MEDIA AS PROPAGANDA OUTLETS
John Locke, an English Philosopher, wrote about the necessity of offering proof “other than by often repeating it, which among some men, goes for argument.” So as not to be guilty of deserving that reproach, I need to define and explain the collusion of government and media interests that I feel has reached the threshold of propaganda, an accusation I’ve made repeatedly. Over my lifetime, the news media has transitioned from being respected as the “Fourth Estate” of government into a conglomerate of untrustworthy entities that parrot whatever government narrative is being flogged. This essay will describe the sequences of events and market forces that lead to the collapse of a previously independent minded media. However, it is more important to understand why the current manifestation of the media represents an existential threat to our freedom.
In his 2022 book, The Psychology of Totalitarianism, renowned clinical psychologist, Mattais Desmet explains a process by which we voluntarily surrender our freedoms. Using the Covid Pandemic as an example, he explains how the phenomena of “Mass Formation” works to our detriment. It is well worth the time spent reading it. If you’re pressed for time, then his interview on Jay Bhattacharva’s podcast, “The Illusions of Consensus”, will give you the basic points.
For this essay, the cliff notes will suffice. The process proceeds along the following lines: social isolation –loneliness – anxiety – frustration – anger. These emotions can be amplified by Technology, Social Media, and the Internet, which can then be used by a government to induce a climate of fear that leads to a collective psychosis. This “Mass Formation” is then used to persuade citizens to act against their own best interests. Totalitarianism doesn’t form in a vacuum. It follows a predictable path, and it requires the acquiescence of the media in all its forms. During a Mass Formation, a government controlled media can exacerbate the problem. An echo chamber of deliberate misinformation which increases fear and anxiety creates an ideological blindness making compliance of totalitarian dictates more likely. Individual freedoms are surrendered without a whimper. This is what occurred during the Covid Pandemic. The only defense against mass formation and that collective psychosis is sincere speech that speaks the truth, and free speech requires an independent media. How do you wake up from the matrix, if you don’t know you’re in the matrix? An independent media is the “Red Pill”.
Personal Perspective
In order to understand my viewpoint, it may be beneficial to know a bit about the family environment of my early formative years. I’m a boomer who grew up in South Florida. My parents met in WWII and were from different socioeconomic backgrounds. My Dad a Democrat from Boston and my Mom a Republican from the upper peninsula of Michigan. Uncharacteristically, even for that time, our family took two daily newspapers. The morning paper was the Miami Herald, a bit left of center, and the evening paper was the Fort Lauderdale News, a bit right of center. The facts reported in the news sections were mostly similar with maybe an omission or two, but the analysis of the opinion pages could vary wildly. The point being that there could be more than one proffered interpretation of the same event based on the same repertoire of facts. What my parents helped me understand was that (at that time) the media didn’t lie, but selective omissions could give more weight to a tendered narrative.
This was the age of Walter Cronkite (CBS), David Brinkley and Chet Huntley (NBC), Eric Sevareid (CBS), and Peter Jennings (ABC) to name just a few respected journalists. It would never have occurred to me in those days that these men would deliberately lie to the Public; perhaps this was because of my own naivety, or maybe because back then, news organizations had a more adversarial relationship with the government. This was possible because Television News Divisions were operate at a financial loss. They were seen as prestigious flagships for the networks not as money makers. William Paley, then CBS owner and chairman, conveyed the corporate position to reporters at a 1960 meeting. He informed them that the costs of the News Division weren’t a concern. “I have Jack Benny to make money,” he told them.
What changed?
The addendum at the end of this essay provides the details for the process of transmutation that the news media underwent to become today’s propaganda arm of the government. I think it would suffice at this point to keep it simple, and merely list as bullet points the course of change:
- CNN establishes a twenty four hour news format requiring an increase of both financial expenditures and personnel.
- Competition and pressure to achieve profitability resulted in expanded programing and new prime time offerings.
- A proliferation of choice eventually instigated an era of consolidation to rein in costs and increase market share.
- Five conglomerates control 90% of media markets.
- Ten companies own half of all daily newspapers.
- Corporate suits, not Journalists, now control the news media.
- Ethical conflicts of interest suppress investigative journalism.
- The Internet changed how citizens receive their news.
- The Internet switched from being a vehicle of free speech to one of selective censorship.
- Advances in Artificial Intelligence allow data mining and more effective censorship on social media venues.
The Perfect Storm
The mechanisms for a conjunction of media and government were now in place, and all that was required was a catalyst which came in the form of a Pandemic. Analyzing the events which occurred during the Pandemic illustrates in the clearest possible way how the government suborned the press. Initially, the only thing we knew about SARS-CoV-2 was what the press reported. Having lost their investigative moxie, the press reported what the government told them. The government told us lies to manipulate behavior. The mainstream media repeated that propaganda without question, but always in a manner to induce fear and anxiety. That fear induced a Mass Formation and collective psychosis that enabled the government to induce compliance. Intelligent people, who might otherwise have questioned the narrative, where caught up in that collective psychosis. They became convinced that they were doing the right thing, even when telling “Noble Lies”, or pushing mandates they knew were wrong.
It is not my intent to deconstruct each of the lies that I’m going to list. Four years after the start of the pandemic there is near unanimous acceptance among independent scientists that these statements were in fact deliberate lies. Others have written whole books with copious documentation proving them as lies, as have numerous peer reviewed papers. If you still believe them to be true, then either you have a severe case of cognitive dissonance, or you only get your information from the legacy media. The following list of deliberate lies is not exhaustive: just one that makes the case for what I’m trying to illustrate:
· It was a Highly Lethal Virus
· It was Not a Wuhan Lab Leak
· The Vaccines are Safe & Effective
· Vaccinations will prevent Transmission
· Masks, Lock-downs and Social Distancing will stop the spread
Each of these narratives were initially presented by the FDA and CDC as fact. Each lie was then repeated ad nauseam by the media in a manner that was almost identical; as if some other entity was writing a universal script to be parroted. The government also spent 1 billion dollars paying comedians, commentators, social influencers and talk show hosts to repeat these lies. A fully fledged Mass Formation event is characterized by two disparate groups: one who believes and one who doesn’t. When members of the latter group began to question the government narrative they were attacked by the media, censored, canceled, gas lighted, disparaged, subjected to ad hominem attacks, and/or fired. These dissidents were people of character who persisted in speaking truth to lies using various internet platforms. The government censorship establishment, a product of the cold war, applied intense pressure to social media companies to use their Artificial Intelligence Algorithms (AI) to either moderate, throttle, censure or de-platform anyone posting content contradicting the approved narrative. After purchasing Twitter (now X), Elon Musk released copious documentation proving that the government coordinated censorship with Twitter, Facebook, TikTok, Google Searches, Linkedln, and other platforms. The Attorney Generals of Missouri, Louisiana, and the lawyers for Robert Kennedy’s Third Party Candidacy have all won court cases concerning that government sponsored censorship.
The Future
The pandemic is behind us. Other than Elon Musk, the media has NOT apologized or even admitted their willing compliance in the suppression of the First Amendment Right of Free Speech. The Pandemic crisis has since been replaced by other crises in a continuous succession; Climate Change, the Ukraine War, Illegal Immigration, the Palestinian attack on Israel, etc. Our government continues to spin their preferred narrative with lies. Having once been complicit, the legacy media continues to act as the official propaganda voice for the government. Digital Media sites manipulate Internet searches to limit your ability to find alternate opinions. It is past time to cancel participation in Social Media sites that continue to selectively censor any content contradictory to the approved narrative. To be sure, there are still real investigative journalists or professionals in other disciplines willing to question that narrative, but you won’t find them working for the legacy media. You have to search for them on the dissident media, and that takes effort. Our form of government is dependent on the involvement of its informed citizens. The Freedom of Speech enshrined in the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights is the cornerstone of our Constitutional Republic. The collusion of censorship between government and the media is a serious internal existential threat to a free America. We are farther along the road to Totalitarianism than many of us realize.
Addendum
If you’re interested and have time, the following section provides additional information to facilitate an understanding of the issues covered in this essay.
A Seminal Event
Numerous factors have driven the transformation of the news reporting world. One of the most influential occurred in 1980. WTCG, an Atlanta Georgia independent station owned by Ted Turner, started to broadcast via Satellite. Two years later, this station, Cable News Network (CNN), spun off a subsidiary that changed everything. Headline News (HLN) instigated a 24 hour rolling format with fixed time slots for special segments. Attempting to copy CNN’s success, other news organizations followed with both satellite channels and 24 hour coverage. The costs of additional broadcast time, and the attendant increase of staffing quickly surpassed a Network’s ability to subsidize those increases with other income streams. Over the next 44 years everything turned topsy-turvy. The primary factor driving this metamorphosis was the quest for profitability in an environment of constantly expanding consumer choice. The TV networks soon realized that “Prime Time” held the solution for potential profits. Emulating the template of “60 minutes”, all the major networks began to develop news programs that were intended to reach non-news audiences. This evolution of news as entertainment became progressively more pronounced as “Prime Time” news magazines proliferated. To generate the income required to cover the fixed costs of the core news infrastructure, news divisions increased the quantity of programing. Television is essentially an entertainment medium. Due to economic constraints, and perhaps the lackluster initiative of serious investigative journalists, the responsibility and commitment to inform the public deteriorated.
Consolidation
As news programing increased, the consumer had a broad selection of news sources which provided an equally broad choice of opinions. That was possible, because in 1971 there were 50 different owners that controlled 90% of the news media. That changed as the news business followed the typical capitalistic market cycle of youth, growth, maturity, consolidation and decline. Starting in 1985, media giants joined the then prevailing Wall Street frenzy of mergers and acquisitions. By 2020, nearly 90% of the media market was owned by just 5 conglomerates: Disney, Comcast, AT&T, National Amusements, and News Corp. The remaining 10% was purchased by other well know corporations, and by 2024, truly independent media was hard to find. Print Journalism, which started with a much broader base, also went through the same process of consolidation. Almost one-third of all newspapers are owned by 25 companies, and the largest 10 companies own one-half of the daily newspapers in this Country. Since 2004, independent newspapers are being absorbed at an average rate of 100 per year.
Journalism suffered under this consolidation. Most of the mergers were highly leveraged, which put additional pressure on the financial side of the business. Their corporate masters now required news divisions to make a profit as debt management and stockholder demand for dividends became a priority. The people driving the boat were not journalists, but bankers, lawyers, and deal-makers whose main concern was business not journalism.
Additional Problems
As news conglomerates grew larger, the ethical quandary of “Conflict of Interest” became more apparent. Independence used to be a journalistic ideal: tell it like it is, and let the chips fall where they may. However, it’s difficult to break a negative story about Disney at ABC, when Disney owns ABC. Additionally, these large conglomerates did business with federal and state governments, or have subsidiaries that offer products for sale. How effective can a news organization within a conglomerate be in a watch dog role, if an investigative story puts the bosses in a bad light? There are large phalanxes of in-house lawyers who are employed to prevent just that. Conflict of interest is also readily apparent in the role advertising plays in news programing. Big Pharma is a major sponsor of Network Evening News Programs. Where was the investigative journalism reviewing the products and claims of the pharmaceutical companies paying their salaries during the Pandemic?
Conglomerates control not only news, but other media venues as well. Movies, Comedies, Dramas, Docuseries, and other programing can contain subtle or not so subtle social or political viewpoints. Repetition of the same point of view on different programing may produce an illusion of consensus that doesn’t really exist. As an example, ABC has 10 different News and Talk shows, CBS has 12, NBC has 13, while Fox and CNN broadcast news 24 hours a day. As previously mention, repetition is not the same thing as argument.
The Disruptive Influence of the Internet
Until the 90’s, the legacy media was the major purveyor of information through television, newspapers, magazines, and radio. Professional journalists served as the gatekeepers for what you were allowed to access and to know. The invention and rapid development of the Internet changed the relationship between the creators of news content, and the consumers of that content. The Internet afforded private journalists unique advantages in the creation of digital media and user generated content. The speed of dissemination, a bottoms up architecture, minimal infrastructure, and the ubiquity of use, all allowed digital media to challenge legacy media for supremacy. On the flip side, it has highlighted the old problems of accuracy, authenticity, reliability, and credibility.
Nikola Tesla, an engineer who invented the rotating magnetic field device (AC Current), predicted in 1922 that the perfection of “wireless, telephony, and television would eventually allow world-wide instantaneous communications”. The first Smartphone was marketed in 1996, but it wasn’t until 2007, when Apple incorporated a touch screen with the I-phone that the use of smartphones grew exponentially. The reach of already established social media (Facebook-2004, Twitter-2005, U-tube-2005), also expanded rapidly with use of the smartphone.
As a consequence, the major televised Networks have experienced a continual decline in ratings and a concurrent loss of revenue. Print news sources have seen a loss in readership. Statistics bear out this trend as highlighted by the following Pew Research data:
While the data does indeed illustrate the decline and marginalization of Legacy Media, it would be a mistake to under estimate the impact of Broadcast Media being able to reach 30 million viewers all at the same time.
The Internet Censored
Mike Benz, who was previously the holder of the Cyber Portfolio at the State Department, is now the Executive Director of the Foundation for Freedom on Line. He has an encyclopedic knowledge of how the US Government transitioned from defending Free Speech to advocating censorship. He explains the process in a must watch interview with Tucker Carlson.
The security state, established in 1948, was a collection of clandestine institutions within the federal government at the beginning of the “Cold War”. The intent was to oppose communist expansion, effect regime changes, and protect Democracies. These were outward looking organizations, authorized to use dirty tricks, but prohibited by a domestic firewall from operating in the US. It may surprise you to learn that from 1991 until 2014, a free and uncensored Internet was the official goal of the State Department, Pentagon, and Intel Services. They championed Internet Free Speech as a way to support dissident groups, over throw authoritarian governments, and circumvent state controlled media. Much of the technology designed to protect free speech, such as virtual private networks (VPN), the Tor/Dark web, and encrypted chat were developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
It was extremely effective until 2014, when during a referendum, Russia used the technique to influence the citizens of Crimea to vote for alignment with Russia instead of Ukraine. Support of free speech changed almost instantly, as Western Intelligent Services realized that control of the Internet and Social Media were essential to control Eastern Europe. NATO created political warfare units to censor Russian propaganda but later looked westward to include right wing populist groups felt to be threatening the cohesion of the European Union. Europe was now censoring its own citizens.
In the US, the firewall against domestic censorship was breached when the terrorist potential of the Islamic State (ISIS) allowed the government to reclassify Muslim citizens as Foreigners. Later, in a “Deep State” sleight of hand, foreign threats were redefined as any mis-dis-mal-information that threatened Democracy. The United States began censoring its own citizens.
Corporation News Philosophies
Networks and newspapers usually have statements enumerating their mission and values. There is nothing intrinsically wrong with a news organization having a political bias, but that bias should be promoted only as an editorial position. The reporting of factual information should be independent of an organizations declared bias. The Federal Communication Commission (FCC) voted in 1987 to abolish the “Fairness Doctrine”, believing it violated the first amendment. That change gave the broadcast networks the freedom to deliver one-sided versions of events if they wanted. That particular FCC rule never applied to cable networks or newspapers. It would be incredibly naïve to think that the owners of a Network or Newspaper didn’t want to have an influence on politics. After all, they donate significant sums of money to political parties and candidates.
Loss of trust
Smartphones, the Internet, and Digital Media should have made it easier to stay abreast of the news, but a 2022 Gallup and Knight Foundation survey showed just the opposite. The data indicated that 61% of Americans believe information overload makes it harder to stay informed, while 37% said it was easier.
The loss of public trust in the news is real. The same Survey revealed that 50% of Americans believe National News Organizations deliberately “intend to mislead, misinform or persuade the public to adopt a particular point of view through their reporting”. Over half of Americans felt that disseminators of national news did not “care about the best interests of their readers, viewers and listeners.” The Survey also “found Democrats trust news more than Republicans”, while distrust has spiked among independents.
Where you personally stand on this issue depends on what you want from the news media: a comfortable narrative reinforcing your conformation biases, or the information necessary to make up your own mind.
The reporting of truth has always been conditioned by subjective interpretation. I personally would prefer my news uncensored, without spin, and following the dictum of that old TV show, LA Dragnet, whose catch phrase was “Just the facts, Ma’am”.
Excellent article: concise, well written and interesting. Thank you for your efforts.