Forum Post: OccupyTheConstitution Democracy Media Influence
Posted 12 years ago on Dec. 31, 2011, 5:13 p.m. EST by A3Admin
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Almost all of the information we get comes through the media. The media heavily filters that information to drive advertising dollars. While Public Broadcasting can claim to be free from the pressure of advertisers, they are still forced to appeal to a high percentage of listeners. This pushes them into the same audiences as advertising supported radio, since high listener numbers are what advertisers want. If this means "sensationalism" becomes the norm, then access to "in depth" material goes out the window. How are we going to solve that?
(This post is part of a collection of posts aimed at launching a new process called the National Opinion Collection System (NOCS). For more information on the process, see http://occupywallst.org/forum/occupytheconstitution-introduction/ )
Unfortunately, rarely do reporters and journalists have much teeth when it comes to looking at issues. This is a corporate culture that implies to not directly go after corrupt practices but have to fawn around the elephants in the room, or it is 'rude' or not 'objective'. Here is an example of how this works.
Ok, let's say a company dumps a bunch of toxic chemicals into the river or ground water (fracking anyone?).
Here is our trusty journalist who swoops in with this report:
"Protesters have raised concerns about the water quality in the Blue river. Individuals have protested recently at the CompanyX, and police have had to disperse the gatherings. No real facts about parts-per-million will be mentioned in this story, and no further real information will be forth coming because that would encourage real reporting and engaging of this issue. So next I'll just interview someone in line who makes a vague comment, and call it a wrap."
The reality is because of how news is edited (censored), this story would probably never even make it to the newspapers, and if so, done very weakly, and with almost no follow-up. Instead we have to cut to an argument in the senate, a weak commentary by a paid 'expert', or a celebrity story.
How to neuter a story actually requires quite clever manipulation. Any reasonable person would find it difficult to discuss or write a story without any real engagement or real reporting, or almost no substance, yet these anchormen make it easy to say almost completely nothing, but posture it like they have.