Look At What A Former NY Times Journalist Says About US Journalism

[Jcrowley]

Look at what a former New York Times Journalist John Swinton was saying about journalism all the way back in 1880 in free America:

“I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.”

“The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press?”

“We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes.”

[babylonsister]

1. Wow! Nice find. Seems not much has changed.

“We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes..."

Sigh. Same as it ever was.

[mmonk]

2. We definitely see that today.

In fact, if our system falls from within (which it looks like it may), this is why.

[ShoePolish]

3. Well

Maybe he's upset he didn't get the editorial job? ;)

[iamahaingttta]

4. Pretty much sums it up!

That's why I laugh and laugh when I hear the shrill voices cry "Why doesn't the media do it's job?!?!?"
They ARE doing their job!
It's up to US here in the alternative to the media to let each other know what WE think.
THIS is the real world.

(FWIW - my father spent his career as an editor at the New York Times. I first heard that quote when I was about ten.)

[Jcrowley]

6. You understand

the role of the media very well it seems. They are indeed doing their job rather well unfortunately. When examined from the perspective that you describe you perceive the problem of the media system in an entirely different way, seeing it more clearly as an apparatus of the corporate state rather than as this watchdog. That can be a bit more uncomfortable but sometimes the truth can make us wriggle.

As Alex Carey sees it, "The twentieth century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance: the growth of democracy, the growth of corporate power, and the growth of corporate propaganda as a means of protecting corporate power against democracy''.

In the US, corporate propaganda has played upon the high level of religious beliefs in the community, beliefs which leave its citizens predisposed to see the world in "Manichean terms''. This outlook leads towards a preference for action over reflection, a "pragmatic orientation'' that is perfectly suited to the corporate aim of identifying positive symbols with business, while assigning negative values to those that oppose them, such as labour unions and welfare provisions.

The organised dissemination of these symbols had its initial impetus in groups such as the National Americanization Committee, which succeeded in manipulating nationalist and patriotic symbols during World War I to associate corporate values with the "American way of life''. The psychological power of this association cannot be discounted: it has proved to be an enduring feature of the political climate in the US today.

Since then the corporate agenda has embraced all areas of society - media, schools, academia and the workplace - with focuses on different levels from "grassroots'' to "tree-tops''. It has succeeded via the mass media in identifying capitalism with democracy and in portraying any challenge to corporate elites as either "subversive'' or "extremist''.

[mmonk]

8. Well put.

[babylonsister]

7. Where are the Murrows? And what happened to the truth? nt

[acmejack]

5. We have a paper here that is celebrating 25 years of independent

speech. In fact the Party starts tonight all weekend, free food, free drinks, free music at the Austin Museum of Art, if you are here for the "Big Game".

The Chronicle started speaking out of frustration with he corporate paper here and has actually prospered! Don't have to be a whore and you can tackle the controversial issues they do!

http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/Issue/home

[KAZ]

9. K&R Good post! Never read this before. n/t

n/t

[blogslut]

10. Gentlemen of the Press

here's my lil flash take: http://www.blogslut.com/msm.html

[dogday]

11. Link?

[BlueEyedSon]

14. did you try

http://www.google.com

[dogday]

15. I thought since the poster had this information

he got it from somewhere... Is that what we normally do? I mean I don't post anything without a link and I don't make people go try to look up something either....

Where is this information coming from?

[Flubadubya]

17. Here's one and there are several others...

http://www.answers.com/topic/john-swinton-journalist

There are apparently discrepant accounts about Mr. Swinton as to when he lived and when & where he said this, but seems everyone agrees that he did say it. :)

[dogday]

19. Thanks so much

for this... I appreciate it :hi:

[The Backlash Cometh]

12. There must have been a time, in the 60s & 70s, when this was not true.

Because I remember a different America.

[blogslut]

13. It's always been bit true

It just seems worse now. Corporatization of the press is not a new thing. I'm always torn because most times, a country with privatized media is very good thing. At other times I wish the state were more involved - internet neutrality is an example.

Regardless, reporters, editors, proofreaders, typsetters...it's all business.

[cascadiance]

18. I'm ashamed to admit that I worked for an ABC affiliate in the early 80's.

Editing remotely transmitted news stories for the evening news. Even in those days, there were problems such as edicts from above that the producers/news director needed to prioritize and find stories that related to the lead in television show for the 10:00 PM news show over other stories that otherwise might have been more newsworthy for the sake of ratings.

There was also well understood amongst us employees there a "gentleman's agreement" between the ownership of our station and the CBS station across town not to give any attention to labor issues within either station, and when folks were even rumored to start something like a union or a grievance, there were people fired quietly. Our station also owned the local city newspaper and perhaps the main AM radio station (which I think I heard recently they might be selling off), so you can see what happens as the media consolidation continues.

[The Backlash Cometh]

21. I know about those gentlemen's agreements.

It's the stuff that good ole boy networks are made of. I know several people who tried to get the Orlando Sentinel to publish information that would have revealed a huge good ole boy network, but they buried the story. Problems are still cropping up because of the machinations that went on during that period, but no one will tell the poor homeowners that have to live with the aftermath of a conspiracy, why their American Dream is turning into a money pit.

The media would go a long way in putting an end to these trust-eroding experiences, if it only remembers what America once stood for, and the role they once played in it.

[indepat]

16. Intellectual prostitutes tantamount to media whores?

[BlueEyedSon]

20. THis is why there need to be MANY voices, so you can triangulate

the truth....

[Jcrowley]

22. The purpose of the media

"It is easier to dominate someone if they are unaware of being dominated. Colonized and colonizers both know that domination is not just based on physical supremacy. Control of hearts and minds follows military conquest."
- Ramonet

The new propaganda has its power in the freedom (or apparent freedom) of press. It is for this reason it is possible to call it new(s) propaganda. The new(s) propaganda needs freedom of media, needs debate (only a small amount, and under control). Why? Because until someone can say without restraint what one is thinking, it is difficult to see this kind of propaganda which wants to homologate the mind. The intellectuals or writers who work against this system are, regardless, inside the system. Because paradoxically those who think that it is difficult to talk and write liberally are indeed talking or writing about this, and so are free to say everything. It is here a more interesting aspect of this propaganda appears. The reflections of an intellectual or writer are delivered to a small segment of the population, and usually someone who already knows these things beforehand. It rarely arrives to the general public.

A propaganda model suggests that the "societal purpose" of the media is to inculcate and defend the economic, social, and political agenda of privileged groups that dominate the domestic society and the state. The media serve this purpose in many ways: through selection of topics, distribution of concerns, framing of issue, filtering of information, emphasis and tone, and by keeping debate within the bounds of acceptable premises (Herman, Chomsky, 1988: 298).

"An independent mind must seek to separate itself from official doctrine, and from the criticism advanced by its alleged opponents; not just from the assertion of
propaganda system, but from its tacit presuppositions as well, expressed by critic and defender."
- Noam Chomsky

[NashVegas]

23. An Interesting Point Chomsky Once Made

The higher the literacy rate of a nation, the more likely they can be successfully propagandized.