- He who controls the media controls the masses. Today,
America's media is controlled exclusively by fewer than a dozen multinational
conglomerates and their many interests. NewsCorp, AOL, Viacom, General
Electric, Disney and others have formed a media oligarch that reaches into
every American home and most every citizen. These few omnipresent entities
hold as paramount the belief in assuring for themselves perpetual loyalty
from as many of the masses as possible. Revenue and profit, corporate growth
and power, executive pay and ego, these are all determined by us, the masses,
and helps explain why the oligarchy has decided to invest and take an interest
in all forms of media that reaches and influences us.
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- We are the lifeblood of the conglomerate, of vital importance,
and, as such, it is in its best interest to control as much of our lives
as possible, transforming us into obedient servants of obliviousness. Is
it no coincidence, then, that the United States has become a nation whose
masses no longer question authority or the propaganda that passes for news?
Is it any wonder why we seem so ignorant as to what is being done to us
and incurious as to what is happening in the world, readily and naively
accepting as true everything that is spewed out of our televisions and
newspapers? We have allowed the oligarchy to hide the keys of democracy
while we carelessly follow it on the road to fascism, where the elite have
control of all aspects of our lives, including our mind.
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- We live at a time when capitalism's inner demons are
beginning to be exhumed from the catacombs of the human ego, when love
for the almighty dollar and her sister greed blinds those basking in the
hypnotizing light of greenbacks and materialism. This phenomenon, combined
with the addictions spurred by power and pomposity, has created in the
last several decades a need by the powerful elite to manipulate and condition
the masses; to transform and mold us into subservient drones that neither
think, question, participate or demand.
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- Through the use of the television -- the most influential
instrument of control and propaganda in present day America -- conglomerates
can direct and sway public opinion on virtually every subject they see
fit. The television has become an opiate for the masses and a conduit from
where conglomerates can dictate how society thinks, acts and evolves. Our
habits and ethics are manipulated, our ideas and beliefs distorted. We
are but pawns in a game of corporate capitalism played by a few elites
whose economic interests lie in making us docile, conformist and oblivious
creatures of mediocrity ingrained with the need to shop and consume. The
system instills a sense of paralysis, isolation and uniformity among the
masses. We are assimilated to conform to society, to incorporate how the
oligarchy wants us to live. The derailment of democracy as we know it is
the end result of the reality we are presently experiencing.
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- As captives to their propaganda, our ears become theirs,
our mouths spout their distortions and our minds contemplate what they
want us to believe. To the capitalist elites, we are but a product, hundreds
of millions of worker bees addicted to televison, easily persuaded and
exploited, wishing for the escapist fantasies we see, sold like shares
of stock to other corporate entities interested in our existence, in our
captive audience. They are the strings by which we move, the drill instructors
by which we march and the brain by which we think.
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- Propaganda, both corporate and governmental, has seemingly
exploded with the ever-increasing consolidation of the media. Today few
interests own the majority of our nation's airwaves, newspapers, Internet
access, print media and television stations. One company can in essence
control everything you hear, see and read on a daily basis, every year
of your life. From coast to coast our sources of information are increasingly
being sold to wealthy multinational corporations that more and more are
mingling into our daily lives, transforming our beliefs, views and goals.
American society is guided by them, evolving through the commands that
help shape the direction opinion will take. Diversity of opinion and thought
is disappearing faster than biodiversity on Earth.
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- There is nothing more ominous than peering into the not-to-distant
future and seeing Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp -- one of the world's largest
media companies and owner of the Fox network (We distort, We decide) --
have majority ownership of DirecTV, the nation's largest home satellite
TV company that in many ways represents the future of entertainment and
information delivery. If the deal is allowed to go through NewsCorp could
incessantly shove down our throats its right-wing, pro-Bush, pro-Murdoch
business propaganda while shutting off truthful and diverse sources of
information. With Bush's FCC enamored with consolidation it is a good bet
that the deal will go through.
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- Guided by measly crumbs of ten-second news flashes, in
paltry thirty-minute news capsules loaded with a potpourri of deceptions
and distortions, the masses are subjected to a blitzkrieg-like summary
of that news which the elites deem necessary to serving their own interests.
These drops of news and information we are granted are designed to quench
the already conditioned low level of curiosity among the masses. These
morsels have no intellectual worth, no capacity to inform and act more
to exacerbate ignorance than to educate. What tidbits of news are allowed
to fester are an amalgam of contorted half-truths, cheerleading subjective
diatribe and porous reporting that is biased in favor of those conglomerates
that employ the reporter. This assures that the decisions and interests
of the wealthy and powerful are maintained and accepted by the masses.
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- What information does not serve the oligarch interest
is either suppressed by omission or attacked. Government and corporate
interests, such as those prevalent in our occupation of Iraq, prevent realities
and truths from surfacing. Instead, propaganda is disseminated that will
distort and manipulate the masses into believing exactly what those in
power want. Corporate media caters to military interests because in many
instances they are part of the military industrial complex. Simply look
at General Electric, one of the world's largest military contractors and
owner of NBC and its sister stations. Helping manipulate the masses in
time of war allows both the corporate media and the government advance
their respective interest in subverting public participation and discourse
while advancing a perception of consent around the nation. Forming a symbiotic
relationship, both now fused into the same two headed beast, one the master
of the other, their combined actions undermine the reality of a world not
seen by the American public.
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- Corporate media, an extension of its mother company,
reports pro-business, pro-corporate and anti-labor positions on a constant
basis. News bits lean towards those interests that will help the corporation
achieve its goals of profit maximization, whether from pushing conservative,
right-wing views onto a gullible public or from conditioning audiences
towards those views it sees as paramount in securing allegiance. News reports
are created not to be right but to have the highest ratings, which in turn
means greater profit. The interests of the masses are ignored and exchanged
for that debate which will fit the interests of the elite minority. Today,
growing reports of an economic recovery linger on the evening news, but
can we see it in our lives and in that of our friends and neighbors? No,
but good economic news benefits the elite who depend on your wallets to
fatten up theirs.
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- Many low and middle-class citizens, through propaganda,
manipulation and constant bombardment by incessant repetition of sound-bite
slogans and visual imagery end up supporting those interests that are contrary
to their own socioeconomic well-being. These people have in essence been
brainwashed into believing that by assenting to the will and opinion of
the elite their lives will be made better. Unfortunately for them, their
lives are made worse as the continued exploitation and subjugation of their
class continues by the same entities they so fervently believe in. This
is a system where the powerful few command the weak majority and where
the most important decisions are made to the benefit of the elite at the
detriment of the rest.
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- Manipulation of the masses has been made easy with the
advent of television. Populations, many made ignorant by pervasive and
purposeful determents of education (itself a different article altogether),
naturally believe and blindly place their confidence in those "trusted"
entities they watch on a daily basis. Television is made an all-comforting
apparatus as we warmly welcome home the many celebrities we become enraptured
with, each manifesting inside us our desire to partake in the small fictional
fantasy world they inhabit. We become numb to reality and its consequences,
failing to analyze and question the actual world we reside in due to conditioning
we have undergone since early childhood.
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- Over time we become robots incapable of discerning or
even seeking the truth in the news that is provided us. We have been stupefied
into believing the garbage blasted from the monitor. We have been trained
to never question, always accept and to always flip the remote when our
attention runs dry. News is decided on the basis of ratings and on the
advertisers paying for commercial spots. Corporate media is but a business
where profit is king and where the seeking of customers -- other corporations
buying ad space -- is of primary importance. We are but a means to an
end, mere statistics in the earnings game. Shows are designed not for our
enjoyment but to attract and retain as many souls as possible from which
to harvest revenue from advertisements and product consumption.
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- The corporate media inundates us with promotion, news,
gossip, tabloid, rumor and innuendo from those celebrities placed high
above the pedestal of sanctimony. Our heroes' daily lives, loves, mistakes
and exploits are absorbed into our psyches through the constancy of corporate
media's assault on our brainwaves. Hollywood-hero news is designed to distract
us from real world events such as war and recession, keeping our minds
pre-occupied and away from information that might wake our slumbering conscious.
While showcasing for our viewing pleasure the present tribulations of our
halo-anointed superstars of the moment, so-called journalists dissect,
analyze and comment about hairstyles, appearance and supposed crimes with
award winning passion. Yet real, pertinent and important news is given
minor and oftentimes erroneous insight. Throughout the channel-horizon
we see the same news, headlines and marketing package. The oligarch's WMDs
have been unlocked; weapons of mass distraction fester like noxious gases
in every state, city and home.
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- Repetitive sound-bites, facetious imagery, verbosity
and one-sided and frivolous analysis and commentary by pundits, spinsters,
newscasters and recycled "experts" is a daily and rampant occurrence
on corporate channels, each spitting out talking points and the company
lines and opinion, never forcing the viewer to actually think for herself.
Relevant news is brushed aside in seconds so that the latest up-to- the-second
news on "Wacko Jacko" is aired. Stories that have no relevance
other than to stupefy a nation into ignorance are played and replayed,
trumping that news that affects most people. We are witnesses to a form
of propaganda that is transforming this nation from a once bright-shining
pulsar of informed democracy into a dark nebula of nothingness where everything
that matters is neglected and all that degenerates and indoctrinates prospers.
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- Without an informed and participatory citizenry democracy
begins to stumble. Our government is being taken over by the corporate
Leviathan and we are indifferent as to its consequences. Crony capitalism
is affecting tens of millions through lower wages, layoffs, longer hours,
lost savings, tax burdens, lack of health care, increased pollution, perpetual
warfare, electoral fraud and the gradual elimination of social services.
Yet we remain passive and loyal, ignorant to the Leviathan's war against
us. The oligarchy uses its powers of manipulation to divide and alienate
us from each other. The divisive and passionate topics of class, race,
culture, religion, party affiliation, immigration and education are constantly
hammered into our collective mind, announcing as real myths and stereotypes,
classifying peoples into groups and imputing on them the necessary ingredients
by which society will marginalize and disdain them. We are told our way
of life is in peril, that we must vote against our interests in order to
preserve that which we most cherish. As usual, fear is used to attain the
Leviathan's interests. A united society is a threat to the establishment,
which is why we are separated and corralled into distinct clusters, conditioned
to segregate ourselves from those deemed different and to fear those labeled
a threat to our existence.
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- In its never-ending campaign to control us, corporate
media instills fear into our daily lives. It has found a gold mine with
the war on terror, becoming yet another fear-mongering profiteer and looter
of the American public. Abusing our still fragile memories of 9/11, the
corporate media unleashes the vast array of products it manufacturers onto
us, using fear as its principle marketing tool, hurling diatribes about
our supposed imminent threats looming in every city. Consume, consume,
consume the Leviathan commands, knowing full well that our fear will eventually
succumb to their perpetual warnings of apocalyptic zeal.
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- America has become a nation of obedient drones, aimlessly
walking empty streets devoid of an informed and participatory population.
Our nation is being pillaged in front of our eyes, the government is now
in the hands of our masters. Apathetic puppets we have become, free thinking
minds we have none. The light that once shined so bright has disappeared
in a fictional world of fright. The elite that pull our strings are becoming
stronger, objective information is disappearing. The powerful few now control
the nation's media and its ideas, and soon our free will and freedom to
think as well. Democracy is disappearing, the Leviathan is swallowing us
whole little by little, assuring itself of allegiance from a people who
once questioned, were once curious and who once had control of this great
nation.
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- http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=14106
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