I'm going to put this out before I review it, right now, cos I often sit on articles to contemplate them and then never release it. I'll look for grammar, spelling and even logic 'soon' - but I think the main points are all there. This is an opinion piece through and through....
The australian media - Conditioning Correctthink
Covid obviously brought this propagandist propensity into clear focus; which then makes one dubious of the integrity of their prior offerings, and ongoing it's hard to take their output seriously at all.
The project - We'll Think For You
I hate 'the project'. It exemplifies all that is wrong in 'news presentation' in this country and time. It's marketed and intended to be that way.
Apparently presenting facts and information objectively is not cool for modern consumption and needs to be mocked, twisted, and used to engender specific responses from anyone plugged in. In me, the response is invariably rage - to the point when i see 'blue' on the tv screen in passing it triggers a quasi-pavlovian rage response.
There was an advertisement, one of the endless 'watch us' snippets... I can't find the line directly, so I'll paraphrase: "Presenting the new and what it means to you." or it might have been "how it affects you."
So they're overtly saying that they will tell you what the news means, how 'the facts' should be interpreted, and how you should feel about it.
Put another way, the media/the government are more or less saying that you, the public, are too stupid to make a decision about what information means and how you should feel and react.
I wonder of course if media presentations were ever actually objective... probably not, but now that social media presents some strong alternative to msm there is growing annoyance by those that actually want to make their own minds up to the polished turd that is australian 'reporting'.
That turd is not just 'the project', the abc and sbs are equally brown, equally "reporting" what they're told to. The project just happens to be extra stinky.
Liz Hazes - "Under Investigation with Liz Hayes"
This rant brought to you by a particular something I noticed in passing recently.
"Under Investigation with Liz Hayes" ...on Ukraine, aka "Why you should think Putin is a C"
I wouldn't suggest you waste your time on it, but youtube link current at time of writing.
An aside - Personal Opinion: The Ukraine Invasion is disgraceful, regardless of motivation. As it continues to unfold the apparent targeting of civilians and non-military infrastructure is obviously abhorrent. And let's leave it at that.
Anyway the program was presenting an authorised position for the public, the correctthink for the drones.
On the program they had various 'experts', of note...
Robert Horvath - "Russia Specialist La Trobe University"
Tony Kevin - "Former Australian Diplomat"
A brief opinion piece:
The la trobe 'russian specialist' was a typical academic, self-righteous, overbearing, interrupting, intrusive , 'leftist', and shrill. Like many 'lecturers' they're primarily interested in talking as much as possible about why their opinion is right and why you simply must accept it. or you're a racist. I don't suggest that he's wrong, but clearly he was a specifically employed, symbolic caricature.
The former diplomat was clearly brought on as an 'alternative opinion', and he didn't seem to want to be on there.
So basically they had three or four anti-putin characters vs this one token pro-putin guy, and a lot of the 'interaction' was just bashing on this one guy, whenever he tried putting out any opinion. The la trobe guy constantly interrupted and shouting him down before the diplomat presented an opinion many times.
It was just farcical.
Personally, I didn't support the diplomat's position, but the program demonstrated a few things;
i) The token inclusion of allegedly 'alternate views', done to show that the program/media is "looking at things objectively from all sides, perspective and opinions," when clearly this is anything but the case. It's like when 'the media' does an interview then edits the content to present an opinion diametrically opposite what the interviewee was saying.
ii) That the media wants to demonstrate that alternative opinions are wrong and are to be shouted down and or dismissed as wrongthink by a majority or righteous outspoken heroes. You want to think correctly don't you? Otherwise you're a conspiracy theorist and possibly a racist too.
This has been used overtly and repetitively over the last couple of years for Covid (which I will not get into), and now it's Ukraine's turn.
Again, I'm not suggesting that the Former Diplomat's position is correct, but a) if he's brought on then he should be able to present his case without being harangued before making his case, b) we should be able to make up our own minds, c) the media should be presenting all the information in an unbiased format if that is their stated mission.
The program did itself no favours bringing in a defenceless punching bag to 'prove' their point.
If something is 'incorrect' then it should be fairly obvious to a mind that is actually trained and conditioned to think - aka without having to goad and guide the population into submission with this kind of circus act.
My position - Making Up My Own Mind
The media should be presenting facts, not opinions. Not telling us "what it means to you."
It is logical that msm has an underlying agenda, and that agenda is not the edification or interests of the population. More likely, it is an agenda of control, but let's not get into that either.
Like many, I think the msm and their messages should generally be ignored or shunned. If you actually want to know what's going on in this shitty world then look anywhere but the TV, radio or newspapers.
Although not everyone's taste in 'entertainment', I've watched a number of articles by Russell Brand. His thing is looking at (usually publicly available) documents or articles about topics, presenting them, and i.e. suggesting that the media might be reporting for a purpose, or in a biased way, not based on the document's content.
In my opinion RB has demonstrated a turn around from a drug-addled, waste of space, to a contemplative, deep thinker. If nothing else a case study that people can come good.
His channel's position might be summed up as "Here's some information, think about it and discuss amongst yourselves."
Here's a sample from today, which happens to also cover some similar points as above.
Australians - Basic and the Common Denominator
But it appears that most australians are happy enough to believe the shit they're force fed on msm. Makes me sad and concerned - perhaps this disillusion is a common feature of old(er) age - I certainly don't understand young people, and the world makes less and less sense.
As those closer to me know, I've felt obliged to undertake some email campaigns, dropping links to interesting, usually controversial articles, articles usually in opposition to the opinions forced down the throat of the population.
Anyway, rant ends.
Until next time...
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