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/* Written  5:05 pm  Oct  4, 1992 by bfrg9732@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu in cdp:alt.activism */
/* ---------- "The Media Monopoly (part 12)" ---------- */

The Media Monopoly

by Ben H. Bagdikian

"The Media Monopoly" is published by Beacon Press in Boston.
Help support the work of Ben H. Bagdikian by purchasing this book.


Part 12 -- The Growing Gap



"In the 1950s... it [General Electric] launched Ronald Reagan as 
a national political spokesman by paying him to make nationwide 
public speeches against communism, labor unions, social security, 
public housing, the income tax, and to augment the corporation's 
support of right-wing political movements."
    -- Ben H. Bagdikian, from his book "The Media Monopoly"

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In 1986, General Electric acquired RCA. Through this acquisition, 
it became the owner of NBC. Among other things, this means that 
it no longer needs to purchase or plead for favorable "PR." "Now, 
if it desires favorable treatment it no longer has to plead with 
at least one major American news organization. It owns one."

The question arises as to if General Electric experienced a major 
criminal conviction, how well would NBC report that news? Would 
NBC "proceed to produce a documentary on criminality... with 
General Electric as an obvious example? If it were disclosed that 
the company paid no income taxes during three years of multi- 
billion profits... would the network [NBC] produce a documentary 
on inequities in the national tax system?"

One hand washes the other. The odds are that there would be some 
degree of bias shown. "American mainstream news is still heavily 
weighted in favor of corporate values, sometimes blatantly, but 
more often subtly in routine conventions widely accepted as 
'objective.'" These "routine conventions" include the following:
1) Overdependence on "official" sources of news.
2) Lack of social context for the "facts" in the news.
3) A "...pattern of selective pursuit that results in some 
subjects regularly developed in depth and others of equal or 
greater importance systematically avoided."


1 -- Just Credentialed Facts
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
"Facts supported by important figures form the bulk of 
contemporary news... [This] overemphasis on news from titled 
sources of power has occurred at the expense of reporting 
'unofficial' facts and circumstances. In a dynamic and changing 
society, the voices of authority are seldom the first to 
acknowledge or even to know of new and disturbing developments."

"Where there are not genuinely diverse [i.e. not just 'official'] 
voices in the media the result inevitably is an overemphasis on a 
picture of the world as seen by the authorities, or as the 
authorities wish it to be."

2 -- Fear of Context
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
"Simple recitation of data seldom lead to public comprehension. 
Most naked facts are comparatively meaningless. Context is 
crucial."

For example, in the late 1980s the fact of the failures of 
various banks *was* being reported. What was *seldom* being 
reported was "...the ominous growth in annual bank failures and 
what this could mean for the national economy. Both advertiser 
and owner want the audience to remain in an accepting attitude 
toward both the news and the advertising. The result is 
unnecessarily bland and unintegrated information..."

While it is true that *some* interpretation of the facts does 
sometimes occur, The "...doctrine of just-the-facts is so strong 
that with rare exceptions the interpretations are done with self- 
cancelling circumlocutions in order to remove any impression that 
political and economic judgements are being made."

3 -- Dig Here, Not There
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
In the vast amount of facts which can be reported, it is 
inevitable that some choice must be made as to which facts are 
reported and which are ignored. "Yet, current professional 
standards give journalists little or no power to question 
systematic failures to pursue some important subjects and 
overemphasis on other subjects. Reporters take for granted that 
they have the right to resist an order to write a falsehood. 
There is no comparable convention for resisting the avoidance of 
important issues or the pursuit of self-serving ones."


[As the case of the General Electric ownership of NBC illustrates, 
it is at the very least quite likely that at some times influence 
has been brought to bear by the parent company on its subsidiary 
network. This filtering of the news means that there is a "rose 
colored window" through which the light of truth must pass before 
it reaches the public. B.R.] Underneath the self-serving nature 
of corporate influence on the various media, "...there is a 
disturbing separation of most major media from the true nature of 
their country's population, a separation that threatens not only 
the future usefulness of the media, but the vitality of the 
American political process."


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Synopsis/Review by Brian Redman
"Ah yes, Armageddon. I remember it well."
End part 12