MediaChannel.org - VIEWS

Ten Tips For Controversial Journalism

In "Into The Buzzsaw," award-winning journalists describe how their mainstream careers were crushed when they pushed ahead with controversial investigations. April Oliver offers these survival tips from her experience with the disastrous CNN/Tailwind story.

	Civil Rights Groups Stay Silent On Media Reports say media ownership affects diversity, from the boardroom to the newsroom, from the faces in sit-coms to the issues in the paper. So why aren't civil rights groups paying attention to media policy? asks Seeta Peña Gangadharan.

	The People's Media Grassroots media — a powerful tool for autonomy and activism — is not meant to compete with slick mass-audience products from Disney and Murdoch, says Deedee Halleck.

	The Commodities Of Europe's Culture Europe must use coalitions, policies and funding to protect its cultural diversity against the global monoculture of free trade media, says Carole Tongue in this speech to the French Senate.

	Paranoia As Pleasure, Pleasure As Paranoia In our "brave new world of amusements," the belief that We are being drugged, mesmerized or programmed by Them may replace TV's actual dangers, writes Todd Gitlin in his new book.

Seeta Peña Gangadharan	PR And Dissent At The WEF Working for the official press team at the World Economic Forum but sympathizing with the protesters outside, Seeta Peña Gangadharan finds that getting out a political message requires a careful strategy.

Another Media World Is Possible
As executives and protesters prepare to face off in New York City for the World Economic Forum next week, delegates to the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil, map out a contrasting vision of globalization. Osvaldo León argues that communications rights must be central to their struggle.

Also: Citizen Networks: When global communities use the power of the Web.
Plus: "Against Market Journalism:" Information exchange for independent journalists covering the World Social Forum.

	Race, Violence And The Australian Media "Muslim Rape Gangs!" screamed the headlines following sex attacks in Australia. Did the media make things worse by harping on the ethnic element? Can Australian media cover race without resorting to racism?

	Italy: Tacit Propaganda Gathering quotes from many commentators on Italian war coverage, Mariella Li Bergoli warns that the unmentioned threat of propaganda endangers press freedom as much as censorship.

	Singapore Slings The War Running in lockstep with a controlling government, Singapore's press cheers the U.S. war, in stark contrast to its Islamic neighbors and to the dismay of its Muslim minorities. A commentary by Paramita Sarkar.

	Indymedia Activists Set Sail For The WTO As the World Trade Organization continues its meetings in Qatar, protesters are witnessing locally and broadcasting globally, thanks to an Independent Media Center aboard a Greenpeace ship. IMC journalist Marcus "Sky" Covell reports on the hopes for the project. Plus: The WTO parody Web site.

	Journalism Of The Future Fair and free newspapers are essential if we are to preserve democracy, Seattle Times publisher F. A. Blethen reminds the SPJ in this recent speech.

	We Need More Propaganda, Not Less This war proves that we all must learn how to decode propaganda and that activists must learn how to use it, says Nancy Snow.

	The Form Of News Does the Web undermine the authority of the editor? A new book says that how we get the news determines its impact. Plus: a survey of U.S. newspapers finds that interactivity is their focus for the future.

	Daily News, Eternal Stories Examining the "mythological role of journalism," Jack Lule uncovers seven myths that shape our thinking. In this excerpt, he uses the example of Haiti to explain the unconscious racism of the American press.

	Journalism And Power: Watchdog Or Accomplice The world's press is losing its ability to keep power in check, says Frank Vogl. He warns the World Bank (and all of us) that corrupt media ownership is endangering development.

	Media In Guatemala: From War To Censorship MediaChannel invites journalists worldwide to share perspectives on the state of their nations' media. Here, Alfonso Gumucio Dagron describes the rebuilding of Guatemala's media institutions after 36 years of civil war.

	India: New Media, Old Injustice A dot-com news site exposed political bribery with a hidden camera and was lauded as the savior of Indian journalism. But are India's unglamorous stories and impoverished newspapers being left in the cold?

	24-Hour News And The Allure Of Voyeurism The allure and impact of live news coverage in our high-tech age may have us speeding past vital journalistic concerns, cautions Philip Seib.

	Malaysia's Indy Media Boom Independent Web sites have challenged the government's monopoly on truth. Now officials are scrambling to mute the opposition. Malaysian Net pioneer and banned writer M.G.G. Pillai reports from Kuala Lumpur.

Featuring three books available in the Book Corner	Market Forces Vs. Serious Journalism: Who's Winning? Profit-at-all costs. Trivia and tragedy. Investigative journalism versus the "newsamuse" business. In recent books Pierre Bourdieu, Arthur E. Rowse, and Bruce W. Sanford, all respected observers of media and politics, contest the inevitability of the bottom line.

	War Zone Hero "Someone has to show the world what's happening," said cameraman Mohammed Shaffi, who died last week. His work portrayed the sacrifices journalists make to show humanity's brutality, writes his friend and colleague Rashid Mughal.

	Is Independent Advocacy Possible? Did a public-policy group support Microsoft because the company funded them? So say Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber. But the Independent Institute's David J. Theroux rebuts these charges — and challenges his critics' independence.

	Low Power, High Impact The downfall of community microradio at the hands of the U.S. Congress disillusions advocates in emerging democracies who look to the United States as a model for citizen media access, writes Peter Molnar from Hungary.

	Inauguration 2001: Watching The Media While independent media activists reported on protests during new U.S. President Bush's inauguration, they went largely unreported in the mass media, writes Dimitri Devyatkin.

Alan F. Kay	Election Fraud And Media Flaws After the "Florida Fiasco" the press has been clamoring for improved voting technology. But it's the system, not the equipment, that's broken, warns MediaChannel advisor Alan F. Kay, and high-tech machines might make it worse.

	Dramatic Strike A strike by the actors' unions was virtually ignored by the mass media, even in the "company town" of Los Angeles. SAG board member Eugene Boggs explains why.

	Therapy News In The U.K. British journalism is abandoning substance for sentimentality, writes MediaChannel advisor Tessa Mayes, as reporters put victims ahead of experts and replace facts with feelings.

	Reporting On Conflict Jake Lynch, an experienced international TV and newspaper correspondent, has helped to create a new method of what is called "Peace Journalism." He offers 17 tips that should help journalists write more balanced reports.

	Galeano's Media Primer From circus-like talk shows to news manipulated by the military, Eduardo Galeano offers this "Crash Course on Incommunications."

	Media Misplay The Black Vote One subtext of the U.S. presidential election was race. Faye Anderson analyzes how the media — both black and mainstream — covered the candidates.

	Election 2000: The Consultants' Campaign The Gore/Bush contest was a badly scripted reality show, writes Robin Andersen. It was process as politics with the news media crying, "Let the best marketing team win!" (Left: The race is still a tie, but Bush may have won the marketing game)

	The New Global Oppression With world power in the hands of a few, the global media stifle culture, dissent and freedom to ensure that the Third World remains behind. Dr. Nawal el Saadawi warns of the "new colonialism."

	A Tower Aflame To Russian President Putin, the burning Moscow TV tower symbolized a nation in decay. But to Finnish journalist Ann-Britt Kaca it evoked the many struggles that led to the fall of communism.

	The Value Of Business, The Business Of Values In this groundbreaking think piece, Jonathan Peizer unveils a model for sustainable development in the New Economy for both nonprofit and for-profit groups.

	Bolivia Invisible Hey, it's just Bolivia (where's that?), and the news of deaths and protests did make it into the newspaper ... the style section of the Washington Post.

	Starr Power When public-broadcasting activist Jerold Starr went on the road to promote his grassroots reform group and his new book detailing his hard-fought battles, he encountered some resistance from unlikely quarters. Starr's way of explaining the issues is a road map for dissemination.

	Advertising With A G-String French theorist Paul Virilio looks at a failed attempt to remove posters for the film "The People Vs. Larry Flynt" from the streets of Paris and sees a sex-culture-advertising-industrial complex busily colonizing "a world without intimacy."

	Storming The PBS Fortress An increasingly corporatist public broadcasting service is failing its public-interest mandate, warns veteran media activist DeeDee Halleck. But a nascent media movement may be the catalyst for change.

	Introducing the Politics of Meaning Peter Gabel, an architect of the "Re-Imagining Politics and Society" conference, discusses what's behind the sense of "disconnect" that often accompanies our days of media convergence.

	The Medium Is The Massage As part of a special audio and text report from the "Re-Imagining Politics and Society" conference, Pauline Oliveros provides a look at her"wish-list" of information that might tame the machine.

	Stalking The Independents' Day As part of a special audio and text report from the "Re-Imagining Politics and Society" conference, Greg Guma asks if, at this crucial time, independent media can counter the power of global corporate consolidation.

	First You Need The Bridge Though new technologies seem ever more accessible, the world is facing technological apartheid. In this three-part series of essays, Jonathan Peizer of the Open Society Institute warns that "bridging the digital divide" requires understanding people's problems before applying technology to solve them.

	Framing Colombia's War As the U.S. Congress debates its aid package to Colombia, Dennis Hans condemns the U.S. media for failing to decode the partisans' misrepresentations of a complex and brutal civil war.

	PR: Preserving Democracy To Fraser Seitel, PR professional and representative of the Public Relations Society of America, PR critic John Stauber is paranoid, angry and way off the mark. "More often than not, in fact, public relations strategies and tactics are the most effective and valuable arrows in the quiver of the disaffected and the powerless."

	Checkout-Counter Censorship The new world of e-tailing is supposed to mean that every book is available to everyone, anytime, and probably at a discount. The truth is that Internet retailing is less efficient than most of us suppose, writes Richard Kostelanetz.

When TV Watches You
According to David Burke's "Spy TV — Just Who Is the Digital TV Revolution Overthrowing?," interactive television is a convergence of marketing, psychology, sociology, advertising, public relations and politics, all adding up to complex user profiles primed for targeted programming. In this excerpt Burke explores how this new technology is set to take advantage of friends and family.

Courtesy
Still Pictures Branch /
National Archives

The Gag Rule
There are many lessons to be learned from the Vietnam War, both political and military. Yet only one lesson has played a central role in every military intervention in the post-Vietnam era: Gag The Press. MediaChannel's "War & Peace" Editor, Tom Nusbaumer, a former U.S. Marine who served in Vietnam, believes that by restricting the press and dumbing down the information given to the public, political and military leaders can forever hide from the media during wartime.

(Pictured left: Walter Cronkite and CBS crew in Vietnam, 1968.)

Anaradha Vittachi
Photo courtesy of
OneWorld.net.

The Power Of Communication, The Power To Communicate
New technology is bringing about a revolution in communication. More and more people around the world are talking to each other, learning about and from each other. Anuradha Vittachi, co-founder of www.oneworld.net, calls on "knowledge-brokers" — the media and development professionals who are often in the position to mediate information — to relinquish some of their historical control over communication. In this article, adapted from a speech delivered at the United Nations on March 23, Vittachi urges us all to emphasize connectedness, rather than the polarizing differences that make for "cheap strife."

	Race, Class, And The New Journalism Recently, big-name journalists gathered to discuss the searing issue of race and class. But somehow they never got to the subject. Was it denial or just avoidance? MediaChannel editor Donnell Alexander was there and talks about what they didn't: the courage of journalists of the hip-hop generation to deal honestly with the intersection of class and race.

Key Martin	Documenting A Documenter Key Martin, who died at the age of 56, was a media activist, a trade unionist and video producer whose belief in the power of alternative media provides an inspiring lesson. Ellen Andors and Bill Doares tell Key's story for MediaChannel.

When The Camera Lies?
In 1992, when Britain's Independent Television News aired footage of emaciated, terrified Bosnian Muslims penned up in what was purportedly a Serb-run prison camp, the world was horrified. The unforgettable images inspired a wave of outrage, which led, ultimately, to the Dayton Agreement, partitioning Bosnia. According to a 1997 article in LM magazine, however, the camera lied. LM claims that ITN manipulated the images and distorted the truth in a deadline-driven attempt to get the scoop on Bosnian death camps. Bruce Whitehead, a former ITN producer, ponders the journalistic ethics of a libel trial that pits a brand name in global media against the tiny, former house organ of the Revolutionary Communist Party.

Video For The Voiceless
Reflected in the media eye, aboriginal peoples appear to us, alternately, as Rousseau-ian noble savages or minstrel-show caricatures: on one hand, the aloof, otherworldly tribesmen in Leni Riefenstahl's "Last of the Nuba," on the other, the pixilated native in the movie, "The Gods Must Be Crazy." What would happen if indigenous peoples were empowered to speak for themselves? Vincent Carelli, a photographer and activist for Indian rights, taught video skills to Amazonian Indians. Media critic Patricia Aufderheide contemplates what happens when a marginalized group, "constantly confronted — in the media as elsewhere — with images of their technological inferiority and their relative powerlessness," gets its hands on the means of production.

John Seabrook. Photo:
(c) Gasper Tringale.

A Place In The Buzz
As editor of The New Yorker, Tina Brown transformed the magazine from snob-appeal reading for the trust-fund set into an upscale version of a Fleet Street tabloid, hawking celebrities and scandal alongside the ads for riding schools and Omaha steaks. Brown is the poster girl for the new, classless culture that New Yorker writer John Seabrook calls "Nobrow," a mongrel offspring of buzz and bucks in which "commercial culture is the source of status, rather than the thing the elite define themselves against." But when Brown comes calling with "a contract in the high five figures," Seabrook — a young man with high-culture genes who comes from old money — has to ask himself, "Which side of this culture war am I on?"

The Economy Is Booming!
Uncritically parroting official statistics on joblessness, Canadian journalists are either "willfully obtuse" or afraid to sound a sour note in the government's happy-days-are-here-again refrain, argues Dan MacLeod. A former correspondent for Radio-Canada, MacLeod believes that Canadian reporters are turning a blind eye on the downside of a booming economy: They repeat "what is said officially, asking few questions — a far cry from Woodward and Bernstein."

Matt Drudge. Courtesy Matt Drudge Information Center	The Drudge Factor "The Drudge factor — that is, the extreme disintermediation of our information environment — means that responsibility for determining truth rests as much with those who consume information as with those who produce it," writes Andrew L. Shapiro.

	Liebling's Revenge: The Power of Interactivity Media consumers are using the Net to challenge Big Media's cultural authority, says Andrew L. Shapiro. As well, they're creating their own grassroots media to challenge mainstream media's exclusive right to determine what news is "fit to print."

Photo courtesy of
the National Arts Club.

Fiction Deeper Than Fact
When Nobel laureate for literature and MediaChannel contributor Nadine Gordimer won the National Arts Club Gold Medal in New York City on February 9th, a leading American journalist was on hand to pay tribute to one of South Africa's most passionate voices for social justice. In his remarks, New York Times Executive Editor Joseph Lelyveld made a heartfelt case for what even the most hard-boiled reporters know to be true: that words can be agents of social change, and that fiction—not journalism—brings us the deepest truths.

(Pictured left to right: Joseph Lelyveld, David Dinkens, and Nadine Gordimer.)

"Clowns For The Market Circus": The Media And Globalization
In his blistering acceptance speech for the 1999 Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom, the Uruguayan novelist and essayist Eduardo Galeano called "the cultural industry and the mass media" to account for imposing a "one-image, word, one-tune" media dictatorship on the planet. To Galeano, the entertainment media are the advance guard of a McWorld whose "cultural damage...[is] at least as devastating as the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo."

(Photo by Chris Hondros - Newsmakers)	AOL Time Warner: Mergergasm Or Threat To Democracy? As AOL and Time Warner celebrated their nuptials, Media Channel asked media studies professor and Project on Media Ownership director Mark Crispin Miller what he thought of this deal to create a $350 billion global media monster. Like many other media critics, Miller is not exactly optimistic.

Understanding Ourselves: Cultural Media And The Soul Of The New Africa
When apartheid was the law of the land in South Africa, the acid drip of racism ate away at the country's media freedom: books were banned, the police seized paintings on exhibition, and songs were banished from the airwaves. Now, says Nobel Prize-winner Nadine Gordimer, the new South Africa stands at the threshold of an "African renaissance" in cultural media—a renaissance whose seeds lie in the "guerrilla innovation" borne, of necessity, under apartheid.

Deal With The Devil
Authors who sign the "standard" book contract are often assuring profits for their publishers...and an uncertain economic and creative future for themselves. Thomas Hauser, who's had 22 books published, believes that the contract offered to authors is not only exploitative, it's quite possibly in violation of antitrust laws as well. Hauser says it's a situation crying out for federal investigation.

Black And White TV
Apparently, the threat worked—the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has called off its impending January 1 boycott of the U.S. TV networks, thanks to a "positive response" from the nets, as NAACP spokesman John White told the Los Angeles Times. But for Earl Ofari Hutchinson, the threatened boycott highlighted the misplaced priorities in the civil-rights group's critique of the entertainment media. For Hutchinson, the NAACP is missing the big issues about U.S. network TV, a "parade of goofball, sex-laced sitcoms, and action, and gossipy talk shows that are deliberately designed to appeal to young, middle-class whites."

From artvt.com.

Ghosts Of Electricity: Robert Kramer
Robert Kramer, who died this November, is best remembered by fellow travelers from the '60s as a radical filmmaker at the barricades of the anti-Vietnam protests and, later, a chronicler of resistance movements in Portugal, post-independence Angola, and Latin America. But his Newsreel project, which produced roughly 60 short, hit-and-run documentaries and "agitation" films between '67 and '71, was a progenitor of the alternative media whose reporters dodged concussion grenades and rubber bullets to cover the WTO protests in Seattle.

	"Y2K: The Movie" Vs. Y2K: The Reality NBC's recent special, "Y2K: The Movie," played fast and loose with the known facts about what may happen to air-traffic control systems and nuclear reactors this New Year's Eve. Still, if things are even one-quarter as bad as the film imagined they'll be, argues Kevin Sanders, you'll need all the help and advice you can get when the millennium rolls over.

	Russian Media Wars Moscow-based journalist Dimitri Devyatkin on collateral damage to the truth in Russian TV news and media power under crony capitalism in the New Russia.

	The Starr Report On Public Broadcasting Jerold Starr, backed by an all-star coalition of media activists such as George Gerbner, Ben Bagdikian, and Barbara Ehrenreich, has a cure for what ails PBS: Citizens for Independent Public Broadcasting, a group committed to putting "the public back into public broadcasting."

	The Insider Michael Mann's "The Insider," is a thriller about a journalist who claws his way, over Big Tobacco lawyers and gutless network executives to the moral high ground. Todd Gitlin examines Hollywood's changing visions of the fourth estate.

	Pay Ball! U.S. sports teams are becoming the must-have item in every media mogul's portfolio. But sportswriter Greg Jones fears these made-for-TV marriages may not be so good for sports... or fans.