If all you know of his work is the smears, then Hopes and Prospects will be a revelation. In his dry, understated way, he excavates the reality behind the Babel of 24/7 corporate news, and places long-buried truths on the table to examine. Every one is sourced to the leading academic journals, the best experts, the sharpest medical advice – yet each one is a shock if you rely on news brought to you by corporations and corrupt right-wing billionaires.

(My emphasis.)

I don’t aim to appear overly-critical of Hari, as it’s refreshing to see a positive review of Chomsky in the mainstream press, but the phrase in boldface is quite telling. It’s the only reference Hari makes to the propagandistic qualities of the corporate media, with the effect weakened by the mention of unspecified “corrupt right-wing billionaires”. (Though writing even this in the mainstream is to be applauded.)

In the reader’s mind, cue: “Ah! He’s talking about Murdoch! Yeah, you can’t trust that scumbag.”

Perhaps a better phrase for Hari to use would have been:

… yet each one is a shock if you rely on news brought to you by corporations, such as the Independent.

The Independent is owned by Independent News & Media Plc, which “manages gross assets of 4.7 billion euros” with “revenue of over 1.9 billion euros”.¹ The newspaper is part of a very large corporation.

But Hari doesn’t mention this. He points to the dark spectre of Murdoch and the right-wing press. Those working for and reading the “liberal media” can go back to feeling good about themselves, that what’s printed in the Independent and the Guardian is much fairer and truthful than the lies pumped out by The Times, Daily Telegraph, or Daily Mail.

John Pilger calls these “soft targets”. Writing of David Edwards and David Cromwell‘s concern with the “liberal media”:

They have concentrated on that sector of the media which prides itself on its ‘objectivity’, ‘impartiality’ and ‘balance’ (such as the BBC) and its liberalism and fairness (such as the Guardian).²

The reason why this is such an issue, the reason why the “liberal” press must be subjected to even more scrutiny than the “Tory press” is because they promote themselves as being progressive, that you can count on them to do a much better job on serious issues. They’re not under pressure from proprietors or partisan interests. They do good, honest journalism.

But the reporting in the “liberal media” is often just as deceptive as that produced by outlets controlled by “corrupt right-wing billionaires”.

It’s great the Independent have published a positive review of Chomsky, but we mustn’t for a minute forget the paper’s place in the corporate media.³

The University of Lincoln’s press office beat me (quite substantially) in publishing a write-up of Dorothy Byrne’s talk at the university last week. It’s a decent article, though Ian writes consistently good copy so that shouldn’t surprise anyone.

But what is interesting is… it’s missing half the people who were part of the talk last week. There isn’t a single mention of Mike Jempson, director of Mediawise, who shared the stage with Byrne.

Update: 11.40pm, December 1st, 2009

My copy’s available here. I’ve focused on Jempson because he had more interesting things to say, and I’ll leave the press office to write about Byrne’s pathetic defence.

Update: 1.20pm, January 25th, 2010

I’ve just spoke to Jenny Sheriston from the press office. Apparently she wrote the copy, and excluded Jempson because Byrne was more interesting, and she considers Byrne to be one of the most important women in broadcasting.

I didn’t write this at the time, but it was the reason for my concern of Jempson’s exclusion: Byrne is is a prominent figure in the dominant media, and so has fairly easy access to other dominant media organisations.

Outside pressure groups, like Jempson’s [Mediawise][ws], often have great difficulty getting attention for their critique of the media, and those with more radical views are often ignored completely.

We should bring attention to marginalised views, and not just focus on the powerful.

I don’t think anyone should really take Murdoch’s views seriously, and certainly not believe what he’s saying.

His motives are so plain to see I’m surprised he managed to get through the entire thing without laughing.

Murdoch is attacking the BBC because it’s a soft target. The Tories are getting in next year, and I’d be extremely surprised if they didn’t hack away at the BBC. He’s making his views on the subject clear well in advance.

News Corp stands to make an obscene amount of money from any cuts at the BBC, and any future cuts are likely to badly affect BBC News. (Recent cuts already have.)

Who is BBC News’ main competitor?

Oh, that’s right. Sky News.

Who’s in charge of Sky News?

Oh, that’s right. News Corp.

Murdoch raised the spectre of “the expansion of state-sponsored journalism”, saying it “is a threat to the plurality and independence of news provision, which are so important for our democracy.”

This is (one of) the point(s) where I’d just be wetting myself on the podium with laughter, if it was me giving the speech. It requires an absolutely stunning feat of mental acrobatics to think of “state-sponsored journalism” as any worse than corporate-funded journalism.

Put simply, one would expect “state-sponsored” journalists to accept and promote the view of the state. What makes corporate-funded journalists any better? Why on earth would a for-profit corporation pay people to make it, or the advertisers that sustain it, look bad?

They wouldn’t, and they don’t.

At the very end of his speech, Murdoch says: “The only reliable, durable, and perpetual guarantor of independence is profit.”

Independence from whom exactly? The state? Sure, I guess, but in most western societies the lines are incredibly blurred between the state and corporations. And certainly not independence from the corporations who own or fund the outlet.

Twice he mentions that “independence” and “plurality” are “so important for our democracy”.

We’ve just dealt with independence, and the response to the idea of “plurality” is similar. The corporate (‘mainstream’) media is owned and funded by corporations. The interests of these corporations are pretty similar, and so they act in similar ways, in support of what business wants. So much for “plurality”.

And finally, the big one, “democracy”. Only big in people’s imaginations, unfortunately. Our democracy is not “less-than-perfect”. It’s less-than-less-than-perfect.

It’s broken. It doesn’t work. It’s simply not democracy. The public have next to no influence, either on a local or national level. The current government was chosen by 22% of the total number of eligible voters.

And that’s it. Public opinion on major issues is often just ignored. See you again in 2010.

So I wouldn’t worry about newspapers closing, because they’ve make next to no helpful contribution to sustaining the health of our democracy, and only exist to serve their owners.

Lastly, Orwell gets misused by a lot of people, but Murdoch really takes the whole goddamn biscuit tin:

Sixty years ago George Orwell published 1984. Its message is more relevant now than ever. As Orwell foretold, to let the state enjoy a near-monopoly of information is to guarantee manipulation and distortion.

I hope I’m not misrepresenting him here myself, but when Orwell talked about the state I think it’s safe to conclude he was talking about those with overwhelming power (or the opportunity to acquire it). Were he writing today, corporations would fill that role.

The collapse of the news industry speaks volumes. It shows that people aren’t interested in the news and, if they are, they’re probably not willing to pay for it.

The corporate (or ‘mainstream’) media is sinking, and is doing everything it can to stay afloat: sacking staff, erecting pay walls, or simply closing some publications.

This, and the things that have caused it, should be celebrated by those in power.

Breeding apathy.

The majority of newspapers’ income comes from advertising revenue, which has decreased as circulation has decreased. Why should advertisers continue to pay so much money, when they’re reaching fewer people?

A commonly accepted view for circulation decline is that it’s because readers can often get the same content online, effectively for free.

Another, but not discussed, reason is that the news media has ceased to have any relevance to their daily lives.

For example, let’s take local newspapers. Their circulation has dropped massively. Many commentators may fret over what this means for “local democracy”. It means precisely nothing for local democracy, as it does not exist in any significant form.

Very few people actually vote in local elections. We can be fairly confident about concluding this is because they believe the outcome will not affect their lives in any meaningful way. They’re probably right.

Most issues of any significance are decided in Parliament. There, too, the public have little influence. The electoral system is a complete joke, producing governments from a party with the support of a minority of voters, let alone the population. ((In the 2005 election, the Labour party got just over 35% of the popular vote. This is just over a fifth of all eligible voters.))

Not only that, but there are no significant differences between the two parties that could conceivably win an election. In John Pilger’s words, they “have converged into a single-ideology business state, each with almost identical social, economic and foreign policies.”

This leaves no real choice for the public. To pick one example, the majority of the British public were opposed (pdf) to the Iraq war, perhaps two million Britons protested against it, and yet two-thirds of MPs voted for it.

Even the most cursory look at the state of our democracy shows it is not healthy, or even functioning. So when those who own the corporate media claim, like James Murdoch did recently, that it “plays a vital part in a functioning democracy”, they can be dismissed outright.

And this analysis doesn’t even consider the causes of our broken democracy, or the role of the corporate media in propping up the “business state” system.

Business won.

Corporate power should revel in this. The system that suppresses real dissent, and often basic facts, has been ridiculously successful.

Not only has it succeeded in hiding the truth from its readers, but the gap between what the media claim ((e.g., the great battle between the two main political parties, the benefits of globalisation, etc.)) and the reality the public can observe for themselves has caused shocking amounts of apathy and feelings of impotence.

The best part about this is that people aren’t turning to radical publications either.

The corporations who own the news media may feel somewhat sore, given the crumbling of once (and often still) profitable activities. But they have absolutely no interest in ratting out the rest of corporate power, because they have sticky fingers in many economic pies.

Original WordPress comments:

Shane Croucher:

So what could replace the corporate-owned media?

Do you believe a new age of political radicalism is needed to kickstart some kind of revolution?

I see what you’re saying, and I can’t fault it, but….what next? If you know what I mean. It just seems like we’re forever stuck.

Rob Wells:

I’m very pessimistic about the future. I hope that, one day, there will be true democratic control of social and economic institutions. There are some encouraging developments in Venezuela regarding worker control and participatory democracy, but my fear is that they’ll be undermined and won’t last, and won’t spread.

History is not encouraging on this matter.

As for everything else, from how to push for such things elsewhere, and how to replace the corporate media, I don’t know. The corporate media could be replaced by community-owned media, but I’m not sure how that would work. It certainly won’t work in the current economic system, at least not on any significant level.

If anything, this is what we should be discussing when we talk about the ‘future of journalism’ or the ‘future of the news industry’. Current debate is largely focused on sustaining existing institutions, or creating new ones that operate along similar lines (for profit, advertising-funded, etc). This system has not helped — and has often undermined — the public’s interests, so we shouldn’t help it survive.