Tag Archives: press freedom

Fake News! Genuine Fake News! The Real Fake News! Get Your Fake News Here!

23 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, A Little Wisdom, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Journalism, Philology, Political Psychology

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https://www.cjr.org/
http://ethics.npr.org/
http://handbook.reuters.com/index.php?title=Integrity
https://www.poynter.org/
https://www.publicintegrity.org/
https://www.spj.org/ethicscode.asp
http://www.timewarner.com/company/corporate-responsibility/telling-the-worlds-stories/journalistic-integrity

https://www.britannica.com/topic/agitprop
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_measures

Fake News Psychology

Accusation in a Mirror

Paranoid Delusional Narcissistic Reflection of Motivation

About State Controlled Press

https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007655
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-17840134

For referencing other web content so often and so much, BackChannels has practically stopped expressing its own logic and sensibility.  Therefore and herewith a few observations related to the now infamous and nationally degrading accusations aimed at the world’s — not only America’s — major high-integrity media (even the famed “Gray Lady” has been the target of somebody’s half-packed mud balls).

First, choose your own preferred mode in contemporary governance:

Feudal Political Absolutism

Modern Checked and Democratic Distribution of Power

That should be easy, but if you’re up to your chinny chin chin in loot, corporate or illicit (or both), and have been the object of generous favor by some singular power, then weighing the options (starting with making a little to a lot less money) may be more difficult.

Let’s move on.

Dictatorship should be oh so 20th Century by now.  If a citizen of the old EU / NATO experience, you have seen it, defeated it — Franco, Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin et al. — lived through it, or at least heard about it and thought as much gone with the Cold War and done, finished, and dead in the west.  If respectful of the American flag and those of others aligned with it in spirit, then perhaps you have been also respectful of the war dead whose sacrifice has enabled this very freedom to read and write with earnest and responsible intent.

In short, you may know and love freedom of speech — “Press Freedom” — as intended and practiced and appreciated.

And yet here I / you / we are confronted by an “information space” packed with the must vulgar of accusations: those institutions wholly devoted to reason and truth, so much has been inferred, have reverted to malicious invention.

It ain’t so, Joe.

Something has been sabotaged, gone wrong, thrown off course in relation to common confidence in America’s political discourse and news, but is that to be blamed on the many communities of best educated editors and writers and remarkably informed, sharp, and thoughtful readers?

An American homily may apply: “He who points the finger should point it back at himself.”

Additional Reference

Klein, Linda A.  “A free press is necessary for a strong democracy.”  ABA Journal, May 2017.

Pomerantsev, Peter.  Nothing is True and Everything is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia.  New York: Public Affairs, 2014.

Addendum – November 13, 2018

 

Posted to YouTube August 9, 2018.

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Also in Media: “Live from the Bully Pulpit: The Abuse of Obligatory Presidential Broadcasts in Latin America” | By Andrés CañizálezCenter for International Media Assistance | May 15, 2017

17 Wednesday May 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Also in Media, Journalism

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After only a few minutes at the podium, however, the transmission of his speech was interrupted without warning.1 President Maduro had ordered a blanket broadcast across all radio and television stations–what is known in Spanish as a cadena nacional. These presidential broadcasts resemble a US Oval Office address in style, but in Venezuela the law obliges both state‑owned and private media to carry the transmissions, which have lasted as long as eight hours. When Maduro invoked this law to interrupt Torrealba’s speech, Venezuelans had no choice but to listen to Maduro or simply switch off their TVs and radios.

Source: Center for International Media Assistance – 5/15/2017

Also in Media: “ANF | Journalist Demiralp: Eutelsat officials could be put on trial” | May 4, 2017

08 Monday May 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Also in Media, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology

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As French satellite company Eutelsat’s threat to shut down Stêrk TV, News Channel and Ronahi TV which broadcast over satellite from Europe continues, protests from Kurdish media continue to rise. Journalist Maxime Demiralp said the events were scandalous and that “Eutelsat is committing a crime with their compliance with Turkey and thus the administrators of the company can be put on trial.”

Read the whole thing: ANF | Journalist Demiralp: Eutelsat officials could be put on trial

Demiralp stated that Turkey is going back every year in regards to press freedom and freedom of expression and protested Western institutions, saying: “Despite all these, if the West doesn’t speak out, that shows that democracy is also in regression. Because this isn’t just an issue about the Kurds. This is an issue of democracy in general. Democracy is in regression throughout the world, as apparent in the West. We can see this very clearly by the company Eutelsat.”

Demiralp stated that Eutelsat has serious relationships with Turkey and said: “This company has serious alliances. The military and police communications infrastructure is done by this company. The Kurdish media is sacrificed to this. That is the financial side of things. The political side is that the states are silent in the face of this dirty alliance. This silence shows the political side of things.”

Related on freedom of the press in Turkey: https://rsf.org/en/turkey | https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/2017/turkey | https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/14/erdogan-free-speech-turkey-journalists-referendum | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_Turkey | http://nypost.com/2016/12/04/crushing-free-speech-in-turkey/ | http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2017/03/turkey-judiciary-sets-example-of-subservience.html |

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FTAC: The Yankee Responds

23 Sunday Apr 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Also in Media, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Extreme Brown vs Red-Green, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Political Psychology

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Article of Interest: 

https://www.eu-foreignpolicy.com/2017/04/21/analysis-from-the-su-24-crisis-to-the-moscow-ankara-rapprochement-leadership-and-foreign-policy-doctrines/

Passage of Interest: 

From our comparative analysis, it emerges how both Russia and Turkey present astonishing similarities in their leaderships styles. It is important to outline such feature of the nations’ political life because, being both “leader-politics” countries, the style of their leaders influences greatly the shaping of the national political agenda and the strategies used by the states to pursue such agendas.

To sum up, one could say that all the facts taken into account here highlight the presence in both countries totalitarian democracy regime, centred on the figure of the all-powerful leader. None of the leaders actually ever rejected the principles of the pluralistic state. In the official national narrative, both of them could be overthrown by a democratic election. But why should this happen, when they embody the essence of their national identity. Just like Putin is THE Russian man, Erdogan image is moulded on THE Turkish one.

“In the official national narrative, both of them could be overthrown by a democratic election. But why should this happen, when they embody the essence of their national identity. Just like Putin is THE Russian man, Erdogan image is moulded on THE Turkish one.”

Perhaps if each were more secure with such an assertion, the press in each state would be free (it’s an easy look-up as to how they are not) and their political rivals less often inhibited, jailed, muzzled, or murdered.

The truth is each may be wrong about himself (there’s also an interesting psychology at play in their “malignant narcissism” and respective kleptocracies), and that’s why open and vibrant national conversations supported by “fair and free elections” matter in democracies — and not at all in dictatorships.

Additional Reference

https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2017/russia

https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2017/turkey

https://rsf.org/en/ranking

https://rsf.org/en/russia

https://rsf.org/en/turkey

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FTAC – On the Taming of the Wild Press

17 Friday Feb 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation

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Unlike Sputnik, which serves Moscow, the American press is free and not in the flattery business.

Many journalists who achieve a decent wage from a major newspaper have done so on their investigative doggedness and straightness.

American presidents both craft but also inadvertently create their own image – and thinking Americans (aye, there’s the rub) don’t rely on just one news presentation or “cut” on an important story to produced in their own minds at least a seemingly reliable image of a state of affairs.

In government, of course, the stakes rise and the accuracy of intelligence becomes even more critical to power.

In Moscow: for President Putin, the world is – or is made – as he wishes to see it, and he himself is seen as he would have the public know him. There the press has been intimidated, steered, and trained, and from time to time “disciplined” by murder.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/05/ten-years-putin-press-kremlin-grip-russia-media-tightens

Elementary.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_journalists_killed_in_Russia
https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-press/2015/russia (2015)
http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/06/28/putin-now-seeking-to-intimidate-journalists-into-not-covering-his-opponents/ – 6/28/2016
http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/06/20/putin-rebuilding-the-iron-curtain-in-his-typical-hybrid-fashion/ – 6/20/2015
http://www.gq.com/story/journalism-in-vladimir-putins-russia – 1/13/2017

“The situation in Khimki is not normal; this is a kind of military dictatorship,” says Yevgeniya Chirikova, a member of In Defense of Khimki Forest, a local environmental group. “Journalists and public figures are constantly being threatened. It’s as if our local authorities cannot accept any different way of thinking.”

Over the past year there has been a series of violent attacks on independent journalists here, culminating in the controversial death in late March of newspaper designer Sergei Protazanov, who had been preparing an issue of the oppositionist Grazhdanskoye Soglasiye devoted to electoral fraud in Khimki’s March 1 mayoral contest. That election was won by the candidate of the pro-Kremlin United Russia Party.

Weir, Fred.  “Russian Journalists Face Violence, Intimidation.”  The Christian Science Monitor, April 28, 2009.

Addendum

When asked by journalists of contacts between his presidential campaign and Russian operatives, he deflected the questions and put the focus instead on what he described as “illegal” government leaks and “dishonest” media coverage.

“The press is out of control,” he said. “The level of dishonesty is out of control,”

After weeks of disclosures in newspapers over turmoil in his administration, he told one reporter to “sit down” for a rambling question.

“Tomorrow, they will say: ‘Donald Trump rants and raves at the press,'” Trump said. “I’m not ranting and raving. I’m just telling you. You know, you’re dishonest people . . . .”

Holland, Steve.  “‘I’m not ranting and raving.’  Trump on defensive in first solo news conference.”  Reuters, February 17, 2017.

In a Twitter rant that extended into work hours, Mr. Trump at once dismissed the entire Russia story as “fake” and made up, and pledged to hunt down the officials in the government who have supplied the details. He demanded an apology from the “failing” New York Times and accused the news media of making up stories and sources, even as he said he wanted those sources apprehended.

Weisman, Jonathan.  “Trump Denounces ‘Low-Life Leakers,’ Pledging to Hunt Them Down.”  The New York Times, February 16, 2017.

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Hamasites – Journalism – The Truth Always Comes Out

13 Wednesday Aug 2014

Posted by in Anti-Semitism, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Islamic Small Wars, Israel, Journalism, Middle East, Regions

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Tell you what . . .

From now on, I will tell you what to do with your life (and

in addition to doing what I tell you to do,

you will pay me for the privilege of my leaving you alone).

*

I will tell you what to see and what to hear,

what to say and what to withhold.

When I tell you what is happening around you,

you are to believe me

and no one else.

I am your authority.

I am your only authority.

*

If you are in the news business, good — you can help me!

*

Every time out, you will make me look heroic (which, naturally, I am) and

not show anything to detract from that image.

*

Call me”Hamas”

Acknowledge that I am greater than you.

And I,

at any time, may

Arrest

Detain

Question

Torture

You

Without explanation.

*

If you so much as breath in Gaza,

I

am your world

I

am all the world

You

will know

______

In Spanish, Gutiérrez, who is writing for Melilla Hoy, tweeted, “On Saturday, 9th of August, Hamas launched a battery of rockets from the press hotel. What was their intent? To provoke Israel to kill us?#SaveGazaFromHamas.”

http://www.algemeiner.com/2014/08/12/spanish-journalist-in-gaza-hamas-launched-rockets-from-press-hotel/ – 8/12/2014.

“Since the war started, one population group in Gaza has disappeared from the streets: people in uniform…They work for Hamas and are targets of Israel… Only at the Shifa Hospital, the big hospital in Gaza City, are a few sitting in uniform. There, they feel protected from the Israeli bombings. In addition, that is where they monitor the international press to prevent it from doing ‘wrong’ things. Local camera crews know this, but foreigners do not: Hamas does not want that killed or wounded fighters appear on camera footage.

Yes, there are many civilian casualties and most of the inhabitants of Gaza live in fear, but Hamas likes to exploit this for its PR. ‘He does not dare to talk to you,’ says the wife of someone who has been placed under house arrest because he is known for criticizing Hamas. She too does not dare to tell his story, because ‘we are being watched’.”

http://mfa.gov.il/mfa/foreignpolicy/issues/pages/testimonies-from-gaza-and-hamas-intimidation-of-foreign-journalists.aspx – 8/11/2014.

The media have turned the civilian death toll into the only measure of the justness of the Israeli warfare. The New York Times and Haaretz, for instance, published the Gaza death toll on their front pages every day. The message is clear: The higher the number of civilian casualties, the more “war crimes” Israel is committing.

This measure is groundless. According to its distorted logic, Nazi Germany – which had one million dead civilians in World War II – was the victim of the aggressiveness of the United States, which lost “only” 12,000 civilians, and Britain, which lost “only” 67,000 civilians. This is a logic and ethical failure.

International media failed professionally and ethically in Gaza – http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4557962,00.html – 8/13/2014

The FPA protests in the strongest terms the blatant, incessant, forceful and unorthodox methods employed by the Hamas authorities and their representatives against visiting international journalists in Gaza over the past month,” the statement said. “The international media are not advocacy organizations and cannot be prevented from reporting by means of threats or pressure, thereby denying their readers and viewers an objective picture from the ground.”

http://www.timesofisrael.com/foreign-press-group-condemns-hamas-intimidation-in-gaza/#ixzz3AIUmVbgW 8/11/2014.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/07/31/forty-questions-for-the-international-media-in-gaza/ – 7/31/2014.

An Italian reporter, after leaving Gaza, confirms that it was a Hamas rocket that hit a school playground, killing 10 kids, but Obama sent Hamas 50 million bucks anyway, while he cancelled tourist visa applications for Israelis.

http://pamelageller.com/2014/07/italian-journalist-leaves-gaza-tells-truth-free-hamas-retaliation-hamas-killed-kids.html/#sthash.RNKyb2ak.dpuf – 7/30/2014.

1. The Gaza correspondent of Canada’s Globe and Mail, Patrick Martin, wrote in his article from 20 July: “The presence of militant fighters in Shejaia became clear Sunday afternoon when, under the cover of a humanitarian truce intended to allow both sides to remove the dead and wounded, several armed Palestinians scurried from the scene.Some bore their weapons openly, slung over their shoulder, but at least two, disguised as women, were seen walking off with weapons partly concealed under their robes. Another had his weapon wrapped in a baby blanket and held on his chest as if it were an infant.”

http://blog.unwatch.org/index.php/2014/07/22/hamas-human-shield-tactic-as-reported-by-foreign-journalists/ – 7/22/2014.

As The Guardian reported, the Hamas government in Gaza issued its ban on journalists co-operating or working with Israel’s media due to its “hostility.” It said “offenders will be prosecuted.”

http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2013/jan/01/press-freedom-hamas – 1/1/2013.

Threats, physical violence and arbitrary arrest and detention by Hamas security forces are common. A score of journalists were arrested or roughed up during 2010 by the Hamas interior ministry’s security service. Such measures oblige Palestinian journalists to censor themselves. In mid-March last year, security forces harshly broke up meetings in the centre of Gaza City organised by the “March 15 Coalition” calling for reconciliation between Hamas and Fatah, and arrested and beat journalists, including about 20 on 15 March 2011. Security forces raided many local and foreign media offices looking for photos of the crackdown.

http://en.rsf.org/predator-hamas-security-forces-in-gaza,42429.html – 2012.

After 15 days he was released. He then made a statement that it is clear that there is a systematic policy practiced by Hamas in the Gaza Strip with the aim of gagging the media by subjecting journalists to arrest, torture and detention in harsh conditions.

http://elderofziyon.blogspot.com/2012/07/journalist-imprisoned-tortured-by-hamas.html#.U-uumuNdV8E – 7/16/2012.

At least eight journalists were beaten by the Hamas police officers during the rallies. Some had their cameras and laptops confiscated, while others were taken into custody and made to sign a document pledging to refrain from covering such events in the future.

http://www.barenakedislam.com/2011/03/29/gaza-palestinian-women-reporters-beaten-and-tortured-by-hamas/ – 3/29/2011.

Hamas Forces Arrest Two Reporters In Gaza –

http://www.imemc.org/article/62548 – 11/23/2011.

Hamas security services also arrested the journalists: Munir Al-Mawri, Ashraf Abu Khsewan and Mustafa Megdad without informing them of the reasons behind their arrest.

The Hamas’ Internal Security Agency summoned Sunday several Palestinian Journalists including Abdul Karim Haji and Hussein Abdul Jawad Karsou’, without revealing reasons for their arrest.

http://english.pnn.ps/index.php/national/3650-hamas-security-forces-in-gaza-arrest-several-journalists – 1/22/2013.

“The political struggle between Hamas and Fatah has inflicted a great deal of damage on the press in the Palestinian Territories,” Reporters Without Borders said. “Many media have been closed and dozens of journalists have been arrested. In the absence of the rule of law, they have no way of defending themselves. Mahmoud Abbas and Ismael Haniyeh cannot remain silent while this goes on. It is in their own interest to ensure there is room for free speech.”

http://en.rsf.org/palestinian-territories-arbitrary-detention-of-journalists-29-08-2008,28353 – 8/29/2008.

Committee to Protect Journalists, search page on Hamas:

http://www.cpj.org/search.php?cx=002635367788333464843%3A1kfp8mbluhy&cof=FORID%3A9&ie=UTF-8&q=Hamas

Friedman, Matti.  “What the Media Gets Wrong About Israel: The news tells us less about Israel than the people writing the news, a former AP reporter says.”  The Atlantic, November 30, 2014.

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