Is hollywood the only institution left powerful enough to challenge state propaganda?

Michael Moore has been using film to challenge the myths and lies of the media and in the past Oliver Stone was vilified by journalists and critics over his alternative view of the JFK assassination.

Most people who has tried to expose scandals has been largely ignored, many major publications fail to review books on cover ups and government scandal.

Oliver Stone's JFK received much more attention than any book on the same subject and Michael Moore has been getting mainstream publicity.

What are your views on the subject?

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Vanity Fair has been rabid against Bush for the last several months - but they don't reach as wide an audience as film. Few things do.

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In the past a documentary exposing a president by the likes of Michael Moore would have been instantly pushed underground and seldom seen

Maybe things are starting to change

Well hell, the Financial Times, New Scientist, and even The Economist (to name three of the highest level news sources around) have been critical of Bush's Iraq policy on various levels. They've tempered it with arguments to the contrary, as they should, but ultimately all three of these sources have found stronger grounds for criticism of Bushy-policy than defence, on this particular front.

But like D says, how are they ever gonna compete with the mass-appeal of films (it's hard to deal with realistic details when your aim is emotion-grabbing retail)

It's interesting how many social and politicial docs are making it to the big screen at the moment. It does suggest that there's a lack of this sort of thing on standard tv . [incidently, if anyone has BBC access in the US, i'd recommend the new 3-part series called The Power of Nightmares. It's not entirely imparital, but none of these things are. It just makes an intriguing political case]

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Bush is so dumb it's kinda hard to defend him but the Oliver Stone thing was a different matter

Stone was being compared to Hitler and Goebbels at the time

The film was being described as a three hour lie from an intellectual sociopath amongst other things

The Bu****es ain't dumb (altho i do think they genuinely have been in the case of Iraq)? But which Ollie Stone thing are you talking about. Ollie's cast so many stones it's hard to keep track

I'm talking about the furore over Oliver Stone's JFK

Newsweek ran a cover story headlined "Why Oliver Stone's new movie can't be trusted"

Another critic accused Stone of contemptible citizenship which is about as close to an accusation of treason as the libel laws will permit

All this began before the movie was even released

Media is indeed the most powerful tool when trying to influence what people think. The politicians are of course just as aware of this as Hollywood. Fox News is a good example of that.

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They had temporarily escaped the factories, the warehouses, the slaughterhouses, the car washes - they'd be back in captivity the next day but now they were out - they were wild with freedom. They weren't thinking about the slavery of poverty. Or the slavery of welfare and food stamps. The rest of us would be all right until the poor learned how to make atom bombs in their basements.

Oh whoops, yeah.

Never seen it, i must say. I've gotta say tho that i don't see dramatic films as the best place for political analysis. Wag the Dog is a good example of rampant pointlessness in that area. As far as JFK stuff goes, there seems to be no way to come to concrete conclusions, so any sort of dramatisation only adds bias without proving facts.

Docs are they way forward. Although god knows Moore has blurred the line a bit too much for comfort with his emotional-manipulation aspirations.

Oh yes. Despite Outfoxed being biased, it's one of the recent 'docs' that has shone some light on tv journalism's failings. Fox sux

It's stunning to me that no one here is challenging the thread's presupposition that we're being subjected to "state propaganda." If you want to know why public discourse has taken such a dive in recent years, look no further than the fringe elements who casually toss accusations about, almost invariably without any elaboration or substantiation.

And are you really citing Michael Moore as an example of someone challenging "myths and lies"? His contributions to the "myths and lies" you refer to is highly documented and easily demonstrable, though his supporters predictably fall back on the "well, he gets people talking," as if mere sound were the goal.

Maybe you're right in that his movies wouldn't have gotten as much attention a few decades ago. Back then, fewer extremists had a seat at the table in American politics. These days, they're louder, and some people are riled up enough that there's a market for such things. Unfortunately, it's every bit as manipulative as I'm sure you imagine the government to be.


Haven't seen it yet, though I did talk a bit with OG-, and he relayed a few of its central arguments to me...one was surprising, another was incredibly sloppy, and I had questions about both that the film apparently didn't address. I'll have to see it, of course, but from what Peter tells me (and he's no fan of Bush, as many of you know), the film falls far short of a real indictment.

Regardless, I think Fox has become little more than a political scapegoat. They're like Halliburton; just mention their name in conjunction with something bad, and odds are no one'll call you on it. Truth be told, if I flip between Fox, CNN and MSNBC for political coverage or commentary around a news event, I don't see much difference, and frankly, I find it hard to believe that most of Fox's detractors do.

There used to be a tv show called Spin City about a governor and his spin staff... prime time, sit com kinda deal. I think it can be generally accepted that state propaganda exists and that we're bombarded with it. It isn't partisan to believe that, as we were bombarded with it in the past, regardless of who's in power. Challenging something so pervasive would be... well, you didn't either, so it seems like you can see what a waste of time it is.

The news programs that simply relay events don't differ drastically between networks, but when it comes to who the news shows have on as credible journalistic sources...thats when Fox starts to smell. I think where Fox differs from the other major news junctions is that they tend to coat opinions as if they were fact. But again, this doesn't appear so much in their simple relaying of world events, but moreso in their "debate" shows and shows with guest speakers/consultants.

I wish Outfoxed had done a better job of comparing FNC externally rather than consistently internally. I think it was an intention on the part of the filmmakers so that FNC would seem like a monster as opposed to maybe just slightly worse than its competitors. One interesting point they made (and I think I forgot to mention this to you, Yoda) was when they showed the clip of the president (or whoever it was) of CNBC saying they were shifting their programing model to be more similar to that of the FNC as FNC is starting to dominate in the ratings...or so was implied, I don't recall ever actually seeing any Nielsen ratings cited.

And I think Yoda had a good point in saying that this thread implies that there is an active source of state propaganda, which I would propose that there isn't. I think there are people out there who do believe things that aren't necessairly true, but I don't believe it is a result of the state exercising propaganda over them, I think its a simple fault due to lack of education in the face of mass media.

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Yeah, I remember Spin City. Not bad, and I see your point, though I think spin and state propaganda are on completely different levels. Spin is to state propaganda what Pee Wee football is to professional rugby.

Now, North Korea...that's state propaganda. I suspect that anyone using such strong terms is doing so either due to a lack of perspective, or else to try to give more weight to what may be a flimsy accusation underneath. I mean, c'mon...Michael Moore's great, some vague indictment of some unnamed person who criticized Oliver Stone, Bush is an idiot. When did political arguments become so flailing and half-assed?

Yeah, I remember you mentioning that. The thing I'd be curious about is how well were overt biases and affiliations identified. In other words, you can have partisans on...everyone does...but you should let the audience know who they are.


I don't have ratings in front of me, but I do know that Fox has been pretty much dominating.

I think you make a really good point about the filmmakers wanting to make FNC seem like a monster; most of these films, for all their faults, probably have at least a few objective insights for us, and I think that gets overshadowed by their overzealous need to serve up a definitive indictment.


See, I think THAT is the real change...we've gone from knowing nothing to knowing the wrong things. There's less downright ignorance, I'd say, but more misinformation. We know more, but not all of it's true, and frankly, I don't know that that's any better.

My thought on this, and I think you're going to hate it, is that it happened when Bush went off the rails, plunged us into an un-winnable war without any backing and the country was divided along partisan lines like hasn't been seen in decades. I will fully grant you that those with ill-formed opinions, people who can't back up what they're spewing, people who don't know an eigth of what they're talking about... oughtta just hush. But in answer to your question: it happened in the last 4 years that everybody suddenly has an opinion on politics. I never followed it beyind the city level before, for instance. Also, I don't think a 'ho hum' attitude to the use of possibly overblown rhetoric to get a thread topic jumping really equates to political or intellectual passivity. I understand your gripe, but I think you're taking on a huge job if you're going to overcome that particular social faux pas.

Fair point. I think it's easy to go along with that statement coz of all the war rhetoric that has accompanied the Bush Jnr era. US tv media seems to have echoed some of the broader messages of the current government, in this area, too readily/unquestioningly. (I'm really in no position to judge, but the little i see backs that perception up).

But your right, there's scant evidence suggesting these media are 'controlled' by the government. But there is some that suggests many of the major players are strongly partisan.

On both sides yeah?

I still haven't watched it all the way through, but what i saw makes me think it's not as rigorous as i'd like, but it raises intersting points. The claims from ex employees of political bias are fairly damning - given that Fox sells itself as an impartial news source. [anyone who knows Murdoch though knows this is standard practice].

I looked into the study they quoted, which suggested people who get their info from tv media are more likely to hold mistaken views (and that those who watch Fox are the most ill-informed of all when it comes to Iraq )

There's some vaguery in the questions posed (i.e. the question relating to connection between Iraq and Al Qaeda - i.e. yes, there are 'links', but no, there's no demonstrated collaboration). So it's a flawed study. But the sample is big, and the other misconceptions are classic .

These stats related to the three stated mis-perceptions of the war in iraq, and how likely people were to have them depending on their prefered news source:

FOX CBS ABC NBC CNN Print Sources NPR/PBS
None of the 3 20% 30% 39% 45% 45% 53% 77%
1 or more misperceptions 80 71 61 55 55 47 23


http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Ir...2_03_Press.pdf
http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Ir..._03_Report.pdf

Other stuff in the doc was just vaguely disturbing. The blurring between opinion pieces and news was dubious, but what was more disturbing was some of the extreme opinions on display.

I don't think Outfoxed is a concrete indictment of Fox in its entireity. Just a demonstration of its more rabid Bush-admin-backing side

Yup

Governing bodies could always spin facts, but now the media that communicates those fact helps that spin get wildly out of control - especially when they're communicating in lowest-denominator terms.

From what i've seen, the likes of Fox are guilty of that. When you add a certain behind-the-scenes bias into the equation, it's easy to see how mass media can become a mouthpiece for government's preferred spin.

Any government would want that level of perceptual control, as far as i'm concerned. Politicians are always going to put spin on things, and media sources are always going to sensationalise the issues. What needs to be tackled is any undeclared partisanship in newsorces that claim to be objective.

I started watching Outfoxed somewhere in the middle of it when it was on swedish television the other day. Some outrageous stuff there but the documentary felt a bit too hysteric and "fragmentaric". A bit like MTV. Which I hate. (I actually sat down and watched this MTV Crib thing when they visited a couple of Hanson brothers. The average time between the cuts was 1,5 seconds. I timed it! That drives me nuts...)

Anyway, even if I suppose the film didn't show the whole picture of Fox News some of the stuff really amazed me. That is so far from good journalism you can get. It's not even journalism, it's propaganda. And if CNN are the same on the other side, that goes for them as well. I feel sorry for americans.

IMHO Hollywood should stay out of politics. If you think that Hollywood is the only place left to challenge "state propaganda" I just think you arent looking hard enough. Hollywood is full of complete morons on both sides. They are actors. They make movies. Why does that make them able to present a concrete argument? In reality, they are all just puppets who always succumb to their own selfish desires.

Instead of getting your information through Hollywood, perhaps you could do some actual research on subjects instead of an easy to digest 2 hour propaganda film. There are sources out there which actually have people qualified enough to speak on a subject.

If Hollywood is the last source to challenge the state, I would be very scared.

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The US has the media by the neck.

We are, indeed, controlled. But there is always bollywood.