Elementary Particles : All Entries

The Death of Objective Journalism

2005-12-11T12:36:00.000-05:00

Objective journalism is dying in this country and, as a result, in other countries. It is being replaced by propaganda. A recent New York Times article profiles the Army's use of propaganda in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other places within the Middle East. This is a very dangerous precedent. While the Pentagon and other government agencies have said that these messages are truly factual, is this enough? Even if all of the articles are completely true, the larger issue remains that these pieces are not attributed, and thus, as even the Government Accountability Office has said, are not "purely factual." The reality that these articles do not say that they come straight from the mouth of the United States government undermines our credibility abroad, and raises the broader question of "why are we doing this?" Even if one accepts that we are pursuing these conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and other places around the world to plant the seeds of democracy, how can this be true when we are destroying one of the key tenants? It is essential that a democratic government have a free press and does not disseminate information in such a format.

According to this article, President Bush and White House officials maintain that the commander-in-chief has had no knowledge of this campaign and is deeply troubled. However, can one really believe this? After the fiasco involving the payment of Armstrong WIlliams to support the Department of Education's policies, and later the same being done by the Department of Health and Human Services, the fact that this type of treatment of the media would happen seems logical and predictable. That President Bush should not know about thus - much less be surprised - seems absurd. In an article that Donald Rumsfeld wrote in the Wall Street Journal (the irony of this is not lost on me), he professed that the information that the United States uses abroad should be attributed and true. However, there is almost a contradiction when he says:

The challenge of conveying accurate and complete information is multiplied when it comes to the battle of perceptions beyond our borders. In the Middle East we have an enemy that is using the various types of media to try to poison the minds of people in that region about the intentions and actions of the U.S. and other countries.

Basically, he is saying that it is difficult to maintain accuracy on the part of the government when we are engaged in conflict abroad. He also uses this statement to take away the credibility of the media there.

This is deeply troubling. I think that the larger community of objective journalists is dying out. In the domestic mainstream media, the same is true. Only their attacker is not the government, but corporate America. Recently, allegations were launched against Fox News that they have altered their stories at the behest of a billionaire from Saudi Arabia, who is an influential stockholder in the News Corporation. Similar reports have come out about the News Corporation, which owns a vast part of our culture and "independent" media. I fear that we are losing a great asset. If we don't fight for a free press and reject the government and corporations from controlling the media that we consume, we will lose one of the most treasured parts of our history.

Politics in Literature: A Lost Part of Our Culture

2005-12-10T21:07:00.000-05:00

Scott over at Conversational Reading has found has an interesting article about the contemporary relationship between politics (and especially party politics) and literature. Scott has an interesting critique of this piece.

It's true that there haven't been any big-name novels of late that have taken American party politics as their focus (interesting, though that TV and the cinema seem eager to explore this territory). Still, I think it is misleading to say that American writers have distanced themselves from American politics.

I'm not so sure that I agree with him. Most authors now see the two categories as separate, and seem hesitant to combine them in a work of fiction. Authors such as Kurt Vonnegut have become very infrequent in the literary world today. Sure, there are authors such as Orhan Pamuk, but even then, these writers seem to only profile a certain nation and region, with politics being involved only incidentally. Even Kurt Vonnegut seems to think that politics no longer belongs within fiction. He's since come out with a book on the political state of America: A Man Without a Country. It seems to me that now the best we have to offer is thinly disguised dramatized political situations such as Richard Clarke's new book, The Scorpion's Gate, which is, more or less, an adaptation of the Second Gulf War to fiction.

I think Scott (and the author of the article) is correct, however, on one point.

I think Wilentz is correct that there's a certain feeling that politics is debased, and perhaps writers don't feel comfortable engaging politics directly, except through satire, which many of them may not have an interest in.

I feel that authors do not want to be branded as political, for fear of the polarizing effect it would have on their audience. Moreover, I think these writers do not want to be labeled as a liberal or democrat. Those that feel this way should have more courage. While, yes, there is some risk of losing a portion of their audience if they take one side, but I would retort that they will also lose some of their audience if they are unable to muster the strength to discuss these issues. We should not reject the importance of the political side of literature.

The War on Christmas - Status Update

2005-12-07T23:28:00.000-05:00

The Christmas spirit is here. It's throbbing, thriving, and touching the hearts of millions the world over. In the spirit of Christmas, Bill O'Reilly is going to "bring horror into the world" of people who are against it. The only problem is finding out who's against it? Is it corporations who produce advertisements with "holiday" messages? Is that really destroying Christmas? No. It is simply bringing other faiths into the fold. I was raised Baptist (though that has changed). I've celebrated Christmas my whole life and will do so again in a matter of weeks. Yet I don't have a problem with other faiths including themselves in my "holiday" celebrations. In the words of this man, can't we celebrate "public holiday[s] devoted to generosity, peace, and love together"? I think we can.

Some other things that Bill O'Reilly is going to do to celebrate Christmas:

I am not going to let oppressive, totalitarian, anti-Christian forces in this country diminish and denigrate the holiday and the celebration.

Did I hear the communists were back? Oh...no, that was McCarthy not O'Reilly