The story I was watching was about Russia being banned from the winter Olympics in South Korea for doping infractions, and it was being told in a very sober, serious manner.
A story for adults, told by adults.
The video footage behind the newscasters voice was of stern Russians with machine guns, scientists doing scientific things, and IOC officials looking like assholes.
These stock images didn’t exactly correspond to the story, but they symbolized it in a recognizable enough manner, which is really all that TV newscast aspire to.
As the story was winding to it’s end, the tone of the announcer changed. The mood was brightening. Full of incredulity, the newscaster said, “And how are they responding over in Russia? Well, Putin is saying that the IOC ban was orchestrated by the USA in effort to discredit him and influence the upcoming Russian election.”
This was said as a joke, the sort of thing that would make you think, “Oh, those crazy Russians!” Most of us, at least over 35, have seen thousands of TV newscasts and unconsciously know the formula—it is the tone of voice that conveys how seriously we are to take a story– and this conspiracy theory was intended as a little bit of levity added on to an information dense segment.
Russia.
What do we know about Russia?
I know nothing, really. I’ve never been there and came of age during the Cold War, certain that I was to die in some Regan inspired volley of nuclear weapons. I don’t have a clue what, or why, typical Russian people think the way they do.
From any sort of “rational” point of view, the answer to all these questions is “yes.” A Russian might have cause to believe Putin’s claim. It is not insane, but it is delivered to us in the exact same way that a skateboarding dog story would be, and because of this we unconsciously dismiss it, even as we hear it.
Strange, that, but there you have it.
The media shapes the message, and I would love to see the last two minutes of all broadcasts to be person-on-the-street interviews with people from foreign nations in the news, more like Humans of New York than a Hot Take on a topical news story. I need this perspective. I want to know what they are thinking, what their faces look like and how they nervously smile when they’re on camera.
They need to be portrayed beyond symbol, and be seen as complex, fully developed people we can understand and love, rather than targets to demonize, mock and bomb.
*1 For those interested, the Columbia Journalism Review has just published a detailed and fascinating article on the impact of Russian Fake News on the US election.
https://www.cjr.org/analysis/fake-news-media-election-trump.php
]]>It’s a bad movie, a very bad movie, and bad in a way that only a movie made in 1985 can be bad. If you’ll recall, Rocky ends up in Russia to fight Ivan Drago, the invincible Soviet super villain played by Dolph Lundgren.
Various dramatic things happen and Rocky wins, as he does pretty much every second movie. What’s striking about it, beyond how awful, cliched and child-like it is, is how vivid and oppressive the American propaganda is.
America has never been particularly subtle about propaganda, and this movie is no exception. It’s an Us Vs. Them proposition, the Soviets are all passionless robots and functionaries living under a cruel and despotic regime, and the Americans, well, they have heart, man, they’re real!
About five years after this movie was made the Soviet Union collapsed beneath it’s own rotting weight. This meant that The Cold War was over, and once again all that was good and free and just and true had won. However Operation Desert Storm, in which the US invaded Iraq, immediately commenced, and ever since, the Middle East (in one form or another) has been the enemy of the West.
After seeing Rocky IV, it struck me that America was always at war, it was as if they HAD to be at war, as if it was a necessary and functioning part of the system. “The Military Industrial Complex,” as it is conspiratorially called, is a huge business in the US, accounting for hundreds of billions dollars. It is a primary economic driver, one from which so much else flows, and it surely looks like it now exists as an essential part of the economy than some subordinate wing of government used to defend abstract principles like justice.
Recently, on December the 2nd there was another mass shooting in the United States, this time in San Bernardino. It was the 355th of the year.
As the news broke, politicians assigned some assistant take to their Twitter accounts and Tweet out their feelings. The event, immediately politicized, had one flavour of politician crying out for gun control, while the other flavour of politician offered “thoughts and prayers.” It turns out that the “thoughts and prayer” crowd had all accepted donations from the NRA.
https://twitter.com/igorvolsky
Granted, this is no scientific study, but it seems to confirm something that we already knew.
On the face of it, the NRA and the on-going weapon crisis is utterly mysterious. Why only in America? Why haven’t they done anything to try to solve this problem? I mean, from 2004 to 2013, there were 316,000 firearm deaths in the US set against 313 deaths from terrorism, but the resources are where?
In the US, politicians and thus policy, are bought.
That’s the way the system works.
War, be it with the Communists or the Terrorists, is very profitable, as is the production and sale of guns. It’s the sort of thing that should actually be put in the Constitution, just so everybody is clear about profit, rather than freedom, being the guiding light of the nation.
Until the anti-gun lobby starts to give representatives money commiserate with what the NRA does, then we are going to have to expect these trends, and all these deaths, to continue.
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