Last weeks class was kind of interesting, we constantly talked about the media circle and how reproduction has an ongoing effect and the components that supports it. The four propaganda ingredients: 1) size, wealth, concentration of media ownership, 2) advertising as primary income source, 3) reliance of media on institutional information source (experts), 4) Flak (media hides stories that will hurt the industry), and 5) anti communism is used as a control mechanism, obviously play major roles when producing material to society.
There are two out of the five ingredients that I would like to touch base on because they are more common in the post-modern culture. First, ingredient number four determines what is forecasted in front of the public’s sphere. Government officials have a lot of hidden stories or twisted stories that they feel should or shouldn’t be casted. For example, the war in Iraq is a strong subject for many families and individuals because they have loved ones fight over there for our country. At the Peace Film Festival there was a film that showed all of the demoralizing events that took place, but it wasn’t produced by the main media circle, it was documented by an insider. Some of the events that took place included sexual abuse, physical abuse, and mental abuse to its maximum potential. Media coverage wasn’t forecast on our NEWS channels because our American troops were the ones who committed these dehumanizing acts, not the Iranians.
The final ingredient is number five, which suggests that those who go against American policies or ideologies will be casted as anti-communism. I personally have a problem with this notion because it takes away from the freedom that America suggests to its people. As long as citizens are not breaking laws that effect or harm government officials, then they shouldn’t be given a negative connotation. Framing an individual as an anti-communist is a control mechanism for authority figures.
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