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Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Military mind games
by Decius at 2:43 am EST, Mar 22, 2003 |
] When asked to explain what is actually happening in these
] violently pretty pictures, politicians contemptously
] refuse to give "a running commentary", while press
] secretaries hide behind the sandbags of "classified"
] information. This trick of appearing open while being
] closed is also seen in the military tactic of attaching
] reporters to army units. It looks fantastically
] democratic but even the most skilled journalists risk
] becoming, in the jargon, "clientised": coming to share
] the fear, excitement and eventually triumphalism of the
] troops beside them. And if heaps of charred bodies should
] occur on either side, these "embedded" journalists will
] be kept well away from them. Many thanks to the Guardian for being the first commercial news outlet that I am aware of to have the guts to actually say that this is all a bunch of bullshit. Hear that sucking sound? Thats the complete information vacuum surrounding this campaign. The propaganda coming from both sides is so transparent that you really can't buy into it unless you care about feeling a certain way about it and are looking for justifications. I don't really need to rip the Iraqi propaganda. The press is happy to offer every imaginable question about it whenever it is released. However, at least the American press is never, ever seen to question the information coming out of the U.S. Military. I've turned my TV off serveral times simply because I didn't feel like I wanted to be treated like an idiot anymore. They are covering this like a football game, and they seem completely naive about how they are being manipulated. Seriously, in Bush's talk on Monday he gave the EXACT time when the conflict would begin. We ALL turned on our TVs at that exact time. We all saw exactly what we expected to see. The bombing began. And we are supposed to beleive that this was a surpise? Their plans had changed? Please... Whether its "Target of Opportunity" or "Shock and Awe" (two words I am so sick of hearing that I hope they are elminiated from the language), these are obviously ways of creating "drama" for the television viewers to follow. They bare little or no relationship to what is actually going on on the ground or in the war room. We have little or no information about what is actually going on other then what is being shown on camera. All the talk is just chatter. I don't want to see a webcam in baghdad. I want to see 24/7 satellite coverage... 2 meter resolution at least. I want raw data. |
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RE: Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Military mind games
by logickal at 12:47 am EST, Mar 23, 2003 |
Decius wrote: ] I don't really need to rip the Iraqi propaganda. The press is
] happy to offer every imaginable question about it whenever it
] is released. However, at least the American press is never,
] ever seen to question the information coming out of the U.S.
] Military. I've turned my TV off serveral times simply because
] I didn't feel like I wanted to be treated like an idiot
] anymore. They are covering this like a football game, and they
] seem completely naive about how they are being manipulated.
] This is finally getting to me. How on earth can you reconcile the worlds of military intelligence, battlefield tactics and 24-hour news channels? Are we looking at the best possible compromise, or just being force-fed the Gerber Baby Propaganda?
We all know that everyone else in the world (including Iraq) is watching CNN. How much can we expect from any such coverage? I'm afraid to say that this whole thing is showing that we (the info-rich individuals with half of a skeptic bone in our body who wish that the Internet was able to serve us the raw data that it SHOULD) have absolutely nothing when compared with the MediaMachine. Raw Data? The lowest common demoninator rules this land, and the LCD just loves to know that the RedWhiteBlue is flying high over some poor little brown people who need to be liberated. In the meantime, CNN is going to show the LCD what it wants to see, which is tanks rolling across the battlefield. In the meantime, when someone finds a good (deleted) who can forward along battlefield recon data, let me know - I'm game. ] Seriously, in Bush's talk on Monday he gave the EXACT time
] when the conflict would begin. We ALL turned on our TVs at
] that exact time. We all saw exactly what we expected to see. Well, give them a little bit of credit ... When you know that the war machine is about to come barrelling over you and you have a chance to avoid it... I seem to recall that there were some memes around here about Saddam making some kind of movement in the last few hours... which actually seemed kind of likely, didn't it? Sorry. I'm just mad because I've spent a lot of good time and effort towards helping my inner child defeat my inner cynic. The inner cynic has, in the past few days, fairly abused my inner child. My inner cynic says he's worried that Baghdad will go up in a nuclear blast as soon as it looks like it's about to be taken, but my inner cynic is also paranoid as hell. |
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RE: Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Military mind games
by crankymessiah at 1:24 am EST, Mar 23, 2003 |
Decius wrote: ] I don't really need to rip the Iraqi propaganda. The press is
] happy to offer every imaginable question about it whenever it
] is released. However, at least the American press is never,
] ever seen to question the information coming out of the U.S.
] Military. I've turned my TV off serveral times simply because
] I didn't feel like I wanted to be treated like an idiot
] anymore. They are covering this like a football game, and they
] seem completely naive about how they are being manipulated.
] This is finally getting to me. How on earth can you reconcile the worlds of military intelligence, battlefield tactics and 24-hour news channels? Are we looking at the best possible compromise, or just being force-fed the Gerber Baby Propaganda?
We all know that everyone else in the world (including Iraq) is watching CNN. How much can we expect from any such coverage? I'm afraid to say that this whole thing is showing that we (the info-rich individuals with half of a skeptic bone in our body who wish that the Internet was able to serve us the raw data that it SHOULD) have absolutely nothing when compared with the MediaMachine. Raw Data? The lowest common demoninator rules this land, and the LCD just loves to know that the RedWhiteBlue is flying high over some poor little brown people who need to be liberated. In the meantime, CNN is going to show the LCD what it wants to see, which is tanks rolling across the battlefield. In the meantime, when someone finds a good (deleted) who can forward along battlefield recon data, let me know - I'm game. ] Seriously, in Bush's talk on Monday he gave the EXACT time
] when the conflict would begin. We ALL turned on our TVs at
] that exact time. We all saw exactly what we expected to see. Well, give them a little bit of credit ... When you know that the war machine is about to come barrelling over you and you have a chance to avoid it... I seem to recall that there were some memes around here about Saddam making some kind of movement in the last few hours... which actually seemed kind of likely, didn't it? Sorry. I'm just mad because I've spent a lot of good time and effort towards helping my inner child defeat my inner cynic. The inner cynic has, in the past few days, fairly abused my inner child. My inner cynic says he's worried that Baghdad will go up in a nuclear blast as soon as it looks like it's about to be taken, but my inner cynic is also paranoid as hell. I don't thin it will end up in a nuclear blast. I think they have done a good job in showing some restraint and sparing as many cicilians as possible. The press is always manipilated during wartimme. What better wa to spread disinformation and win the psychological war. However, I think what we are recieving is far more of an actual protrayal that what the Iraqis are seeing. |
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RE: Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Military mind games
by Rattle at 4:50 am EST, Mar 23, 2003 |
crankymessiah wrote:
] This is finally getting to me. How on earth can you reconcile
] the worlds of military intelligence, battlefield tactics and
] 24-hour news channels? Beer, football, and Fox. ] Are we looking at the best possible
] compromise, or just being force-fed the Gerber Baby
] Propaganda? Force fed Gerber Baby Propaganda. ] We all know that everyone else in the world (including Iraq)
] is watching CNN. How much can we expect from any such
] coverage? More advertising.. I was expecting more advertising.. The only thing missing is Microsoft logos on the sides of the tanks raging across the desert. Then all my nightmares will have taken form.. ] I'm afraid to say that this whole thing is showing that we
] (the info-rich individuals with half of a skeptic bone in our
] body who wish that the Internet was able to serve us the raw
] data that it SHOULD) have absolutely nothing when compared
] with the MediaMachine. Raw Data? The lowest common
] demoninator rules this land, and the LCD just loves to know
] that the RedWhiteBlue is flying high over some poor little
] brown people who need to be liberated. In the meantime, CNN
] is going to show the LCD what it wants to see, which is tanks
] rolling across the battlefield. In the meantime, when someone
] finds a good (deleted) who can forward along battlefield recon
] data, let me know - I'm game. Thats why I was so pissed when http://www.kevinsites.com got shutdown.. I had great expectations for that blog.. The key thing that all the major news outlets are all horny over is how real-time they can get with the data.. Thats why we are spending 2 hours looking at a tank drive thru a mostly non-changing desert LIVE, while they talk about how cool it is.. Or spending 2 hours watching an empty field LIVE, waiting for a bomb to drop on it.. The situation could improve.. We are only a few days into this.. The clamps on information could start to ease up as it moves along.. Or, it could be just the opposite, and it gets worse.. Who knows? We will find out I guess.. Tommorow will probably be the day when the interviews with the liberated iraqis start to appear.. Where we finally get our chance to see what they have to say about Saddam when his minders and the fear of persecution are no longer present.. And moreover, what they have to say about Americans and the way Iraq has been liberated. It will be interesting to see the manner in which its all handled.. ] Sorry. I'm just mad because I've spent a lot of good time and
] effort towards helping my inner child defeat my inner cynic.
] The inner cynic has, in the past few days, fairly abused my
] inner child. The cynic always wins.. |
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Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Military mind games
by Rattle at 9:56 am EST, Mar 22, 2003 |
] The official White House gloss on why acres of newsprint
] previews were made to look stupid is that the CIA
] suddenly got a fix on the Iraqi figurehead and tried to
] take him out: "target of opportunity" replacing "shock
] and awe" as the Pentagon catchphrase of choice. That
] explanation has been accepted by the press as meekly as
] they bought the supposed war plans. But healthy distrust
] demands examination of another possibility. Did the US
] military - playing on the media's desperation to publish
] conflict strategies in advance as if they were sporting
] fixtures - sell them a false yarn about the action's
] likely shape? Of course the media is being played.. The media always gets played in wartime. That should be obvious. Everyone knows the media was played durring the first Gulf War. Hell, its such common knowledge that its makde its way into Hollywood movies as a punchline. It is shocking that this is the first article I've seen that make this case.. The TV war coverage has really sucked.. Yes, the digi-fuzzy footage of the armored vehicles rolling at high speed across the desert is impressive.. But its not useful to have running on the TV for three hours while I gotta listen to a talking head tell me how cool it is. Not helpful. Not the information I want, certainly not the information I need. The "embedded" journalists have NOTHING useful to say. I have heard way more talk about their damn masks and bio suits then anything actually happening with the conflict.. And furthermore, the best shot of something blowing up came from Al-Jazeera [U: Abu-Dhabi actually]. The US news outlets fail on all levels.. ] Yet when asked to explain what is actually happening in
] these violently pretty pictures, politicians contemptously
] refuse to give "a running commentary", while press
] secretaries hide behind the sandbags of "classified"
] information. This trick of appearing open while being
] closed is also seen in the military tactic of attaching
] reporters to army units. It looks fantastically democratic
] but even the most skilled journalists risk becoming, in
] the jargon, "clientised": coming to share the fear,
] excitement and eventually triumphalism of the troops
] beside them. And if heaps of charred bodies should occur
] on either side, these "embedded" journalists will be kept
] well away from them. Anyone who made it up to the start of this war, and actually thought this administraton could be described as "open" in any way, should have their head checked. |
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Military mind games
by Lost at 6:41 pm EST, Mar 22, 2003 |
Teh good. |
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