A media phenomenon in America, that captures the unhappy viewers, and arguably one of the few influential TV shows that appears to have any concern for the public interest is The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.
Although it is a comedy show it is “often cited as the only source of news for many television viewers”[3]. The show has specialized in decoding the hidden message behind the news in the mainstream media and ridiculing the hypocrisy and incompetence of public figures. Brian Williams NBC News anchor describes Jon Stewart as a “freestanding branch of government in this country." [4]. The role of the show seems to be a moral corrective between competing interests and ideologies within the media. And Jon Stewart seems to have borrowed the BBC Charter, and based the purpose of his show on it.
This comedy show is one of the few forces that are working against the mind erasing that the ideologists and the commercial interests controlling the media in America are performing.
But perhaps the audience is unaware of the desire for control in the media conglomerates and the evil geniuses behind them.
This brings us to the theory of opinion forming. In his article On Media Giantism William Safire describes the fast consolidation of ownership of radio stations and popular websites and the result is that “the great cacophony of different sounds and voices is being amalgamated and homogenized” [5].
Some of the voices on radio retain their uniqueness like the conservative host Rush Limbaugh who could be argued that is using his show as “an agent of reinforcement”, and a playground for his influence among the conservative base as well. In the last presidential primaries he urged his republican supporters to switch parties and vote for Hillary Clinton with the idea that she would be an easier opponent for John McCain in the general elections [6]. His open bias and his attempts to provoke chaos and conflicts would probably justify the writing of a book called ''Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot and Other Observations'' by the liberal author Al Franken. This author wrote another book titled "Lies, and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them: A Fair and Balanced Look at the Right" in which “comically savages Murdoch's minions at Fox (and other conservative media icons)”[7]. News Corporation sued the author for “trademark infringement” over the using of Fox News slogan “fair and balanced” on the cover of the book. The judge ruled in favor of the author saying “Of course, it is ironic that a media company that should be fighting for the First Amendment is trying to undermine it."[8]
These examples paint a dark picture of the media influence and the rationale that drives the minds of media personalities and moguls. It shows how the media is a tool for certain people for imposing their views and manipulating the public opinion. The predatory practices of Rupert Murdoch described in The Mass Media Power in modern Britain (Eldridge 1996) indicate that this person sees himself as a power superior than any government in the world and he is not hiding his intentions to use his power to affect national and foreign policy of many countries for personal gains and satisfaction, while crushing the competition. Murdoch openly argued for the war in Iraq and it appears that all of his 175 newspapers across the world have supported it too [9]. The article by suggests that “the leader-writers are attempting to break down stubborn public opinion”. This shows that in this case and perhaps many others one person orchestrates the agenda setting of 175 newspapers with 40 million copies weekly, and through his media empire he makes the case for a war, that is widely opposed by the public opinion [9].
The public opposition doesn’t seem to be a problem for Mr. Murdoch. Study from October 2003 finds wide range of misperceptions about the Iraq war among the American people. It shows that 60% of Americans believed at least one of the following: clear evidence had been found of links between Iraq and Al Qaeda; W.M.D. had been found in Iraq; world public opinion favored the U.S. going to war with Iraq. The polls conducted by the Program on International Policy (PIPA) at the University of Maryland and Knowledge Networks show that only 23 percent of those who got their information mainly from PBS or NPR believed any of these untrue things, but the number is 80 percent among those relying primarily on Fox News.
It is ironic because this person is not elected by anyone, he is not accountable to anyone, theoretically he has no political power and yet he has built an organization that perhaps the UN could only dream of. The recent victory of Barack Obama could be seen as a classic good versus evil case, and shows that the influence of Fox News is limited. On the other hand spending for political advertising for 2008 has reached $2.6 billion, which is a good sign of who makes money no matter what, and how powerful the media and the media lobby is in America to make that possible and legal [10].
Luckily there is one institution left in the world, whose history, traditions and functions place it on a level that is far from the reach of the dirty hands of mummy-like moguls and other evil creatures.
Since its creation the BBC is seen as a moral bastion that is independent and its purpose is to have positive impact on the society. According to the Crawford Report only the state could license the BBC to be “a public corporation acting as trustee for the national interest” (as cited in Curran 2003: 367). Eldridge points out that “interests of the state and the interests of the civil society are not necessary identical” (Eldridge 1997: 47) which is a key concept in the relationship between the BBC and the state and suggests that the BBC’s function is to protect the national interest even from the state itself. The growing view in the British society before the WW1 has been that “Organization of public communications along purely commercial lines would not provide the resources for universal and substantial citizenship” (Graham Murdok as cited in Eldridge 1997: 45). This has led to the development of an institution that has been the leader of an independent minded society, resistant to infiltration of powerful commercial interests.
The media in the UK cannot have too much influence on the political process because of the existence of the BBC and its purposes outlined in the Charter. The government cannot remove the license fees because of the special relationship it has with the BBC. First the BBC acts as moral corrective of the government and the society, and has maintained the highest standards in journalism since its creation. Second it is not in its agenda to increase its influence, because that would contradict its main purposes outlined in the Charter. And third if the government decides to remove the license fees and turn over the BBC to private hands it would be seen by the public as a sign of fear from scrutiny by journalists whose job is to work for the public interest. Or worse, the government that dares to abolish the license fee will remain in history as the government that gave up to the pressure from commercial interests and destroyed the most precious British institution.
The above examples suggest that the media is a very powerful tool and left in the hands of people with no moral principles and positive ideas it could be destructive. The influence of the media is so great that media moguls enjoy power greater than the power of presidents and leaders of international institutions. They use this power to manipulate public opinion, to create chaos, to turn social groups into rivals, to provoke conflicts and they do that for the money and for fun. The hope is in institutions like the BBC that exist to serve the public interest and educate people that whenever someone is fighting, someone else is watching and making money.
[1] http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1855330-1,00.html
[2]
[3] Http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/time100walkup/article/0,28804,1611030_1610841_1609910,00.html
[4]
[5] http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE7D61530F933A15752C0A9659C8B63&scp=14&sq=liberal%20media%20ideologies%20competing&st=cse
[6] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1581320/Republican-votes-skew-Democrat-primaries.html
[7] http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1044416,00.html
[8]
&en=fd1b2e748a874370&ei=5070
[9] http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2003/feb/17/mondaymediasection.iraq