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About Street roots. (Portland, OR) 1998-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 14, 2012)
Street roots 9 Sept. 14, 2012 BUBBLE, from page 8 1« 1796, America is embroiled in an "undeclared Naval W ar w ith France""O ur f i r s t undeclared war! . . . I f any person shall w rite , print, u tte r, or publish ... any false, scandalous, and malicious writing o r writings against the government, the Congress, or the P resident... w ith intent to defame ... o r to bring them ... into contempt o r disrepute! o r to excite against them ... the hatred o f the good people o f the United S ta te s... wonderful job within its limitations. It doesn’t really do a great job in the Persian Gulf states because its principal sponsor is a Gulf state. But elsewhere it did a magnificent job. Wherever A1 Jazeera and the mainstream Western media were not, you had individuals with cellphone cameras and passion bringing those pictures to the world. It doesn’t mean those pictures are absolutely reliable or that they ought not be vetted. But, I mean, even the BBC, a very respected organization would sometimes say, ‘This is all we can get from the region. We cannot vouch for it, but we feel that we should bring it to you anyway.’ And in large part that stuff actually was quite reliable. I’m not saying we should always trust it; we should question everything. That’s part of the responsibility of living in this world as it is, and as it’s developing. A. B.: That reminds me that you have that old Spider-Man quote, “With great power comes great responsibility. ” The Alien p a rt says he can deport any foreigner deemed “dangerous." B. G.:(Laughs) I’m such a geek, Aaron, you have no idea. A.B.: I am too! A n d Spider-Man was actually my personal favorite. But, it seems like yo u ’re not necessarily directing that to members o f the media as much as you are to the consumers. Pages from Brooke Gladstone’s new graphic novel about the evolution o f American media. B.G.: I am chiding the media expectations do you have o f readers, viewers continuously in that book. It’s often been and listeners? What is your vision o f an ideal presented to me that what I’m offering is media consumer? some kind of apologia, and I feel B.G.: Well, I hope maybe that’s a failure that they’re in the writing. Wherever HI la ie e ra and the consuming more than Because so much of just what I supply. I » a la stre a i» Wester» media the book is hope that they’re were not, yew had constructed to cognizant that they explain why the In divid uals w ith cellphone should have a rich messages are and varied media diet distorted in the way and that they b rin g in g those pictures to they are — the shouldn’t hold back the world« It doesn^t mean commercial reasons, from correcting us the reasons that are those pictures are absolutely when we are factually built into the wrong. I hope that reliable or that they ought business and the they’ll speak back to reasons that are built not be vetted. But even the us, but, before they into our human BBC w ould sometimes say, yell at us, I hope they wiring. I’m not *This Is a ll we can get irons really listen to what letting the media off we do. I mean there the hook. The media the region. We cannot vouch are a number of lo r It, but we feel that we that don’t do the people who will write trick ought to die. should b rin g it to you into the message But if you look at the anyway." I n i in large part board not having polls and if you look really listened to the that stuff actually was guile at the progress of story, but to what media, as I have, I’ve reliable. they expect that the seen it isn’t story might have necessarily the best been. media that live the long and healthiest lives. And there’s a great A.B.: So I found a reader online who wrote deal of worthy media that has to struggle for a review on the Goodreads website. The reader existence. And if you face that simple fact, questioned the conclusion that you come to, you have to understand that this is a mutual that we get the media we deserve. This person relationship. disagreed, saying that the press is controlled by A.B.: As a creator o f media, what kind o f the people who own it. A nd to quote the review, he said, “I ’m not responsible for the greed- driven politics o f Rupert Murdoch. ” B.G.: I am talking about our totality. I’m not speaking about us as individuals with myriad individual preferences. All I know is that Rupert Murdoch has been profit driven far more than politics driven. His news (corporation) is right wing and — at least according to studies by the Pew Research Center and others — tends to be very inaccurate. His television channel — as opposed to his cable news channel — has been often on the cutting edge of pushing what are American standards in a way that is anything but conservative. You may not be old enough to flash back to the beginning of “The Simpsons,” but it was regarded by conservative culture critics as an absolute monstrosity. “Married With Children” was another. He wasn’t worried about offending conservative sensibilities when he was creating a very profitable channel, filling a need that people had to push the boundaries. In creating Fox News channel, he found an audience of angry white men, the very audience that had been assembled by Rush Limbaugh when he essentially revived AM radio all by himself and basically migrated the tone of AM radio to cable news. Now, this individual who wrote this review is not responsible for that, but that doesn’t mean that we as a culture aren’t responsible for it. And so, to put all the blame on Rupert Murdoch as if he were acting in some sort of void where his money is coming from a mysterious place disconnected from the society and the culture that he is appealing to, is just not facing reality squarely in the face. Certainly Rupert Murdoch is responsible for not applying the standards that many of us would prefer to his media properties, but we as a culture have to take some responsibility for consuming those properties so avidly. And if this person who wrote the review chose to read that last line as applying to each and every individual with their individual preferences, I can’t help that. I was making a statement about the symbiosis that exists between news-media producers and media consumers. A. B.: Now that you’ve done this research and yo u ’ve p u t together this book, has it changed how you do your work at WNYC? B. G.: Actually, it does. I have learned so much that I apply every day. I learned about what Adolph Ochs said after the famous “without fear or favor” phrase when he wrote the opening editorial after he purchased The New York Times. I learned about what the Penny Press really meant and how our flawed notion that represents objectivity is rooted in that period. Probably the main thing that got driven home to me is that almost everywhere we seem to be going, we’ve been, in some manner, before. There is some new stuff, for sure, there always is. But that ultimately it comes down to human nature. And every way that we respond has to do with that, and that if anything, the Internet is only making us more of what we already were to begin with. Reprinted from Real Change, Seattle, Wash. 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