by SUSAN FOGARTY
I’m a firm believer that the media have far too much influence over our lives. And the reason I believe this is the media do not only control what I do hear; they, perhaps more importantly, can control what I don’t hear.
None of us have time to go and find out the two, three or eight other sides to every story. We’re dependent on the media to tell us what’s going on in the world.
However it’s up to the media to choose what to tell me.
The reason these things are on my mind is my children have started asking me questions. I’ve raised them to question, and now it seems those questions are making me think.
Take the recent 9/11 anniversary, which is actually September 12 in New Zealand. It didn’t happen here on the 11th. But the media insist on telling us it did.
But the real issue is what the media tell us about 9/11. There’s no doubt the loss of innocent lives is always unacceptable, but it’s hard for me to sit by as my kids watch the news on telly and are told, overtly or otherwise, that America was attacked in this terrible way through no fault of its own.
Where’s the other side of this story? Why are we fed images of Hillary Clinton telling us the United States will stamp out terrorism anywhere in the world it occurs, yet America itself is guilty of numerous terrorist acts?
We should all be concerned that our children are being informed, by the media, that a group of people simply got in planes and flew them into buildings for no reason — because the reality is they didn’t. They did it because they were trying to tell the rest of the world something — and it’s something I want my children to hear.
The TV media in New Zealand present an Americanised version of such events, and then tell us any other version is a “conspiracy theory”.
So why is this? It’s because the media are no longer interested in presenting news in a neutral light. They no longer seek to tell the truth — they seek to tell the truth as their owners see fit. This message has been driven home sharply in the last few months with the Rupert Murdoch debacle.
How free is the press? Former British PM Tony Blair is the godparent of one of Rupert Murdoch’s children, that’s how free.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it certainly gives the impression there’s been a cosy degree of mutual back scratching between the media and the Labour Party in Britain — and that’s only the stuff we’ve managed to find out about.
Additionally, in New Zealand Fairfax Media owns The Dominion Post, the Christchurch Press and the Sunday Star Times, along with 60 community newspapers. APN News & Media pretty much owns everything else.
So despite the plethora of newspapers available, we should not be fooled into thinking this provides us with anything near the truth, or a diverse range of ideas allowing our children to grow up forming their own opinions. Unless we are vigilant, our children are in real danger of growing up with opinions shaped by organisations with agendas far beyond freedom of the press.
I think our apathy in this area is dangerous. We should not only be interested in freedom of the press — no longer so much from government intervention, as from big business interests — but we should be vocal about it. Sadly, however, most people are more concerned about updating their Facebook profiles than learning what’s going on in the world. But, mark my words, the loss of independent media brings Big Brother just that bit closer.