American mass media is a marvel of technology. It is whiz-bang, sparkle-glitter, and satellite wizardry. It is a master plan of methods to communicate in a pauper’s worth of substance. With such technology, how are people so woefully misinformed? The average American neither knows nor cares about the vast world beyond the nation’s border. The average American student knows little math, no history, and very little geography, and nor does he or she want to know. Americans have computers in school, dozens of TV stations, and the most aggressive news media on earth. Does that mean they’re better informed? Hardly.
On November 2, 1995, the United Nations General Assembly voted overwhelmingly, 117 to 3, to condemn the United States for its continuing blockade of Cuba. The international community called the United States blockade a flagrant act of aggression and a blatant violation of international law. That the U.N. vote was reported at all in American media is amazing, for such news is more often than not passed over entirely by the American press. But where was information about the blockade itself, the effects suffered by the Cuban people, in-depth comments from United Nations delegates and leaders around the world? For a more substantive report, one had to listen to the BBC World News Service, for the rest of the world takes note of events the U.S. prefers to ignore.
American media is a business, and it has a mission, not to inform Americans, but to entertain them. Every media enterprise in America reports the drivel that Marsha Clark and Chris Darden are secret lovebirds, but the vote of a global assembly condemning U.S. actions received only scant coverage at best. Why? The media is a source of titillation more than information. The mission of the media is to please, to comfort, and primarily, to sell. When TV was developed, it was promised that every American would learn about the world in his living room. When computers were developed, wasn’t it said that they would be invaluable learning tools and that children would learn more faster? National scholastic tests show otherwise, as kids master computers as toys and learn splendid hand-to-eye coordination, but little else.
The media paints false pictures of the nation and the world, pictures designed to serve corporate masters and to make America look good. This feel-good media approach serves the American delusion of white supremacy, but it does not inform. When the New York Times echoes the National Star, what can the word media mean? How could millions be surprised at Minister Farrakhan’s enormous influence among Blacks unless the media wasn’t doing its job? How could they look at a million and count less than half that number? The major media, like its racist projections, is to be rejected, not consumed, for your very patronage gives it life. From death row, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.
These commentaries are recorded by Noelle Hanrahan of Prison Radio.
