Post-class Noam Chomsky- Tae Heung Lim

Noam Chomsky's view on propaganda is rather different compared to common understanding of propaganda. He says that propaganda does not have to be war and communist related subjects. Propaganda is just part of advertisement, and way of forcing informations into people's mind. Propaganda could be a commercial that someone see everyday. For example; commercial for skin whitening products could be a propaganda for people who relatively have darker skin. Commercial can influence them by creating hegemonic beauty of whiter skin tone. Once they made them believe into their hegemonic ideology, it is very easy from there. All they have to do is keep pumping out those propaganda and create fear of left out of their circle. This is related to Horkheimer's theory, in todays society, it is heavily depend on consumer based economy. It is critical for a brand to create social status or image to attract consumers. It is all about fitting into 'class' or 'status'. Industries before they were all about the "need" and now it is more about what we "want". Industry to cultural industry is big shift because people don't consume because they need it, they but it because they want it. It is all about buying a culture, and pitting into those community, and class. Now a days, what car you drive, clothes you were, food you eat, kinds of phone and service you use, they all fall under the fitting into the class and community. It is all about claiming your social status though products we consume.

Today people consume so much information and think little, it is very easy to believe something rather too quickly. We should take more time to process our thoughts 

Herman and Chomsky Robby Riehle

Herman and Chomsky’s article “A Propaganda Model” reinforces the reality that everything we see in media is almost entirely influenced by the government and the media conglomerate giants. Herman and Chomsky’s say they do so though 5 filters: “Size, Ownership, and Profit Orientation of the Mass Media”; “The Advertising License to Do Business”; “Sourcing Mass-Media News”; “Flak and the Enforcers”; and “Anticommunism as a control Mechanism”.  Which all news we are witness to has to go through to determine whether or not it is fit for the public to view. Of which I think the first filter maybe the most important for understanding this concept. Examination of Size, Ownership and Profit Orientation of the Mass Media elucidates the imbalance in media companies and their relative abilities. This inevitably comes back to the 5 Media conglomerates that essentially control all media and decide what the public sees. These are of course. Time Warner, Disney, Bertelsmann, Viacom, News Corporation. The article discusses how the media follows a propaganda model that “traces the routes by which money and power are able to filter out the news fit to print, marginalize dissent, and allow the government and dominant private interests to get their messages across to the public”(204). I great example of how media conglomerates control industry can be seen thought recent developments that have taken place between Disney and Lucasfilm, in which Lucasfilm was purchased for $4 billion. And seeing as how Disney owns the ABC broadcasting network we will get a first hand look at the information they make available and how they present to information in an effort to distort of views of the merger; following the propagandist model. 

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/disney-buying-lucas-films-for-4-billion/

Herman & Chomsky - Evan Pantazis

I found this reading to be particularly relevant to events that occurred this week, namely with the Disney Corporation. We have talked in some detail about Disney and theorists' ideas on ideologies dealing with Disney, but for CMC 200 I wrote a research paper and content analysis on Disney animated films and their effects on stereotypes, gender roles, and the perpetuation of both throughout generations. I related the readings on propaganda and corporation influence on media and information to Baudrillard's ideas of "masked reality" and "simulacra". But also I related the most recent event, Disney's purchase of Lucasfilms, to the fanboy reading from Jenkins.

Because Disney owns the ABC broadcasting network, ESPN, controls one of the largest Hollywood studios, and represents and ideology across the world, it is very safe to assume that they could influence the public's opinion through media propaganda. Not only could they effect the public's opinion, but they could also render cultural norms, as well as limit the exposure to certain information for their benefit. Furthermore, Disney already had a widespread reach of an audience, but now they have tapped into the one of the largest global fanboy cultures in the world with Star Wars, and already plans to Star Wars films.

It would be very interesting to study the changes and reception to the new ownership of Disney by the fanboy culture, or more importantly if propaganda finds its way into the new films and media.

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/disney-buying-lucas-films-for-4-billion/

Herman & Chomsky - Courtney Sparling

I am really interested in propaganda and took a course last spring called Argumentation and Media Manipulation and am currently taking a course called Economics, Media, and Propaganda, which I find  really opened my eyes to the many ways we are controlled as consumers, most of which we are not even aware of. 

I was surprised to see this model with the five filters, because neither of those classes touched base on it, which is a little strange. For sure, I see that these filters make total sense when it comes to the use of propaganda by the mass media, which "serve the ends of the dominant elite."

I liked how the reading included the data tables so I could really see the different breakdowns in aspects of how much money each company makes and who controls what and with what connected affiliation.  

It's even scarier that these types of mass media systems are controlling us. Especially with the TV and internet, we are coming across hundred and hundreds if not thousands of ads and news stories each day. They flash by us with images and sound and we sit there and absorb it all naturally. Advertising is the filter that I take the most interest in because I find that people don't take it seriously. We just see these ads in magazines, on billboards, on the back of our cereal boxes, etc and in return they shape us and tell us what to buy and how to be consumers.

Pre-Class Blog 10/31/12

The propaganda model informed us on how we are forever consuming mass media which is perpetuated through a systematic filters of propaganda. Propaganda refers a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position. When I think of this, I immediately think about all the different types of war propaganda there has been and of which I have studied. This propaganda was used constantly during a time of great depression, but it made people adjust to abnormal conditions and this is turn helps them adapt to the conditions of the war. Ultimately we notice now that there was a ridiculous monopolistic control over the media, in order to provide the viewer which what they wanted them to see. This is what Herman & Chomsky talk about. But they elaborate more into the Propaganda model, a model with five filters. Herman and Chomsky argue that "the torture of political prisoners and the attack on trade unions in Turkey will be pressed on the media only by human- rights activists and groups that have little political leverage." (220) This quote jumped out at me and made me think about the current set of events that we are faced with in the past few days and that is Hurricane Sandy. My television screen, daily newspaper and social media news feeds have been heavily saturated with the devastating set of events that have swept the west coast. Although, whilst in a conversation with a native today I found out that in fact Haiti has taken yet another blow with approximately 52 deaths. This goes along with an array of different countries, but why is information about the East Coast so heavily pushed in my face and yet I had not heard much about anyone else affected. Herman and Chomsky discuss the fact that in these situations they would "elict flak from government" and the overarching negative to this is that they would "stand alone in focusing on victims that from the standpoint of dominant American interests were unworthy" (220). This is extremely interesting to me, but seems to be true and apart of this ethnocentric nation we live in.

Herman & Chomsky

This article involved news and the how the media is controlled by our government. I felt as if this was an article I could relate to in the fact that my uncle is a broadcaster for Fox News so I've grown up in a house that frequently discussed news and the work going into behind the scenes.
"Ben Bagdikian stresses the fact that despite the large mass media numbers, the twenty-nine largest media systems account for over half of the output of newspapers, and most of the sales and audiences in magazines, broadcasting, books, and movies." (Herman and Chomsky 206)
The quote brings to life the way in which all of our sources for information converge into a small grouping of corporations. We are led to believe that our information can be trusted when it's reassured by numerous sources, yet this is all a facade put on by the corporations. In all actuality it's a few spread into many.
When I think of this article I relate it back to the books The Hunger Games. It sounds strange but in the books the government controls all of the information received by the people. From the citizens minds the games played every year need to happen to remember the darker days. In both that fantasy world and our society today we are constantly flooded with images from the media and eventually we believe what they intend for us to. Today we think it's ok for some social issue to occur and in the book it's ok for them to send off two people from their district every year.

http://youtu.be/uUO1k1YadXQ

Herman and Chomsky Pre-class blog

Herman and Chomsky’s article “A Propaganda Model” reminds us that what we see through the media is heavily influenced by the government and other major corporations. It discusses how the media is structured through a propaganda model that “traces the routes by which money and power are able to filter out the news fit to print, marginalize dissent, and allow the government and dominant private interests to get their messages across to the public”. (204) They then go on to break down the 5 filters that news has to go through before determined to be fit for the public to view: size, ownership, and profit orientation of mass media, advertisement, sourcing, flak, and anticommunism. They wrap up by stating “the five-filters narrow the range of news that passes through the gates, and even more sharply limit what can become ‘big news,’ subject to sustained news campaigns” (220).

This reading reminded me a lot of the HBO series The Newsroom. This show is about a news team led by a sarcastic anchor that decide to stop delivering popular based on ratings and instead, focus on “real” news that educates and informs their audience. The show portrays all the factors that are considered when deciding what news is appropriate for viewers and a news team that goes against the “filtered” news that other programs were doing.  Here is a clip from the show where the shows main character Will McAvoy explains the goal of the news team and apologizes for failing to deliver “real news”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuXDK46P9bM

Herman & Chomsky—Propaganda Aaron

Last Year I took a course on media manipulation, and propaganda was a large part of that course. We didn’t however look at the 5 filters ‘news’ passes through to be printed or broadcasted. Our media is instituted by the elite to keep the masses at bay, all media is meant to persuade the general population to buy things, whether it is products, ideas, dreams or identities. Propaganda systems and campaigns lead to the domination of the many by the few. The first filter provides the limitation on ownership. “Even small-newspaper publishing is big business… [and] is no longer a trade one takes up lightly even if he has substantial cash – or takes up at all if he doesn’t.” dominant media firms are large businesses that is controlled by extremely wealthy people, because of how closely interlocked these people are with other businesses, banks and the government our ‘news’ is affected by this. News then passes through the next four filters; Funding, Sources, Flak and Anti-Communism. The readings also present many examples of propaganda and media’s bias. “The recent propaganda disinformation attacks on Nicaragua have been needed to avert eyes from the savagery of the war in El Salvador and to justify the escalation U.S. investment in counterrevolution in Central America.” When discussing wartime media Propaganda is easily found, we see it from the government [obviously? Uncle Sam] but because the of the interlockedness of the government and media we also see it in [subconsciously in our media text Cap] While reading articles about propaganda and “Big News” I came across an interesting film called the Behind the Big News: Propaganda and the CFR. While reading an article about the movie I read a quote that gives more insight to this subject. “The executives, the editors in print media, the senior producers, executive producers in the visual media – these are the people who have the ideological bias and what’s probably almost as important – their personal friendships. They go to the same country clubs, they go to the same dinners, and they socialize with a lot of the people that they cover.” –Roger Charles, former Correspondent at ABC News

Post Class 10/29

Monday's class I definitely left feeling I had a better grasp on a lot of Jameson’s Ideas and concepts. A quote I really thought was interesting was “The underside of culture is blood, torture, death and horror” I think this quote is really talking about what isn’t seen in our pop culture, the part of culture that is unpopular. This part is the homelessness, the areas and neighborhoods that are stricken with poverty. Our culture doesn’t like to display its underside it would rather stress the horrors of other nation and febreeze the homeless [metaphorically] over here. I also see in some Hollywood filmmakers projecting or prophesizing this cultural underside in the future. I feel like some of these movies are stressing this divide between the haves and have nots. For example in the movie Cloud Atlas (Which EVERYONE should go see) the city in the future had new technologies and looked to be like a typical futuristic city, lights, lasers, robots and everything is seemingly metallic. But this city was actually suspended in the air and under this city; there was a poverty stricken city, a literal underside to culture. This is the same in the movie Total Recall (2012). I think Hollywood’s take on the future is almost always frightening luckily in the Back to the Future (1985) the projected 2010 future was wrong, so I’m not too worried about these new “prophecies”

Herman & Chomsky - Melanie Roth

Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky’s A Propaganda Model, brings to light government manipulation within the news, and how public perception is shaped by this higher power. Overall the public seems to understand the generic idea that the mass media is a tool for communicating messages, but what most of our society doesn’t realize is that powerful sources are regularly managing the media to manipulate them. Herman and Chomsky articulate that the mass media “traces the routes by which money and power are able to filter out the news fit to print, marginalize dissent, and allow the government and dominant private interests to get their messages across to the public” (204). This type of media propaganda in the news is especially ubiquitous because of the current presidential debates and upcoming election.

If it has been made clear to certain people that the news continues to construct what the government wants us to hear, why haven’t we tried putting an end to it? I have always believed that as citizens of the United States, our government should always be completely honest with us, providing us with constant truth. After thinking more in depth about construction in the news, I argue with myself, that maybe some things are better left unsaid. By managing the media in a certain way, the government could actually be protecting us from chaos among our society. In many films and television shows we have been presented with an idea that sharing certain information with the general public could result in wreaking havoc. For example, in the show Lost, two of the main characters keep certain life threatening information from the other survivors because they realized that by informing everyone would allude to chaos. By causing chaos in their camp, they wouldn’t be able to take care of the problem successfully, resulting in people getting hurt. Lost demonstrates the use of filtered information as a form of safety precaution. Even though they were not completely honest with the other survivors, they kept their best interest in mind, which may go along with our own governments reasoning for keeping certain things from us. “The raw material of news must pass through successive filters, leaving only the cleansed residue fit to print” (Herman and Chomsky 204).

The article below, Fourteen Propaganda Techniques Fox “News” Uses to Brainwash Americans, brings to light some of the tactics that many news stations use day by day. I decided to include this article, because of its relevance to Herman and Chomsky’s theories, within the reading.

 http://truth-out.org/news/item/1964:fourteen-propaganda-techniques-fox-news-uses-to-brainwash-americans

Post Blog 10/29 Jameson

  "Nothing is real" a famous quote from Strawberry Fields Forever from The Beatles and is representative of not only our ideology of the present and future but of the past as well. Jameson's idea of "pop history" were history is represented by "our ideas and stereotypes of the past" (419), rather than actual accounts or evidence of the past events, shows how fundamentally our human experience is becoming one of simulation rather than nature. A world of aesthetic sensuality that lacks depth or substance. As we are raised in this environment Jameson points out that "the subject has lost its capacity actively to extend its pro-tensions and re-tensions across the temporal manifold, and to organize its past and future into coherent experience, it becomes difficult enough to see how the cultural production of such a subject could result in anything but 'heaps of fragments' and in practice of the randomly heterogeneous and fragmentary and the aleatory"(419).
  Jameson also speaks of the gap between the evolution of our technology exceeding our own understanding, and perhaps control. There are enormous forces created, palpable outcomes, felt in political economy as well as other respects. These forces create new emotions in the human experience. Altered states of mind and of reality. But with physical consequences on the human body and psyche.
  Back to the Beatles, in the video they tease 'intensities' out of the viewer using editing and effects to alter the reality into a universe where physics behave in more random and fragmentary way. There is knowledge of physics but the manipulation follows no specific stream of principles other than visual stimulation, sensual disorganization, and the use of fragments of simulated altered physics by way of video technology to create emotions and feelings in the viewer.

Pre Class Herman and Chomsky

Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky’s essay “A Propaganda Model” states, “A propaganda model focuses on this inequality of wealth and power and its multi-level effects on mass-media interests and choices” (204).  This idea is very important and, for me, ties together everything that we have been talking about recently in class.  This statement by the authors directly correlates to the concept of the “haves and have nots” that we have spent the last few class periods talking about.  Adorno and Horkheimer’s idea that the “haves” or in other words, those with the power, can control the system, speaks directly to Herman and Chomsky’s idea that the inequality of wealth in our society, directly impacts who can control the mass-media.  The ability to control the mass-media is overwhelming and scary, in the sense that so few, can have control over what the rest of the population sees.  This in turn, is the idea of propaganda – that those with power can influence those without power. 

Herman and Chomsky go on to explain the five filters of the propaganda model, and end by stating:

The raw material of news must pass through successive filters, leaving only the cleansed residue fit to print…The elite domination of the media and marginalization of dissidents that results from the operation of these filters occurs so naturally that media news people, frequently operating with complete integrity and goodwill, are able to convince themselves that they choose and interpret the news ‘objectively’ and on the basis of professional news values. (205)

I think this paragraph is one of the most important throughout the essay, because not only does it illustrate the impact that the elite have on the news, but this quote also illustrates the fact that elite are so good at propagating their beliefs, that those news and media personalities are tricked into thinking that they are objective in what they share with the world.

This is a really scary concept, because it’s difficult to believe that so few people, control everything that we see on a daily basis.  Our news is biased in the sense that we are only seeing what the elite deem important, even if it does not pertain to us at all.

This week, my media example is a government video using Donald Duck to encourage the American public to pay their taxes even though they are very high.  What is interesting is that in this video, the government blames the high taxes on Hitler, so as not to be made accountable, and to make it seem like it’s the patriotic thing to do.

Propaganda Video

post class 10/29

“Frantic economic urgency of producing fresh waves of ever more novel-seeming goods.” I liked this quote by Jameson because it ties into what we learned from Habermas and his words discussing the “cult of the new.” There is this theme in modern lifestyle that we are always looking for what is new and popular. We never sit back and are satisfied with what we have. We are always looking for newer, faster, stronger, prettier, sleeker, and so on. I liked how he called our economy frantic and urgent. These are adjectives that I think really sum up what we have in our culture though because we are never at a standstill. I also find it useful when we are able to make these connections to past readings because it helps put things into perspective.

“The underside of culture is blood, torture, death and horror.” When we get these wonderful things like clothes, jewelry, electronics, and so on, we don’t think of how these things came about, we just think about having them, and how they are the best and what we wanted. When in reality, there are children being forced to work, there are people slaving away making minimum wage and barely making it by, and sweat shops. Other things are blood diamonds. I learned about this when I watched the movie “Blood Diamond” which is such a cruel and awful thing to think about, but it is reality. Everything may look shiny on the surface but in reality it wasn’t so simple to get or make a lot of what we won which is an awful thing. I have included the movie poster to “Blood Diamond” because I think it really ties into what Jameson discusses here.