Listen to a reading of this article: The other day I stumbled across a 2014 opinion piece in The Guardian titled "It's not Russia that's pushed Ukraine to the brink of war" by Seumas Milne, who the following year would go on to become the Labour Party's Executive Director of Strategy and Communications under Jeremy Corbyn.
Thereafter, the Guardian turned into basically state-controlled media/propaganda mouthpiece. They champion imperialism, warmongering, rampant neoliberalism, and they publish what the five eyes briefs instruct them to, unquestioned and unedited as “news”. Even the Guardian’s columnists, which traditionally in a newspaper are the countervoice to the editorial line, are now thinly veiled court jesters of the state. It’s one endless barrage of state propaganda masquerading as independent news media.
Big government and big corporations are now indistinguishable. You cannot separate CNN from the CIA. You cannot separate Google from the NSA. You cannot separate Pfizer from the FDA.
Mussolini’s definition of fascism as the inextricable intertwining of government and corporate power is now reality. We are ruled by selected—not elected— legislators, by spymasters and secret police, by suits in corporate boardrooms, and by the Davos ruling class and their Ivy League toadies.
The role of media is to conduct an information war not only against Russia (or China or Iran), but against every critical thinker, against the very act of free thought, to repeatedly rape the human mind.
Democracy does not exist. How can democracy exist if the electorate is thoroughly propagandized and if all the truths that matter are classified?
Voting machines are black box computers with secret proprietary operating systems that untraceably produce pre-determined results that have nothing to do with a simple count of ballots.
The open-air concentration camps of the Palestinians serve as the ideal model of social organization. The open-air concentration camps in which we live—nation states—differ from those of the Palestinians only by size.
Our spouses, relatives, friends and neighbors are pod people.
“None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.” — Goethe
John Pilger, yes. Just finished listening to Max Blumenthal report that Pilger told him that fake left alternative media Democracy Now! stopped having him on because one of their funders, the Lannan Foundation, didn't like him. Link: https://twitter.com/TheGrayzoneNews/status/1618310099860328448
Hell, CBS News published a report on corruption in the Ukrainian military a few months ago. This should be something like "Newsflash! Water! Is Still Wet!" but instead CBS were forced to issue a sniveling, cringing apology.
I have a video file copy of a BBC news and current affairs item broadcast in 2014 which provided an accurate report of what had happened exposing the truth about fascism in the Ukrainian government and its military. Like Caitlin says here, back then we had an open media where all voices could be heard. Now, almost a decade later we have this totalitarian stranglehold on the establishment media which seeks to wipe from history the events which have brought us to a point where one is being forced to demonise Putin whilst canonising Zelensky. However, there are many who know the truth of all this and will never be silenced when given an actual opportunity to speak, in person and face to face, rather than be incarcerated in this faceless theatre of digitised communication which is controlled by the intelligence and security agencies which are drip fed with belligerent propaganda by the various academies and think tanks subservient to this monstrous criminal organisation which is NATO. All one can do here is to have the courage and consistency in preserving the truth of all this by calling out these liars and hypocrites every time
This is the lily-white west condemning the dirty orientals, claiming a moral ground they abandoned decades ago. It is nothing more than an immaculate deception
Thank you for this excellent review of mainstream (and left-leaning) journalism's downward trajectory. The views published in 2014 would be stark heresy today. The tsunami of propaganda that arrived in early 2022, together with the broad success of that propaganda in persuading Americans that Russia is a hell-gate swarming with bloodthirsty demons, demonstrate the strategy of hybrid warfare. In which it is as important to keep control of public opinion as it is to control battlefield territory.
There has been war propaganda going back a long time (think Randolph Hearst) but what we're experiencing today, with the application of social media, sophisticated algorithms for audience targeting, and machine learning tools to refine the propaganda along the way -- this is something radically new. I've seen plenty of propaganda in my 68 years, but what I've see in the past year is truly astonishing. Newspapers that used to allow some space for dissent are now closed up tighter than a vault. And there is no distinction between news reporting and opinion; everything that should be simple news is saturated with opinion (anti-Russia, naturally). And what's astonishing is that 99.44% of the readers are eating it up like ice cream.
Caitlin, keep up the good work. Because we are in a dark place now.
Excellent article, as always. It also shows how many prefer to being sheep, lambs to the slaughter, when it comes to information.
But then again, how large a proportion of the population has the ability to garner the necessary information, given that many have to work two jobs, long hours, and if they are married, both work?
The current economic situation seems to me apt to continue this trend, to keep people too tired to get the information, and too tired to care. The movie Gladiator, where the senators talk about the "Roman masses" hit the nail on the head, when they noted that the Roman Emperor bringing back the games in the coliseum would keep people distracted. The same now, with sports, and media entertainment.
This is vitally important work, so please keep focused on it. When people are exposed to this, they get it and get pissed off.
There is no better illustration or validation of the features of Orwell than how the media has erased prior coverage on Ukraine and completely not only ignored or revised, but re-written history.
The amazing thing is that it's all right out there in the open - they haven't yet learned how to completely memory hole reality and history - and yet it is still ignored and denied.
One big problem, though, is that, to my generation, Orwell was a hero. To this generation, he's unknown or some privileged white guy.
‘The rumor that raced through Washington last week of an atom bomb someplace in the city being readied for the next terrorist atrocity had a familiar ring to me.
In late July 1961, President Kennedy, just back from the grim Vienna summit with Khrushchev, asked me to dinner in Palm Beach. After daiquiris and Frank Sinatra records on the patio, his three guests and I gathered around the table for fish-in-a-bag, a White House recipe. Between lusty bites, Kennedy told the story of Khrushchev's anger over West Berlin, the island of freedom in the Soviet empire's East Germany. "We have a bustling communist enclave just four blocks from the White House," I noted, meaning the Soviet embassy. Kennedy paused, fork between plate and mouth, and said, "You know, they have an atom bomb on the third floor of the embassy." Aware of JFK's love of spy stories, I said something like, "Sure, why not?"
No, Kennedy continued, it was his understanding that the Soviets had brought the components of an atomic device into the building in inspection-free diplomatic pouches and assembled it in the upstairs attic. "If things get too bad and war is inevitable," he said, "they will set it off and that's the end of the White House and the rest of the city." I laughed. Still suspending his bite of fish, Kennedy said, "That's what I'm told. Do you know something that I don't?" No sign of mirth. The conversation moved on.
Five years ago I was lecturing in Staunton, Va., and retold the story. In the question session, a man in the audience rose and said, "You may not believe that story about the bomb in the attic, but I do. I worked for 25 years at the Defense Intelligence Agency, and that was our understanding." And now I can hear Kennedy asking again, "Do you know something I don't?" ’
If you have been learning about Ukraine from the mainstream media only since the invasion, then you will conclude that ONLY Russia is responsible for this war because the Western mainstream media has been trying to erase the history of Ukraine since after the invasion.
There have been numerous historical incidents, as Caitlin points them out, when the Western media reported what would be considered “Russia propaganda” today. For example, many media organizations in the West had no problem calling out the Nazi ideology of the Azov battalion or reporting that the US had a big role in making the 2014 Maidan coup successful, but if you dare highlight these things today, you would be called a “Russian agent.”
If you think that the only trustful source for the global news is the Western media, then considering checking out what it had to say about Ukraine prior to the invasion.
I ALSO HAVE THE NEWSLETTER CALLED "THE GREAT AWAKENING" WHICH TALKS ABOUT THE CRISES WE COLLECTIVELY FACE. CHECK IT OUT.
We go into frenzies about cancelling people with basically evil ideas - because one opinion is as good as another - or, at the least, we must be forbearing because it can be the case of diamonds among the shit...or something. But free speech, in fact, belongs to the monied, which are consonant by some coincidence or miracle, with the powerful. This element can turn lies into truth, , and they do it all the time. I mention "miracle" because to construct actual Nazis and supporters in Ukraine as good and in fact more worthy in their objectives than are the Russians - does take some kind of black magic. Only actual democracy can counteract this sad truth. But we don't have it.
The decline of the Guardian, which I actually used to enjoy reading at the time of the Seamus Milne article cited, is emblematic of the changes that have taken place in our Western societies more generally over the last ten years. Thank God the independent media, and voices like Caitlin’s, have sprung up to fill the gap and continue to speak the truths that used to be sayable in the mainstream press, but are sayable no longer. I think the turning point for the Guardian was probably when Alan Rusbridger was paid a visit by the secret police with hammers to smash up every last one of his hard drives. To think that we say we live in the “free world”. Not free for us propagandized serfs, that’s for sure.
I gave up on US media a long time ago. Then The Guardian was subverted. Next was Democracy Now! Truthdig was shut down. Then The Intercept went bad. I felt that I noticed a pattern....
I suppose Substack has low enough circulation as to escape Their notice. We'll see how long that lasts.
The Mass Media Used To Publish Perspectives On Ukraine That They Would Never Publish Today
Here’s what you need to know about the Guardian:
June 2013: Snowden revelations published
https://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/nov/01/snowden-nsa-files-surveillance-revelations-decoded
Feb 2014: Guardian’s Computers based in by agents of the UK govt, prompted by instructions of Langley
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/01/edward-snowden-gchq-visit-guardian-destroy-computers
Dec 2014: Guardian editor who dared to publish Snowden revelations is sent packing:
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/dec/10/alan-rusbridger-stand-down-guardian-editor-in-chief
Thereafter, the Guardian turned into basically state-controlled media/propaganda mouthpiece. They champion imperialism, warmongering, rampant neoliberalism, and they publish what the five eyes briefs instruct them to, unquestioned and unedited as “news”. Even the Guardian’s columnists, which traditionally in a newspaper are the countervoice to the editorial line, are now thinly veiled court jesters of the state. It’s one endless barrage of state propaganda masquerading as independent news media.
Simple as that.
Big government and big corporations are now indistinguishable. You cannot separate CNN from the CIA. You cannot separate Google from the NSA. You cannot separate Pfizer from the FDA.
Mussolini’s definition of fascism as the inextricable intertwining of government and corporate power is now reality. We are ruled by selected—not elected— legislators, by spymasters and secret police, by suits in corporate boardrooms, and by the Davos ruling class and their Ivy League toadies.
The role of media is to conduct an information war not only against Russia (or China or Iran), but against every critical thinker, against the very act of free thought, to repeatedly rape the human mind.
Democracy does not exist. How can democracy exist if the electorate is thoroughly propagandized and if all the truths that matter are classified?
Voting machines are black box computers with secret proprietary operating systems that untraceably produce pre-determined results that have nothing to do with a simple count of ballots.
The open-air concentration camps of the Palestinians serve as the ideal model of social organization. The open-air concentration camps in which we live—nation states—differ from those of the Palestinians only by size.
Our spouses, relatives, friends and neighbors are pod people.
“None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.” — Goethe
Have a nice day.
John Pilger, yes. Just finished listening to Max Blumenthal report that Pilger told him that fake left alternative media Democracy Now! stopped having him on because one of their funders, the Lannan Foundation, didn't like him. Link: https://twitter.com/TheGrayzoneNews/status/1618310099860328448
Hell, CBS News published a report on corruption in the Ukrainian military a few months ago. This should be something like "Newsflash! Water! Is Still Wet!" but instead CBS were forced to issue a sniveling, cringing apology.
I've seen more self-respect in a whipped dog.
I have a video file copy of a BBC news and current affairs item broadcast in 2014 which provided an accurate report of what had happened exposing the truth about fascism in the Ukrainian government and its military. Like Caitlin says here, back then we had an open media where all voices could be heard. Now, almost a decade later we have this totalitarian stranglehold on the establishment media which seeks to wipe from history the events which have brought us to a point where one is being forced to demonise Putin whilst canonising Zelensky. However, there are many who know the truth of all this and will never be silenced when given an actual opportunity to speak, in person and face to face, rather than be incarcerated in this faceless theatre of digitised communication which is controlled by the intelligence and security agencies which are drip fed with belligerent propaganda by the various academies and think tanks subservient to this monstrous criminal organisation which is NATO. All one can do here is to have the courage and consistency in preserving the truth of all this by calling out these liars and hypocrites every time
This is the lily-white west condemning the dirty orientals, claiming a moral ground they abandoned decades ago. It is nothing more than an immaculate deception
Thank you for this excellent review of mainstream (and left-leaning) journalism's downward trajectory. The views published in 2014 would be stark heresy today. The tsunami of propaganda that arrived in early 2022, together with the broad success of that propaganda in persuading Americans that Russia is a hell-gate swarming with bloodthirsty demons, demonstrate the strategy of hybrid warfare. In which it is as important to keep control of public opinion as it is to control battlefield territory.
There has been war propaganda going back a long time (think Randolph Hearst) but what we're experiencing today, with the application of social media, sophisticated algorithms for audience targeting, and machine learning tools to refine the propaganda along the way -- this is something radically new. I've seen plenty of propaganda in my 68 years, but what I've see in the past year is truly astonishing. Newspapers that used to allow some space for dissent are now closed up tighter than a vault. And there is no distinction between news reporting and opinion; everything that should be simple news is saturated with opinion (anti-Russia, naturally). And what's astonishing is that 99.44% of the readers are eating it up like ice cream.
Caitlin, keep up the good work. Because we are in a dark place now.
Excellent article, as always. It also shows how many prefer to being sheep, lambs to the slaughter, when it comes to information.
But then again, how large a proportion of the population has the ability to garner the necessary information, given that many have to work two jobs, long hours, and if they are married, both work?
The current economic situation seems to me apt to continue this trend, to keep people too tired to get the information, and too tired to care. The movie Gladiator, where the senators talk about the "Roman masses" hit the nail on the head, when they noted that the Roman Emperor bringing back the games in the coliseum would keep people distracted. The same now, with sports, and media entertainment.
The complete capture of western journalism by the 'intelligence' agencies has been truly detrimental to freedom for the world.
This is vitally important work, so please keep focused on it. When people are exposed to this, they get it and get pissed off.
There is no better illustration or validation of the features of Orwell than how the media has erased prior coverage on Ukraine and completely not only ignored or revised, but re-written history.
The amazing thing is that it's all right out there in the open - they haven't yet learned how to completely memory hole reality and history - and yet it is still ignored and denied.
One big problem, though, is that, to my generation, Orwell was a hero. To this generation, he's unknown or some privileged white guy.
11.12.2001 – By Hugh Sidney – Time Magazine
‘The rumor that raced through Washington last week of an atom bomb someplace in the city being readied for the next terrorist atrocity had a familiar ring to me.
In late July 1961, President Kennedy, just back from the grim Vienna summit with Khrushchev, asked me to dinner in Palm Beach. After daiquiris and Frank Sinatra records on the patio, his three guests and I gathered around the table for fish-in-a-bag, a White House recipe. Between lusty bites, Kennedy told the story of Khrushchev's anger over West Berlin, the island of freedom in the Soviet empire's East Germany. "We have a bustling communist enclave just four blocks from the White House," I noted, meaning the Soviet embassy. Kennedy paused, fork between plate and mouth, and said, "You know, they have an atom bomb on the third floor of the embassy." Aware of JFK's love of spy stories, I said something like, "Sure, why not?"
No, Kennedy continued, it was his understanding that the Soviets had brought the components of an atomic device into the building in inspection-free diplomatic pouches and assembled it in the upstairs attic. "If things get too bad and war is inevitable," he said, "they will set it off and that's the end of the White House and the rest of the city." I laughed. Still suspending his bite of fish, Kennedy said, "That's what I'm told. Do you know something that I don't?" No sign of mirth. The conversation moved on.
Five years ago I was lecturing in Staunton, Va., and retold the story. In the question session, a man in the audience rose and said, "You may not believe that story about the bomb in the attic, but I do. I worked for 25 years at the Defense Intelligence Agency, and that was our understanding." And now I can hear Kennedy asking again, "Do you know something I don't?" ’
As mentioned by another commenter, they have been under the thumb of the security services since the Snowden leaks: https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-09-11-how-the-uk-security-services-neutralised-the-countrys-leading-liberal-newspaper/
If you have been learning about Ukraine from the mainstream media only since the invasion, then you will conclude that ONLY Russia is responsible for this war because the Western mainstream media has been trying to erase the history of Ukraine since after the invasion.
There have been numerous historical incidents, as Caitlin points them out, when the Western media reported what would be considered “Russia propaganda” today. For example, many media organizations in the West had no problem calling out the Nazi ideology of the Azov battalion or reporting that the US had a big role in making the 2014 Maidan coup successful, but if you dare highlight these things today, you would be called a “Russian agent.”
If you think that the only trustful source for the global news is the Western media, then considering checking out what it had to say about Ukraine prior to the invasion.
I ALSO HAVE THE NEWSLETTER CALLED "THE GREAT AWAKENING" WHICH TALKS ABOUT THE CRISES WE COLLECTIVELY FACE. CHECK IT OUT.
https://awakes.substack.com
Manufacturing Consent Media
"Think of the press as a great keyboard on which the government can play"
"It is the absolute right of the State to supervise the formation of public opinion"
Dr. Joseph Goebbels, Reich Minister of Propaganda
We go into frenzies about cancelling people with basically evil ideas - because one opinion is as good as another - or, at the least, we must be forbearing because it can be the case of diamonds among the shit...or something. But free speech, in fact, belongs to the monied, which are consonant by some coincidence or miracle, with the powerful. This element can turn lies into truth, , and they do it all the time. I mention "miracle" because to construct actual Nazis and supporters in Ukraine as good and in fact more worthy in their objectives than are the Russians - does take some kind of black magic. Only actual democracy can counteract this sad truth. But we don't have it.
The decline of the Guardian, which I actually used to enjoy reading at the time of the Seamus Milne article cited, is emblematic of the changes that have taken place in our Western societies more generally over the last ten years. Thank God the independent media, and voices like Caitlin’s, have sprung up to fill the gap and continue to speak the truths that used to be sayable in the mainstream press, but are sayable no longer. I think the turning point for the Guardian was probably when Alan Rusbridger was paid a visit by the secret police with hammers to smash up every last one of his hard drives. To think that we say we live in the “free world”. Not free for us propagandized serfs, that’s for sure.
I gave up on US media a long time ago. Then The Guardian was subverted. Next was Democracy Now! Truthdig was shut down. Then The Intercept went bad. I felt that I noticed a pattern....
I suppose Substack has low enough circulation as to escape Their notice. We'll see how long that lasts.