Apr 13 2010

Free to be Human

Category: Books,Personal,Politics,The Media,World Affairs — Jonathan @ 5:40 pm

Following on from my previous review of the MediaLens book ‘Guardians Of Power’ I decided to take a look at one of David Edwards’ earlier titles, entitled ‘Free to be Human’. The book was first printed back in 1995, and deals with the subject of personal freedom, specifically that “there is no greater obstacle to freedom than the assumption that it has already been fully attained”.

Edwards begins the book (as he and David Cromwell did in Guardians of Power) with a description of the propaganda model devised by Chomsky and Herman, but the similarities between the two works essentially end here. Edwards then begins to widen out the propaganda model to encompass the myriad of different areas where we face a constant barrage of control and manipulation, and where views are filtered to fit the state and business interests. Whether it be in our personal lives, our religious beliefs, or our ethics. Edwards relies not on simple ‘conspiracy theory’ or other shallow explanations, but to the systemic ‘filtering’ of unwanted ideas and opinions described in the propaganda model itself.

Edwards bases many of his ideas on Buddhist teachings, something which I admit I had my concerns about beforehand, although I can safely say that my initial misconceptions around Buddhism were soon shattered, as I realised that Buddhism is a world away from the conventional theistic religions, the ultimate goal being personal enlightenment, rather than belief or worship of a spiritual God.

Edwards uses many examples throughout the book, the most interesting in my opinion being the desolated day-tripper, a man who sets off on a day trip with his family, and then becomes overwhelmed with fear when he realises that he cannot explain why he is taking the trip. Edwards then takes us through this man’s life, looking at how his mind has been moulded from birth to conform in our society, and how the sudden realisation of his dissatisfaction with life manifests itself.

Edwards reserves special (and very accurate) criticism for our profit-driven capitalist system. A system which, as he points out elsewhere in the book, is concerned not just with satisfying (essentially false) needs and desires, but of creating the very dissatisfaction it aims to cure:

The forbidden truth is that we are living by a set of lies which are necessary for short-term profit, at the expense of human physical and psychological life and global environmental integrity. We are living in a system where power ensures that the requirements of profit take priority over the requirements of living things – including to know that this is the case. Consequently our freedom extends as far as, and no further than, the satisfaction of these requirements, with all else declared neurosis, paranoia, communism, extremism, the work of the devil,or Neptunian nonsense.

In addition to criticism of capitalism as a whole, Edwards has many excellent points to make about the damaging effects of the beauty industry and their exploitation of post-war feminism in the pursuit of profit. He states that the emergence of diet articles and plastic surgery have contributed to an increase in physical and mental disorders, as well as a great distortion in the way women have come to see themselves, and is a perfect example of the mass media’s power to manipulate. (For example, he quotes from Naomi Wolf’s book ‘The Beauty Myth‘, which states that between 1966 and 1969, in direct correlation to the media’s new fixation on thinness and perfection, the number of women who perceived themselves as being overweight rose from 50% to 80%.) I was also fascinated by Edwards’ suggestion that the literature we now perceive as important to society, for example Shakespeare and Orwell, may also be a product of the filtering system, in that unpopular historical works may be suppressed entirely, or not published at all, whereas literature which supports the dominant classes or the current socio-economic system is exalted as ‘classic’.

Edwards also discusses the indifference with which most of us treat conflict, poverty and inequality around the world, and how we now tend to psychologically distance ourselves from these horrors, remaining passive to atrocities such as the Indonesian invasion of East Timor. One of my favourite quotes in the book comes towards the end, where Edwards discusses the sometimes absurd rationalizations we create when something we are told, which in essence makes perfect sense, conflicts so completely with our ingrained beliefs and learned knowledge:

Having chosen one of these rationalizations, moments later we can be settling back in our chairs in the office, or in the pub, or in front of the TV, feeling as ‘comfortably’ as part of the ‘real’ world as before. We will have avoided conflict and disruption in our individual, familial, social and career lives; we may have avoided confronting the waste of years, or decades of effort and striving for a deluded dream in a profoundly immoral and brutal system. (The cliché of the transformation of young socialist into old conservative is not a change from idealism to pragmatism but from rationality to rationalization.) The cost of surrendering our reason to rationalization is that we will tend to reject ideas that allow access to a coherent understanding of the world, including it’s problems, including our problems.

In chapter three, Edwards criticises the belief in a cosmic father-figure (CFF), inherent in the great monotheistic religions, and then concludes that Atheism is just as dangerous because it provides ‘believers’ with the same certainty and security. This certainty then removes our need to look for answers to life, as our belief makes asking these questions unnecessary. Whilst I cannot argue at all with his reasoning on this point, Edwards then goes on to suggest that Atheism forms part of an ‘Unholy Trinity’ along with ‘Progress’ and ‘Consumerism’. Edwards’ reasoning appears to be that since Atheism does away with all spirituality, and emphasises the ‘pointlessness’ of existence, that consumerism and the idea of ‘having fun’ and satisfying our lusts will naturally take over as a result.

This was one area of the book were I did have some slight reservations. Whilst I would not argue that Atheism does have potential to fuel consumerism, I would counter that this is true of most mainstream beliefs. Therefore I can’t quite understand the assumed link between the three members of this ‘Unholy Trinity’ and why this is exclusive to Atheism.

I emailed Mr Edwards to congratulate him on an excellent piece of work, but also to question this link between Atheism and Consumerism. He very kindly responded with the following comments:

Incidentally, by “atheism” I really meant the assumption that life is ‘meaningless’, a happy (or unhappy) accident, that ethical norms are intellectual inventions with no grounding in anything beyond personal opinion, and so on.

To be sure, theistic religions have often been at the heart of systems of exploitation and violence, but they’re more useful for promoting servility and deference, less useful for promoting unrestrained hedonism. After all, they have traditionally (at least nominally) emphasised restraints on behaviour. Modern atheism promotes ‘Do as you please so long as you can get away with it.’ But that of course does not mean that theists are not often hedonists, or that theistic religions cannot also promote consumption.

My point was that atheism is really perfect for our kind of unrestrained consumer society where all values are subordinated to profit (as a matter of legal obligation for corporate managers). It also satisfies our conceit that we are scientific, rational creatures who have moved beyond all superstitious religious dogma. In fact there is no greater superstition than belief in the intrinsically existent self or ‘I’ – the new god at the centre of the materialist universe.

- Email from David Edwards  (22nd April 2010)

Free to be Human must rank as one of my favourite books, I doubt that any other author has sparked so much thought about my own existence and way of living, and I certainly see some aspects of myself in the desolated day-tripper, as I’m sure most people would. I can highly recommend this book as an effective antidote to the largely hidden ‘filtering’ system operating in the world today, and I will certainly be looking into the rest of Edwards’ work.

Update 22/04/10: Article updated with comments received from Mr Edwards.

Dec 12 2009

Guardians Of Power – medialens

Category: Books,Politics,The Media,World Affairs — Jonathan @ 12:05 pm

Apologies if it’s been a while since I’ve written anything on here, I recently started studying an introductory Social Sciences course at the Open University, which has probably been taking most up the free time I would normally have used to write articles for this website, but I’m back for now…

Guardians Of Power – David Edwards & David Cromwell

gop-mlBefore I review this book, I’d like to give a little background to medialens and what they do. Medialens is a ‘UK-based media watch project’ who publish informed criticism of media bias and censorship, revealing the distorted view of the world which mainstream media often provides. Run by the aforementioned Edwards and Cromwell, they publish weekly media alerts and base their work on Chomsky and Herman’s 1988 book ‘Manufacturing Consent – The Political Economy of the Mass Media’. In addition medialens also encourage their readers to challenge individual journalists on their work, something which has gained them some enemies in the past. However they are also influenced by the Buddhist view that ‘while greed, hatred and ignorance distort reason; compassion empowers it’, which hopefully provides us with the means to create a peaceful society, along with a fair and balanced media.

This, their first book, represents a compilation of their media alerts on a wide range of subjects.They start by giving some background on Chomsky and Herman’s ‘Propaganda Model’ of the media, on which the project is based, along with some examples of how ownership and advertising can play a huge role in what we actually read. Here’s wikipedia’s brief summary:

The propaganda model is a theory advanced by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky that alleges systemic biases in the mass media and seeks to explain them in terms of structural economic causes.

It views the private media as businesses interested in the sale of a product — readers and audiences — to other businesses (advertisers) rather than that of quality news to the people. The theory postulates five general classes of “filters” that determine the type of news that is presented in news media. These five classes are: ownership of the medium, the medium’s funding sources, sourcing, flak and ‘Anti-communist ideology’. The first three are generally regarded by the authors as being the most important.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda_model

The authors make it quite clear that advertisers and owners are able to exert a high-level of control over their publications. In addition the pressure to retain advertisers, which medialens quote as providing 75% of their revenue, can necessitate self-censorship along with helping to decide which stories get coverage in the first place. For example, a newspaper may decide to omit any mention of carbon dioxide emissions from air travel if today’s edition also features a large cut-price flights promotion. A frightening thought indeed, but one which does occur frequently, largely unnoticed.

In coverage of news events, medialens ignore the right-wing and go straight for the UK ‘liberal’ media, beginning by exposing systematic failings in coverage of the Iraq war, along with the sanctions that preceded it. Their exchanges with former UN assistant secretary-general Denis Halliday and his criticism of the way in which sanctions were reported in the media were enlightening.

Their alerts covering the build up to the 2003 Iraq war again demonstrate how little a threat was posed by Saddam Hussein and his ‘weapons of mass destruction’, along with discussion of how certain (highly-qualified) voices were sidelined if their views didn’t quite match up with those of the establishment.

The book also features chapters on Afghanistan, Kosovo, climate change and the fight for independence in East Timor. All of which are truly excellent pieces of work. Towards the end the book makes a slight detour, concluding with suggestions for how the media can become more compassionate. The story of Helena Norberg-Hodge’s visit to the residents of Ladakh in Northern India really interested me, in that their way of life allowed them to be so happy and emotionally healthy whilst living in relative poverty, unaffected by the egotism and consumerism of the west.

I opened this book at 9am one day and quite honestly could not put it down until I’d finished it, it’s a fabulous wake up call to anyone who believes that we possess a honest and unbiased mainstream media. A second book was released this year called ‘Newspeak in the 21st Century’ and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.

I’d highly recommend that everyone visit the website and read some of their excellent work, subscribe to the weekly medialens alerts, and donate if you can.

Aug 16 2009

Propaganda

Category: Books,Politics,The Media — Jonathan @ 8:32 pm

A while back, after watching Adam Curtis’ fantastic ‘Century of the Self‘, a documentary focusing on the rise of individualism in modern society, I purchased a copy of Edward Bernays’ book ‘Propaganda‘. The story of Bernays’ life, as told in Century of the Self, is almost as fascinating as his work.

propaganda-coverBernays was born in Austria in 1891, and was nephew of the renowned psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud. Bernays went on to become the father of modern Public Relations, and pioneered many of the PR techniques still in use today. Although rather than exploiting his uncle’s popularity, things surprisingly worked in the opposite direction, as at this time Freud was almost unknown outside his native Austria, and Bernays was to be instrumental in popularising Freud’s theories in the US, as they were inherently linked to Bernays’ own work within PR.

One of Bernays’ most famous successes was to break the taboo on women smoking. Whilst working for the American Tobacco Company in 1929, he staged a PR event to launch his so-called ‘Torches of Freedom’ campaign, which attempted (and largely succeeded) to convince women that smoking was a symbol of independence and freedom, and a protest for equality in society.

His book ‘Propaganda’, although written in 1928, is just as relevant today as when it was published, and although some of the examples are slightly dated, the basic principles of public relations remain almost unchanged to this day.

Bernays firstly documents the history of propaganda and it’s usage by governments around the world, and explains why the phrase itself fell into disrepute, mostly due to it’s heavy usage by the German’s in the first world war. Bernays believed that manipulation of the masses through PR was essential to create a properly functioning society:

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. …We are governed, our minds are moulded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. …In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons…who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.

Two of Bernays’ techniques interested me greatly, and can be spotted as a common fixture in today’s advertising-driven culture. The first was the theory that it was necessary to sell the ‘need’  for a particular product, rather than the product itself. He gave the example of a business struggling to sell pianos. Now, rather than advertising the piano itself, Bernays created the idea of a ‘music room’ which people could set aside within the home, he then organised to fill the publications of the day with features on the benefits of the music room, and ideas for furnishing such a room. This would inevitably create the ‘need’ for the piano to fill the space set-aside for it in the newly created room, and so vast swathes of the public had been manipulated into purchasing a product they essentially didn’t need, without even knowing it.

The second of Bernays’ techniques revolved around using a person in authority, who the public would inherently trust, to influence their purchasing decisions:

Suppose the old type of salesmanship, acting for a meat packer, was seeking to increase the sale of bacon. It would reiterate innumerable times in full-page advertisements: “Eat more bacon. Eat bacon because it is cheap, because it is good, because it gives you reserve energy.” The newer salesmanship, understanding the group structure of society and the principles of mass psychology, would first ask: “Who is it that influences the eating habits of the public?” The answer, obviously, is: “The physicians.” The new salesman will then suggest to physicians to say publicly that it is wholesome to eat bacon. He knows as a mathematical certainty, that large numbers of persons will follow the advice of their doctors, because he understands the psychological relation of dependence of men upon their physicians.

This kind of technique I’m certain is familiar to most people and although the public relations business still utilises the services of trusted professionals, nowadays it seems to rely much more heavily on celebrity endorsements, which I suppose signifies the much greater role they play in our lives and the importance we place on their opinions.

Bernays was obviously a highly-intelligent man, who possessed a deep understanding of psychology, psychoanalysis and sociology which he wielded to great effect, it’s certainly a testament to his work that people are still reading it 80 years on. Propaganda is an astounding and highly enjoyable book and as I said earlier it is just as important now (if not more so) than on it’s original release. If you’re interested, the full text can be read online here and here or purchased from here.

May 18 2009

My Latest Reads

Category: Books,Politics,World Affairs — Jonathan @ 11:39 pm

After my last in-depth book review back in February I thought I would quickly write up what else I have been reading so far this year:

Noam Chomsky – Hegemony or Survival

chomsky_hegemony_or_survivalChomsky’s 2003 book is a summary of US foreign policy from the end of World War II up until the current Iraq War, examining America’s pursuit of global dominance and it’s terrible consequences. Chomsky expresses his view that although the attacks of 9/11 were shocking and deplorable, the biggest shock was that for the first time the guns were pointing in the opposite direction. My only criticism of this book was that due to the high volume of names, dates and figures, I found myself occasionally reading paragraphs twice. Nevertheless it was a fantastic book and I’d highly recommend it alongside the pocket book ‘Media Control’ as a excellent intro to Chomsky’s world view.

The Cold War – A Very Short Introduction

cold_war_vsiThe ‘Very Short Introduction’ series from OUP provides an excellent foundation for exploring a subject, giving the reader a wide-ranging overview of events and opinions whilst attempting to maintain impartiality. This particular book is no exception, it begins by explaining the radical changes taking place after the end of the Second World War and going on to discuss how events all over the world, such as the wars in Vietnam and Korea, fueled tensions between the US and the USSR and how diplomatic measures were in full swing in an attempt to prevent a full-blown nuclear war. I’m almost at the end of this book and while almost all of the events took place before I was born, it has been very enjoyable history lesson for me.


British Politics Unravelled – Giles Edwards

britishpoliticsunravelledI came across this little gem from 2005 whilst in my local library and whilst it’s now sadly out of print, I managed to find a copy for myself on eBay. It’s essentially a beginners guide to British Politics, covering important questions such as: How does the Constitution work?, What actually happens in No 10? and What is an early day motion? The book also has chapters on British Law, Elections, the EU, the Economy and even the Media. It discusses for instance, how a newspaper chooses it’s political allegiance, what the purpose of a party whip is, how ‘spin’ works, it even details the powers that exist within courts and local governments. In fact, the entire book is a goldmine of useful and interesting information, presented in an easy to understand and concise manner. I ended up tracking down Mr Edwards to congratulate him on a job well done, which isn’t something I have done with any other author. Politics isn’t exactly everybody’s cup of tea, but like it or not, it affects almost every aspect of our lives and if you have any interest in learning about the political process in the UK then this book should be at the top of your shopping list.

Feb 09 2009

Hidden Agendas – John Pilger

Category: Books,Politics,World Affairs — Jonathan @ 1:25 am

Note: This is the first book review I’ve written, so please forgive any beginners mistakes I make!

I have spent the last few months watching journalist John Pilger’s television documentaries, having first discovered his film-making through the 2007 award-winning “The War on Democracy”, an excellent account of US greed and it’s effects on Southern and Central America, including the events surrounding the US-backed coup d’état against Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez in 2002 and many other instances of US involvement in attempts to overthrow democratically elected governments around the world.

I became hooked on his work after purchasing “Documentaries which Changed the World”, the first DVD box set of his films, and have since snapped up the rest of the DVD’s. These include some classics ranging from ‘Burp’, which chronicles the history of the ‘ice cold war’ between Pepsi and Coke, ‘The New Rulers of the World’ examining the effects of globalisation on Asia, and ‘Stealing a Nation’ which tells the tragic story of the Chagos islanders, expelled from their homeland in the 1970′s by the British government, the Chagos having been given to the US in order for them to build a military base on the largest island, Diego Garcia.

Hidden AgendasI recently finished reading his 1998 book ‘Hidden Agendas’, a collection of essays on many subjects, some now outdated although many just as relevant today as when they were first written. Pilger states that he lives by the Claud Cockburn quote, ‘Never believe anything until it is officially denied’ and it certainly shows in all of his books and documentaries. Despite the dangerous places the ventures to, he remains determined to uncover the facts at all costs.

In his chapter on the Gulf war, Pilger shows how manipulation of the media during the conflict helped to steer the journalists in the right direction, encouraging them to focus on the new ‘high-tech weapons’ and the miraculously low US and UK casualties, therefore largely ignoring the hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths which occured during the conflict. Pilger also covers the devastating impact that the sanctions against Iraq had on the civilian population.

In the section on the Indonesian invasion of East Timor in 1975 Pilger exposes not just the complicity of the UK government in the mass slaughter of civilians, but also that British manufacturers were arming the Indonesian army. The story of the Ploughshares and their acts of ‘military conversion’ using only hammers to destroy hawk jets destined for delivery to Indonesia was heartening, and showed that direct action against arms suppliers can be successful, their trial and subsequent aquittal can only reinforce this.

One of the most memorable sections is the two chapters on Burma and it’s brutal military regime, here Pilger’s reporting is undercover and has to be remain low-key to avoid detection by the authorities. Some of the interviews with ordinary citizens, although sometimes cut short, provide a fascinating insight into their lives under the Junta and just how bad things have gotten for them, as the west turns a blind eye to western oil and gas companies reaping the profits of Burma’s natural resources, being extracted via forced and even child labour. His interview with Burma’s elected leader in exile, Nobel Peace prize winner Aung San Suu Ki is deeply moving and shows the determination within Burma’s ‘National League for Democracy’ to return to a democratic system of government.

Chapters on the British media (including the rise of PR) and the docker’s strikes in the 80′s certainly filled gaps in my knowledge of issues so close to home, and gave excellent examples of how a monopoly over the mass-media can be abused and used to mould public opinion in any way imaginable.

In his writing and documentaries, Pilger joins Noam Chomsky in successfully exposing the depth of the government and media manipulations of the truth, challenging the ‘official’ and established versions of events. He opens your eyes to what is really going on around you, without a hint of scaremongering, and I highly recommend anyone interested in world affairs to purchase Pilger’s books and DVD’s right away, with “Documentaries which Changed the World” being an excellent starting point for further exploration of his work.