Transcript Week 2 - mnsu.edu

Week 2
Bias and Ethnocentrism
Five Filters of Propaganda
Bias
• Each person and each professor
has their own perspective.
• Biology
– Gene Theory of Evolution
– Symbiogenesis Theory of Evolution
Both Sides to an Issue?
• Some people want to give equal
time to opposing views.
– Never just two sides.
• “Balance” was ordered in coverage
of civilian deaths in Afghanistan.
– http://www.commondreams.org/headlines01/1031-02.htm
Value Neutral or Objective
• Some professors, journalists, or others
will say they are objective.
• Beware!
– They are either ignorant of their bias
• Or
– They are intentionally trying to deceive you.
Ethnocentrism
• Ethnocentrism is seeing and judging the
world ONLY from your personal
perspective.
• Ethnocentrism also places ourselves in
a superior position relative to other
people in order to justify our actions.
Five Elements of Ethnocentrism
• Viewing the Other as Inferior
• Dehumanization
• Civilizational Mission
• Ideological Camouflage
• Political Denial
Viewing the Other as
Inferior
• Biological Inferiority
• Moral/Cultural Inferiority
Dehumanization
• Once a group is viewed as inferior,
it is easy to dehumanize them.
– Individuals in the group are seen as
less than true people, lacking souls,
humanity, culture, etc.
– Derogatory names are used to
characterize the group.
Civilizational Mission
• Because it believes it is superior,
one group takes it upon itself to
"civilize" the “inferior” people.
– Manifest Destiny
– White Man’s Burden
– Crusade on Terrorism
Ideological Camouflage
• The subjugation and ill-treatment of
other people need justification.
• Sham science
– Bell Curve
– Eugenics
Political Denial
• Government denies responsibility
in the mistreatment of a group of
people.
Five Elements of Ethnocentrism
• Viewing the Other as Inferior
• Dehumanization
• Civilizational Mission
• Ideological Camouflage
• Political Denial
Five Filters of
Propaganda
Distortion in the Media
Today
• Five Filters of Propaganda
– Sociology in Practice
• Worthy and Unworthy Victims
Students and
Education
More than 50% of students at four-year schools and more than 75% at
two-year colleges lacked the skills to perform complex literacy tasks.
That means they could not … understand the arguments of newspaper
editorials, compare credit card offers with different interest rates and
annual fees or summarize results of a survey about parental
involvement in school.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2006-01-19-college-tasks_x.htm
Recent Media Studies
• “A new study based on a series of seven
US polls conducted from January
through September of this year reveals
that before and after the Iraq war, a
majority of Americans have had
significant misperceptions and these are
highly related to support for the war in
Iraq.”
•
http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/international_security_bt/102.p
hp?nid=&id=&pnt=102&lb=brus
Five Filters in the
Propaganda Model
• Concentration of Ownership
• Advertising
• “Sourcing” the News
• Flak
• Anti-Communism
Concentration of
Ownership
• 20 years ago, 50 companies controlled the vast majority
of media resources. Now, it is five.
– “These five huge corporations —
• Time Warner,
• Disney, (owns ABC)
• Murdoch's News Corporation,
• Bertelsmann of Germany, and
• Viacom (formerly CBS)
– — own most of the newspapers, magazines, books,
radio and TV stations, and movie studios of the
United States.” http://www.benbagdikian.com/
Advertising
• Advertising supports the costs of
production for media outlets.
• Outlets not able to attract advertisers
are less able to compete.
• Advertisers seek a “buying mood.”
Sources
• Media outlets attempt to save
money and time by relying on
readily available sources for news.
• Corporations, politicians and
others provide press releases,
press conferences and prepared
videos for the media.
Flak
• People and groups dissatisfied with
media coverage will attempt to change
coverage through complaints.
– Complaints by pundits and editorial writers
– Complaints by organized groups
– Complaints by politicians
Anti-Communism
• While the authors wrote about the concept of
anti-communism, we can see its application
today.
• Both the terms “liberal” and “terrorism” are
used to dichotomize debate.
– You are either with us, or against us.
• The fear of terrorism is used to promote
policies.
Division of Coverage
• The Five Filters of Propaganda lead to a
division in the coverage of issues.
• Sources
– Official US sources are favored.
– Sources sympathetic to US interests given
more coverage.
Division of Coverage
• Flak is used to ensure coverage
sympathetic to US interests.
– Coverage of issues and people sympathetic
to US interests will be promoted.
– Too much coverage of people
unsympathetic to US interests will be met
with Flak.
Division of Coverage
• Accusations of Terrorism and Liberal
Bias
– Association with terrorists are implied to
delegitimate people who do not sympathize
with US interests.
– Coverage is compromised because
journalists attempt to avoid accusations of a
“liberal bias.”
Worthy and Unworthy
Victims
• Worthy victims
– Generous with gory details
– Quotes of outrage and demands for justice
– Front page and editorials
• Unworthy victims
– Low key – less emotional
– Regretful and philosophical generalities of everpresent violence and tragedy of human life
– Less prominent coverage and no editorial content
denouncing murderers
Rachel Corrie and CNN
• No discussion of injuries. - "My back is broken, my
back is broken"
• “… "crack down" on pro-Palestinian peace activists, … whom it
believes are breaking the law and assisting terrorist groups.” “The
Israeli government has long argued that some peace activists help
terrorist networks …” http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/05/03/cameraman.killed/index.html
• "This is a group of protesters who are acting very irresponsibly. They
are putting everyone in danger, the Palestinians, themselves, our
forces, by intentionally placing themselves in a combat zone. We are
checking the details of the incident and believe it to be a very
regrettable incident.” http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/03/16/rafah.death/index.html
• 7 articles including Rachel Corrie
– Only 1 is dedicated to her
Jessica Lynch and CNN
• “Lynch suffered serious gunshot wounds”
–
Wednesday, April 2, 2003
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/01/sprj.irq.lynch.rescue/index.html
• “No evidence of gunshot or stab wounds
found”
– Thursday, April 3, 2003
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/South/04/03/sprj.irq.rescue/index.html
• Photos of Jessica during rescue and “senior
photo”
• Family history and extensive description of
capture and rescue
• 91 articles including Jessica Lynch from April
1, 2003 to August 24, 2006
Coming up
• Comparison of News Article and
Actual Event
• Outfoxed