Like a few people I am rather cynical about the role of the mainstream media (msm). In part this cynicism arises from working in media for a while, in part it is reinforced by the fact that the msm has become a fully integrated component of the capitalist system and as such is unable to examine or question the dominant paradigm that seems to have the world rushing towards a rather unpleasant future.
Yet its role in providing us with some form of public record of events persists. In this regard I am not referring to the vast quantities of opinions or op-edits that clutter most of the press sites or their physical manifestations. Nor am I talking about the gratuitous and highly condensed form of TV reporting that graces our screens around dinner time. I am simply observing the fact that the press still provides a first draft of history, incomplete for sure, but a draft nonetheless. However we also learnt something else from the Rupert’s Australian in recent times.
What we learnt or observed quite explicitly is that the public domain of knowledge about what goes on in the corridors of politics is manipulated by practitioners of spin who are highly connected to media outlets and political sources. We see daily the public fascade of politics, the proceedings of the houses of parliament are public record, and we glimpse the stage managed events designed to neatly encapsulate some minute bit of government policy. And then we get the codified version of the behind the scenes mechanations offered up by the various journalists imbedded into Parliament House.
Imbedded journalists were used by the US recently to improve their media profile during the invasion of Iraq and in the Afghanistan campaign. The idea was that such journalists or media would form a close relationship with their protectors and report a version of the ground war that was largely sympathetic to the US mission. Of course given the life and death nature of combat, the highly charged emotional nature of such environment has parallels with the psychological phenomenon know as the Stockholm Syndrome.
The atmosphere in media circles on Capitol Hill during the few days that saw Rudd deposed in favour of Gillard was highly charged. The twitterverse was alive with random noise and the iPhones were hardly able to stay on charge long enough to work for more than a few hours. The symbiotic nature of the relationship between institutionalised media that is embedded into Parliament House and the political sources was clearly illustrated, both needing the other to play a role in a drama that becomes part of the public record, both reaffirming and legitimising the other.
There is a widespread belief especially among left leaning circles that the media has an overriding right wing political agenda. This view is often expressed when considering the overly political “campaigns” waged by the Australian against things like the government’s roof insulation scheme or school building program. Given such concerns it seems remarkable to learn that certain elements within this so-called left leaning government were using the very same media to conduct a campaign of destabilisation directed against the incumbent Prime Minister.
What is knowable about the events of last week is limited. Public access to the halls of Parliament House is restricted, our knowledge is mediated by professionals. These professionals in turn are locked in with their subject material and on one hand they are dependent on the business of politics to justify their existence. On the other hand they are subject to the demands of efficiency or motivated by concerns for profitability even if such considerations are at arms length to the day-to-day business of reporting on politics.
What is clear from the events of last week and the behaviour of the msm is simply that none of it can be trusted to inform the public with a complete factual record of what goes on. Clearly the media subscribes to the notion that we can’t handle the truth. Also clear is an acceptance and exploitation of this modus operandi by political parties. Equally as likely is the idea that drama of politics transcends the business of government which has serious implications for any concerns about the capacity of government to improve the living conditions of the public they supposedly serve. The soap opera of politics now dominates the inquiring mind of the our fourth estate watchdogs while the broader substantive issues are abandoned to writers who preach from the pulpit of vested interest.
