- Subjectively, Americans are basically in agreement that
the media is influential, and occasionally too influential as represented
by polls.
-
- Polls themselves are essentially simple surveys, but
can be extremely insightful in many respects, especially when attempting
to derive a simple answer from a complex problem or situation.
-
- According to a Pew Research Center study conducted in
April of 2000, the majority of Americans turn to the television for news.
This proclivity is quite detrimental in a crisis just look at the
aftermath of 9-11, an obvious government false flag operation if ever there
was one. Americans were entirely reliant on the news for any and all information
about what happened that day - Americans trusted the news networks to tell
them the truth, they trusted their government as well, sadly, both let
us down and to such an extent that they can no longer be trusted gain
ever again!
-
- Another study, (Van Eijck. Koen, Van Rees, Kees, 2000)
published in the journal Communication Research showed conclusive evidence
that reading had declined overall, as a result of television viewing. The
study conducted in Europe emphasized that people that had once read for
the purpose of personal gratification in 1975, had generally turned to
the television by 1995 and for the same purpose - gratification. However
those that read for informational purposes in 1975 employ television viewing
for purposes other than acquiring serious information (Van Eijck et all,
2000). This study effectively indicates that television has become a more
dominant source of entertainment among the majority of the Dutch population
since 1975. However, according to the research, those that sought serious
information in 1975 by reading still sought sources other than television
in 1995.
-
- Nothing has changed in this respect, today those curious
and/or intelligent enough continue to seek out honest information, but
they've turned to the blogs as they no longer trust the media, whether
it be print or television, and don't mind reading news in order to acquire
good, decent, uncensored information.
-
- Unfortunately there is another element in the equation,
the apathetic television viewer, the couch potato, the armchair commando,
the video game aficionado, you know who I'm talking about. These people
make up a substantial proportion of Americas and help to bolster the American
economy with their unrestrained and insatiable consumerism. The good news?
They don't really matter, most of them wouldn't look up from the boob tube
for a moment if they didn't have to. The only way these useless creatures
will ever get motivated about anything is if someone takes out the satellites
and leaves them without a meaningless and degenerate program to watch.
-
- In April 2000, people like the above were asked whether
they watched television news programming regularly, to which 75% responded
affirmatively (question # 5). When asked how much time they had spent watching
television yesterday, excluding news programming, 57% responded that they
had spent more than an hour watching television. Sixteen percent admitted
to watching between two and three hours, 11% watched three to four hours,
and 8% watched more than four hours of television programming (question
# P.2). In 1998 Pew found that 13% of Americans regularly watched daytime
talk shows like Jerry Springer or Rikki Lake (question # 16U).
-
- One 1997 poll conducted by Hart and Teeter (1997) revealed
that 79% of those polled admitted watching more than seven hours of television
weekly, 24% watched more than twenty-nine hours weekly. A Scripps Howard
News Survey (1993) revealed that 77% of those responding said that their
television was on at least 3 hours daily, with 26% admitting that their
television was on for longer than six hours daily.
-
- In contrast to the amount of time Americans spend before
the television, and the frequency in which they watch television news programming,
only 15% of Americans stated that they listened to public radio regularly
[Not that this matters today, public radio is every bit as bad and pro-Zionist
as any television program]. In the same year 35% admitted to watching news
magazine programs like Dateline regularly. Eighteen percent watched television
programming like "Cops." Ten percent of respondents admitted
to watching programming like Oprah Winfrey regularly, and 12% watched Judge
Judy regularly as well. For all intents and purposes, it doesn't matter
whether you watch cops or nightline, you're equally likely to learn any
facts from either.
-
- Pew found that 12% of the respondents indicated that
they read news magazines like Time, U.S. News and World Report, or Newsweek
regularly. All three of these magazines are owned by huge media corporations.
In the case of Time, AOL Time Warner also owns NBC and cable news networks
as well. Newsweek is owned by The Washington Post Company, and U.S. News
and World Report is owned by the media giant CMGI. The point is that it
may be difficult to get different perspectives from different news sources
if they are owned by the same corporations, which of course they are, AND
the same people.
-
- In case you haven't been paying attention, this has been
going on for a long time. Spiro Agnew, former vice president of the United
States delivered a speech in Des Moines Iowa in November 1969, in which
he stated, "No medium has a more profound influence [than television
news] over public opinion- nowhere in our system are there fewer checks
on vast power (Speech delivered in Des Moines Iowa, November 13th, 1969).
-
- In a relatively recent interview, Nicholas Johnson, (1995)
a former Federal Communication Commission (FCC) official, commented on
the developing media monopoly in mass communication. "At the time
of the Time-Warner merger, when company executives were asked why they
were merging, Time-Warner said that according to their calculations, it
would not be long before there would be five firms that control all the
media on Planet Earth, and that they intended to be one of them."
Johnson later acknowledged that, "it is true that most people get
most of their information from television. It is also true that fewer and
fewer people, particularly young people, are reading the newspapers."
To summarize the article, the media is already monopolized by a few powerful
companies, but if trends continue eventually Time-Warner's calculations
may in fact be correct.
-
- If the above surveys are any indication of where Americans
spend a good part of their time, and where they acquire the majority of
their news from, one must conclude that television represents a large element.
-
- Polls suggest that Americans also view the honesty and
integrity of their government with a tremendous amount of suspicion, which
is great news, because they certainly should. Remember when reading the
below that these polls were taken quite some time ago, polls today reveal
that American opinion of their politicians is at an all time low.
-
- When asked in 1995, "Would you rate the level of
ethics and honesty in politicians, excellent, good, not so good, or poor?",
Americans responded by and large with "not so good, and poor."
Less than 3% felt excellent was an adequate description, and 16% identified
with "good." Despite the fact that there was a Democratic president
in the White House, Republicans and Democrats nearly equally agreed that
the level of honesty among politicians was "not so good," with
Republicans slightly edging out Democrats 51% to 44%. This is all that
more interesting, when one takes into account the fact that in 1995, when
this poll was conducted, the Republicans had a majority in the house (ABC
News, 1995).
-
- In another poll comparing the honesty of Democratic and
Republican office holders, it was found that the majority of those Americans
surveyed felt that their politicians were of "average" honesty
(Gallup Organization, 1998a, 1998b). In a more recent poll, it was revealed
that American opinion concerning the level of honesty of their public officials
had not changed a great deal in that the results showed that 60% of the
respondents felt that it was either low, or very low. Only 3% identified
a "high" level of honesty in their public officials (Princeton
Survey Research Associates, 0400705).
-
- Governments have a vested interest in maintaining calm,
and preventing panic among its population for a variety of reasons, not
least of which include economic stability, and order. Is it possible that
the American government would encourage the mass media to assist it in
the preservation of economic stability and order, even if "truth"
were somewhat sacrificed, for the "collective good?" I think
the reader knows the answer to that question of course they're lying
to us, we all know it now, but somethings not right is it? Somehow we're
all being lulled into this idea that all is well, despite the fact that
we all know better, or at least should.
-
- The television unlike a book cannot be put down, and
then contemplated on, and returned to without missing potentially important
points either supporting or refuting ones original views the television
is a 'passive learning' instrument, we're not actively engaged when viewing
it, we're sitting [or lying] back and literally allowing it to form our
opinions for us. We must turn it off!
-
- What is known about the fact that individuals tend to
develop uniformed opinions, even when provided with accurate or inaccurate
information is well understood in marketing circles, and is referred to
as "selective distortion." This phenomenon can occur in two primary
ways. If an individual wants to believe something is not true, then even
in the face of an overwhelming amount of information disputing their original
contention, they will still reject what they do not want to believe. Likewise,
this can happen in the same manner with an individual that wants to believe
something is in fact true, no matter the amount of material refuting that
belief (Futrell, 1999, Pp. 119-122).
-
- Those who obtain the majority of their information from
a single source, and then encounter another source that disputes some of
their earlier beliefs, are in all likelihood going to succumb to another
sales psychology principle known as brand loyalty. In a very real sense
the Catholic church embraced this type of loyalty, in that it was compelled
to reject the Copernican, and Galilean ideas of the sun, rather than our
earth being the center of the solar system, or known universe at that time,
in favor of the antiquated, but politically, and religiously acceptable
terra centric Aristotelian, and Ptolemaic models. The church was so adamant
about their acceptable, and "brand loyal" version, that it threatened
Galileo with excommunication if he didn't conform to their incorrect account,
and denounce his accurate hypothesis (Brophy & Paolucci, 1962).
-
- The church issued the following statement, "The
doctrine that the earth is neither the center of the universe nor immovable,
but moves, even with a daily rotation, is absurd, and both philosophically
and theologically false, and at least an error of Faith" (Asimov,
1979, p. 275). If that is not rejection in the face of scientific empiricism,
one must wonder, what a better example might be. Another well-known theologian
named John Shelby Spong, devoted an entire book to the investigation of
Biblical literalism, or inerrancy, embraced by so called contemporary fundamentalists,
and their rejection of scientific empiricism (Spong, 1991). Spong is essentially
describing the "brand loyalty" of a specific population of church
goers, who are individually unaware of the bible itself, its history, relevance,
and meaning, but rather rely on the interpretation of it provided by their
minister or church doctrine, that Spong believes to be equally ignorant
of the text. Sadly, Spong is not much better than those he seeks to condemn
as fools, he's a globalist that embraces the fallacy of multiculturalism
but he's right on about the vast majority of those that refer to
themselves as Christians and their unbelievable ignorance of history and
geography.
-
- Indeed, even the traditional macroeconomic view of advertising
"holds that the main purpose of advertising is to manipulate or persuade"
(McConnel, Campbell, Brue, 1996). Read those words again, "manipulate
and persuade!"
-
- Another very interesting and perhaps persuasive force
contributing to opinion formation and the role the media plays is put forth
by zoologist Desmond Morris (1969). "In addition to law, custom, language,
and religion there is another, more violent form of cohesive force that
helps to bind the members of a super-tribe "society" together,
and that is war" (p.32). This is an interesting perspective if one
looks for a moment at what happened as a result of September 11th, and
the anthrax letters. There has been a declaration of war on terrorism.
The enemy hasn't been fully identified, the goals have not been fully established,
and there is no end in sight, but yet the American people support it, or
at least supported it up till now. As the American people become more informed,
the alert individual can't help but notice that the war of terror which
originally was focused on without, i.e. the Mid East, has become more and
more focused on the within, i.e. right here in the United States, slowly,
imperceptively, the enemy has morphed from Islamo-Fascists to terrorists
of the "Home grown" variety. I've got news for you America, our
government is looking at US, you and I, especially if you're not one of
the aforementioned apathetic materialists if you've got a mind and
an informed opinion YOU ARE THE TERRORIST!
-
- Morris's book, The Human Zoo (1969) is an excellent source
of information pertinent to our modern era. "There has been a great
deal of debate recently concerning the way in which modern mass-communication
devices, such as televisions are shrinking the social surface of the world,
creating a global televillage. It has been suggested that this trend will
aid the move towards a genuinely International community. Unhappily this
is a myth, for the single reason that television, unlike personal social
intercourse is a one-way system" (1969, p. 36). Morris was right and
wrong, television is a "one way system," but it's the perfect
medium for ushering in the new world order, globalism or Internationalism,
whatever you prefer to call it communism to some.
-
- Morris felt that humans were subject to forces encouraging
conformity. An excellent example of the conformity principle is in the
following. The external threat, "has such a powerful cohesive effect
on the members of the threatened group that the leader's task is in many
ways made easier. The more daring and reckless he is, the more fervently
he seems to be protecting the group who, caught up in the emotional fray,
never dare question his actions (as they would in peace time), no matter
how irrational these actions may be" (Morris, 1969, p. 53). Let me
repeat the last sentence again, "The more daring and reckless he [the
leader] is, the more fervently he seems to be protecting the group who,
caught up in the emotional fray, never dare question his actions (as they
would in peace time),no matter how irrational these actions may be."
-
- Does the War on Terrorism apply to this principle? Certainly
President Bush's popularity remained quite high initially despite the fact
that he instituted many invasive and unconstitutional policies that would
in all likelihood have never succeeded in the absence of an alleged external
enemy and in the case of Al Qaeda, a illusory enemy.
-
- Perhaps this conformity principle plays some kind of
role in the fact that we the American public seem satisfied at present
with the information we've received and continue to receive from the government,
by way of the media, and we do not feel the need to question higher authority
at this time. OR, perhaps the media is not telling us just how many Americans
are already questioning the authority of our government at this very moment.
-
- Wake up America, the Zio-American government is very
close to committing another act of terror on American soil that will dwarf
what they did on 9-11. Will you be fooled again, will you allow them to
conscript your sons and daughters and send them overseas to kill and die
for Israel and oil? There isn't much time left
-
- [1] http://www.natall.com/who-rules-america/
- For sources see reference section
- http://pcapostate.blogspot.com/2007/04/study-focusing-on-formation-of-opinion.html
-
- http://pcapostate.blogspot.com/2007/07/how-influential-is-media-really.html
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