American Media and the Protests of the World

Foreign policy priorities and powerful interests oftentimes play out in the media (1). Broadly speaking, from the selection of news stories to the particular angles they may take, the U.S. media’s account of foreign events can give readers an interesting glimpse into the interests of America’s powerful. It is no coincidence that media attention focuses much more on matters that relate directly to U.S. national and corporate interests even though similar events around the world go underreported. Four case studies—the protests in Ukraine, Venezuela, the West Bank, and Thailand—help demonstrate this relationship.

Ukraine

By a wide margin, the mass anti- and pro-government protests and accompanying political crisis in Ukraine have received a majority of the news coverage. Dozens have been killed and pictures of fires and violence from the protests have gone viral. While many may know of Ukraine only for its Chernobyl nuclear disaster, the former Soviet satellite has vast geostrategic importance to the United States. The U.S. has given over $3 billion to Ukraine since its independence in 1991, mostly for pro-market reforms and strengthening civil and political institutions. The billions of dollars in aid are intended to help orient Ukraine away from Russian influence through economic and political alignment with the West. Since 1995, Ukraine has also been in consultation with NATO to explore the possibility of membership. These developments have in part helped shape the current media portrayal of anti-government demonstrations there as a kind of post-Cold War tug-a-war between Western and Russian influences, since the now-disposed prime minister made an eleventh-hour rejection of talks with the European Union over Ukraine’s possible membership, a decision that became the very spark of current unrest. Indeed there are decades of economic, political and military interests at play between the West, Ukraine and Russia, and the media’s reporting has certainly reflected this.

Venezuela

Venezuelan protests, too, have found their way onto the media’s main stage—or at least its orchestra section. Mass demonstrations erupted two weeks ago with grievances including rampant crime, high inflation, food shortages and general economic stagnation over the past 15 years. The country’s oil wealth and proximity to the United States add to the media’s interest in Venezuelan protests, however the two countries have a bitter history. Under Hugo Chavez’s presidency, the Venezuelan leader was not shy about his disdain for the United States and particularly its leaders. He and current President Nicolas Maduro have both blamed the U.S. for demonstrations against their leaderships, most recently when President Maduro accused the C.I.A. of attempting a coup. The story is only now beginning to reach a mass audience.

Thailand

Obtaining moderate news coverage is the

steady flow of demonstrators since protests first gripped Thailand back in November 2013. As I’ve written before, the mostly-peaceful protests have occasionally turned violent by unknown assailants. Just this past weekend, a bomb killed four people—three of them children—during an anti-government protest in Bangkok. On Sunday, 34 people were wounded and one girl killed by gunmen who open fired on demonstrators. Political leaders on all sides have signaled to their constituents to eliminate violence while those in power see their legitimacy evaporating in the eyes of thousands of demonstrators. Despite the fact that Thailand is party to the Southeast Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO)—a security pact signed by Thailand, the United States and six other nations—bilateral relations with the U.S. are generally poor. One of the biggest points of contention are the food subsidies given to American farmers by the federal government, which are seen as giving growers an unfair price advantage, especially in the rice market. While not a perfect comparison, Thailand's current political crisis is not too different from Ukraine’s, the only crucial difference being Ukraine’s higher geostrategic value to the West.

West Bank

While Israeli-Palestinians peace talks are at the heart of the Obama Administration’s Middle East policy, scant media coverage has been attributed to a demonstration of a different flavor that embodies one obstacle to peace: “thousands” (2) of Israeli youth joined protesters gathered in the West Bank city of Ma’ale to protest the freeze on construction of new settlements in the contested E-1 region. On the surface, the gathering was a one-day affair. Scores assembled in the city to show solidarity with and support for Jewish settlements in the West Bank during peace talks that would—if ever ‘successfully’ concluded—probably require the transfer of some settler lands to Palestinian ownership. What makes the gathering significant is the fact that members of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s own Cabinet attended the rally and that the international community roundly condemns Israel’s settlement expansion and points to it as the number one impediment to peace. The crowd’s zeal to promote the settler movement coupled with high-profile government supporters in attendance throws doubt on how acceptable a peace deal would be to the Israeli public and political spheres. Highlighting these bits in the U.S. media wouldn’t be good for the dimming hope surrounding the talks.

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(1) Edward Herman, and Noam Chomsky, Manufactured Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, (New York: Pantheon Books, 1988).

(2) Israel’s Haaretz news publication. Note that the youth gathering in the West Bank was almost entirely ignored by the American media.

State (of) Media and Egyptian Democracy

"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech." - Benjamin Franklin

The dominant reporting in Egypt goes something like this: Mohamed Morsi, Egypt's first democratically-elected President, and his Muslim Brotherhood are a threat to Egyptian national security. His removal from power by the military, while not unlike a coup, was legitimated by massive anti-government protests and widespread disapproval of Morsi's leadership, both of which threaten Egypt's social fabric. The Egyptian army, backed by popular support, stepped in to secure order and will act as midwife to the ugly, winding road to democracy. Democracy, democracy, democracy!

While it's tempting to take any of these statements at face value, we're talking about a process with many competing interests and variables. Political plurality, free and fair elections, institutions and the rule of law all play a role in the democratic process. But in a country like Egypt with a dark history of martial--not rule of--law, government co-option of political parties, and a strangled press, these pillars of governance increasingly rely on independent assessment to test their efficacy. This role is traditionally shared by rights groups, professional syndicates and especially the media who act as watchdogs to and stakeholders in the political process. During this time of political transition and constitutional referendum in Egypt, neutral analysis of government action is central to the country's democratic potential. However, the current treatment of reporters, and harassment of domestic and foreign media outlets in Egypt (along with exclusion from the political arena and state-run media) throws doubt on the legitimacy of its democratic process.

Snowden, the NSA and Why Americans Don’t Care

While trolling through Buzzfeed’s list of best signs from the July 4th protests and the comments sections of various articles on the NSA/Snowden story, I’ve witnessed bold and unafraid Americans speaking up against injustice and government overreach. One of the more ironic signs spelled out the NSA acronym as ‘New Stasi Agency,’ a reference to the intelligence apparatus of East Germany that sought to 'know all.' Additionally, many readers commented on and expressed outrage toward the unprecedented nature of recently exposed U.S. surveillance programs. It’s good to know that people take seriously issues such as unwarranted seizure of citizens’ metadata and secret courts.

Courtesy of Buzzfeed

Not seriously enough, as it turns out. New insights keep piling up with minimal reaction from the American populous: the FISA court’s precedent-setting decisions for intelligence gathering, gag orders preventing tech companies (Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo, Google) from speaking of government requests for user data, general secrecy surrounding the NSA, FISA and the latter’s trove of jurisprudence that remains largely out of sight. No legislation is on the table calling for accountability and transparency. No one is flooding the streets and their representative’s office demanding explanation or remedy. Instead, a few protests dotted America on its birthday. No one seems to care.

The Media and the Manhunt

The Media and the Manhunt:

The Banality of Evil (and Good) 

Christine Deluna and Zach Crawford

On Wednesday April 17, CNN’s Peter King reported live on TV a suspect in the Boston Marathon bombings was taken into custody. This would have been a huge victory for CNN and Boston…if it were true. King falsely reported this “breaking” story and started a media firestorm, which ended in every reporter in a 100-mile radius descending on a Boston courthouse only to find there was no suspect, and oh, now there’s a bomb threat at the courthouse.  Shamefully, CNN’s next BREAKING NEWS bulletin would feature its own journalist’s negligence.

CNN’s misreporting Wednesday became the catalyst to the media equivalent to a chicken running around without a head, wings, and legs. From the millisecond-by-millisecond coverage of the manhunt to the post arrest schmorgesborg of misleading and speculative coverage, the media’s response to the Boston Marathon bombings has revealed the flaws of many news outlets while highlighting the strengths in others. Unfortunately, these strengths were, and continue to be, outshined by hypotheticals and flashy attempts to contextualize and sensationalize a news story, even if some (or entire) details are completely irrelevant.

Oh, we know what you're thinking: but the terrorists are white.