Re:Former Twitter Employees Charged with Spying for Saudi Ar...
by tsimionescu on Thursday November 07, 2019 @03:56AM
(#21471563)
One of the points of Manufacturing Consent is that it's not necessarily the government directly choosing a narrative (that sometimes does happen, especially through selective leaks) but that the news media itself and the people who end up doing editorial policy are largely aligned with the government to begin with.
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Re:Former Twitter Employees Charged with Spying for Saudi Ar...
by enraged_camel on Thursday November 07, 2019 @11:38AM
(#21474729)
It's not that they are aligned with the government, necessarily. Rather, they are aligned with large advertisers, and those tend to be powerful companies and conglomerates with global interests.
Essentially, if you're a media outlet, you'll try hard to not piss off the hand that is feeding you, and Chomsky's assertion is that this is how the media manufactures consent (for all the horrible things the government does to defend the interests of those advertisers abroad).
Re:Former Twitter Employees Charged with Spying for Saudi Ar...
by tsimionescu on Thursday November 07, 2019 @01:11PM
(#21475666)
That is one aspect, but there is even more: in general, people who rise in positions of power, such as editorial positions on major media outlets, or political power, or capital, tend to have similar beliefs and interests. This is because of things like common education institution and social bonds.
Essentially, if your opinions are significantly different from those of most politicians (on the important topics), you're unlikely to rise up through the ranks in most major institutions.