A Propaganda Model
Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky
When I think of propaganda, my mind immediately goes to World War II. I associate it with Nazi, Germany. I think of it on both sides- the negative connotation and the positive. I think of the United States and its military posters. I think of the freedom of speech we cherish, and the right we all hold to vote. This is where Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky step in to explain the notion that the media is an industry based solely on manufacturing through their work titled, “A Propaganda Model”. The model they wrote about focuses on five filters, the first being the media and its ownership. Within the media industry, there are large corporations that dictate a vast majority of the public’s intake. I associate this with companies like Disney and Apple that basically run our world. And they do so strictly for profit. They only want to release product that will strongly benefit their company and propel their reputation forward. How can corporations become so dominant? Advertisements; the second filter of the five. Media projects do not run cheap, and the consumer support does not always cover the product in full. Advertising companies fill in the blank. They fund these projects by investing money in order to boost their profit, and based off that, the media companies then can even filter through the companies and choose which ones to include and support based off the most successful (relevant) advertisements; meaning advertisements are selling both to us but also by us. The third filter mainly focuses on journalism and how it is intertwined with these corporations. Big businesses are aware of the public’s knowledge and access to it so they devote a whole team, a whole new branch to their corporation, specializing in providing material to hand off to the news outlets. A tailor made window for the consumers to see how and why x, y, and z were made and sold to them. Journalism is the vehicle for this knowledge and depends on its sources to remain afloat. Challenging the ideas, however, is what threatens the value of one’s voice. Shedding light on problems is different than that and is appreciated, but disagreeing and covering up, is what will ultimately terminate a career in the field. That’s the fourth filter. The power the media holds over the voices that direct the mass’ attention. How do they do this? The fifth filter- anti-communism. An enemy, target, or better yet scapegoat to divert the attention towards. Terrorism, Communism, and Immigration are all modern day examples that we see frequently in the news that are labeled as problems or fears we need to be aware of. All of this takes place in our media. Propaganda is a lot more involved than people are aware of.
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