Semantically you're right, but what the US had under the Fairness Doctrine was a lot better than the utter dystopian nat-sec propaganda machine we have now.
It's fair to say that there were still shitty corporate elements to the media back in, say, 1975, but at least there were credible journalists on major media outlets opposing war. The mere concept of that is unthinkable in 2022. Except if it's Cucker Tarlson who takes a good anti-war position cynically to rope in people to white nationalism.
I still would say I'd want that banned. Incrementally going back to less evil media is just acquiescing to the liberals' concern trolling and giving them some power. Look at the "free press" of WW1 or during the Russian Civil War. Or for the 70s you had some, emphasis on some, marginally anti war (really anti-draft not anti-war) media that wanted troops brought home, but at the same time couched it in virulent anti-communist and anti-Viet-Minh shit.
I see no reason to return to the days of the "soviet expert" and the cold war liberal narratives just because they sometimes didn't back every imperial action as readily. Why would you do that instead of removing the free press fetish? Any revolutionary society by necessity HAS to shut that shit down. Just giving it a bit of an opening helped spur the end of the USSR and halt popular opposition until it was too late. Under the fairness doctrine it was still a nat-sec propaganda machine, I have no clue how wanting none of that whatsoever is "semantics", its fundamental to removing liberal intelligentcia. No Marxist should back the idea of any remnant of liberal hegemony being allowed to have any power, or to yearn for it.
We don't have to say "or we could do a nicer liberal order", that is not an option. Fairness doctrine era allowed for there to be fewer monopolies on who could say the broadly same liberal capitalist consent manufacturing. That's IT. That press still in its totality was harmful to revolution and leftist movements. Any improvements over today in specific topics dont change that. Press can only be worthwhile in a socialist society when the entire system of news media is destroyed. It would have to be collectivized and highly regulated by communist views. a supposed "free press" cannot do that. Free press allows for counter-revolutionary reporting and obfuscation, with maybe the hope of regulating blatant lies.
per Gramsci
These are the days of subscription campaigns. The editors and administrators of bourgeois newspapers tidy up their display windows, paint some varnish on their shop signs and appeal for the attention of the passer-by (that is, the readers) to their wares. Their wares are newspapers of four or six pages that go out every day or evening in order to inject in the mind of the reader ways of feeling and judging the facts of current politics appropriate for the producers and sellers of the press.
We would like to discuss, with the workers especially, the importance and seriousness of this apparently innocent act, which consists in choosing the newspaper you subscribe to. It is a choice full of snares and dangers which must be made consciously, applying criteria and after mature reflection.
Above all, the worker must resolutely reject any solidarity with a bourgeois newspaper. And he must always, always, always remember that the bourgeois newspaper (whatever its hue) is an instrument of struggle motivated by ideas and interests that are contrary to his. Everything that is published is influenced by one idea: that of serving the dominant class, and which is ineluctably translated into a fact: that of combating the laboring class. And in fact, from the first to the last line the bourgeois newspaper smells of and reveals this preoccupation.
But the beautiful – that is the ugly – thing is this: that instead of asking for money from the bourgeois class to support it in its pitiless work in its favor, the bourgeois newspapers manage to be paid by...the same laboring classes that they always combat. And the laboring class pays; punctually, generously.
Hundreds of thousands of workers regularly and daily give their pennies to the bourgeois newspapers, thus assisting in creating their power. Why? If you were to ask this of the first worker you were to see on the tram or the street with a bourgeois paper spread before him you would hear ** “Because I need to hear about what happening.” And it would never enter his head that the news and the ingredients with which it is cooked are exposed with an art that guides his ideas and influences his spirit in a given direction. And yet he knows that this newspaper is opportunist, and that one is for the rich, that the third, the fourth, the fifth is tied to political groups with interests diametrically opposed to his.**
And so every day this same worker is able to personally see that the bourgeois newspapers tell even the simplest of facts in a way that favors the bourgeois class and damns the working class and its politics. Has a strike broken out? The workers are always wrong as far as the bourgeois newspapers are concerned. Is there a demonstration? The demonstrators are always wrong, solely because they are workers they are always hotheads, rioters, hoodlums. The government passes a law? It’s always good, useful and just, even if it’s...not. And if there’s an electoral, political or administrative struggle? The best programs and candidates are always those of the bourgeois parties.
** And we’re aren’t even talking about all the facts that the bourgeois newspapers either keep quiet about, or travesty, or falsify in order to mislead, delude or maintain in ignorance the laboring public. Despite this, the culpable acquiescence of the worker to the bourgeois newspapers is limitless. We have to react against this and recall the worker to the correct evaluation of reality. We have to say and repeat that the pennies tossed there distractedly into the hands of the newsboy are projectiles granted to a bourgeois newspaper, which will hurl it, at the opportune moment, against the working masses.**
If the workers were to be persuaded of this most elementary of truths they would learn to boycott the bourgeois press with the same unity and discipline that the bourgeoisie boycott the newspapers of the workers, that is, the Socialist press. Don’t give financial assistance to the bourgeois press, which is your adversary. This is what should be our battle cry in this moment that is characterized by the subscription campaigns of all the bourgeois newspapers. Boycott them, boycott them, boycott them!
Those bolded parts are the most important, with the best point being "And we’re aren’t even talking about all the facts that the bourgeois newspapers either keep quiet about, or travesty, or falsify in order to mislead, delude or maintain in ignorance the laboring public. Despite this, the culpable acquiescence of the worker to the bourgeois newspapers is limitless. We have to react against this and recall the worker to the correct evaluation of reality. We have to say and repeat that the pennies tossed there distractedly into the hands of the newsboy are projectiles granted to a bourgeois newspaper, which will hurl it, at the opportune moment, against the working masses.**"
Even if you make them tell "the truth" bourgeoise media will always be counter-revolutionary
I don't disagree with most of what you wrote, but we are a long way off from having state-controlled egalitarian media, and within the parameters of what's possible in the short term, tweaking the existing laws to make media less shitty is something that's attainable, and would do a lot of good.
I know it's "lib" to say that short term fixes are good steps to take, and a lot of times it's bullshit (ex.: ACA), but sometimes it is actually true. The media conglomerates have done so much damage to left discourse in the past 40 years, the left is on the brink of not even existing in this country. I think that before we can even think of organizing anything resembling a revolutionary narrative in this country, you have to turn the media switch back on first.
In what way was I ever talking about what is achievable for a western left? I said why I hate the free press and want it destroyed. That's like responding to someone saying "death to the american empire" with how under FDR the US was less involved in wars for those first 2 terms and we really are not close to creating a pacifistic american communist state; so really it should be "weakness to flagrant imperialism so we can fund social programs". Its totally missing the forest for the trees.
I cannot fucking deal with these smug fucks. Like I am glad trump made journalists feel upset and scared, they deserve twice what they felt trump was doing to them. Complete scourge on humanity, there is no place for communicating with the jingoistic genocidaires. They serve no positive function in society. abolish the free press
How did that come across as a statement specifically on what "the left" in america can or should agitate for in terms of policy in the present moment? deflecting to "well we cant think about that right now" or "it'd just be too hard" as if that was what was being spoken about is a kneejerk reaction. Who is "we"? why do you presume that statement was about strategy or hopes for policy for the left in america at the moment? All rhetoric does not need to be filtered through american liberal democracy brain, leftist thought let alone shit-posting is not about what is "within-reach" of american radlibs. Dont lower your views and opinions based on that shit. Its defeatism to the liberal pessimism
But even in terms of what "we the left" or whatever can do, there is no media switch for us, never has been one nor can there ever be one. Using our own party press for organizing is super important, but if we are talking pre-revolution strategies and not just what would be the correct way for things to be, then no caring about a more "free" free press is not a project for the left. Amid the most rampant yellow journalism communists organized and unions had their own papers. and when those become illegal, you just keep distributing illegally instead of caring about liberal ideals such as a free press.
We have to say and repeat that the pennies tossed there distractedly into the hands of the newsboy are projectiles granted to a bourgeois newspaper, which will hurl it, at the opportune moment, against the working masses
We do NOT need to turn the media switch back on, that is pure liberalism . Any organizing through newsprint will, like Lenin said, be through its use as a form of collectivized organizing. Not any form of free press or news media. Empowering the media or the fetish for an informed public is not a positive short term fix. The existence of bourgeoise press means any revolutionary movement is at risk, we cannot bounce off of it or use it as a stepping stool. If we can speak openly then do so but do not push for the ability of the enemy to do the same, and do not buy into the idea that there is a "free press".
In all his works devoted to the theme of "capitalism and the press", Lenin saw the bourgeois press as an organic component of the superstructure of capitalist society with all the consequences that this entailed. For example ** he linked the issue of freedom of the press with that of bourgeois freedom generally, the bourgeois attitudes to slogans of freedom of conscience, assembly and speech in the process of historical development (from sincere proclamations when fighting feudalism to blatant opportunism and utter violation when fighting socialism). What freedom of the press for the working people can there be in present-day capitalist countries,** when the printing and publishing, the paper mills and warehouses, the advertising business and so on are all in the hands of the capitalists ? Lenin put this question every time he touched upon the theme of "capitalism and the press". He did not go into a great deal of detail since the answer was fairly obvious. There could be no prevaricating : one cannot talk of any freedom of the press for working people in such conditions, one can only talk of freedom of the press for the propertied classes. "All over the world, wherever there are capitalists, freedom of the press means freedom to buy up newspapers, to buy writers, to bribe, buy and fake 'public opinion' for the benefit of the bourgeoisie."
The myth of the bourgeois press as an expression of public opinion was created by bourgeois theoreticians of journalism so as to mask its class nature. Bourgeois sociologists saw the category of "public opinion" as existing independently of class contradictions within capitalist society. They always presented it as an arithmetical mean of popular will. It was precisely the bourgeois press, in their view, which expressed that arithmetical mean. They never cared to observe that, before expressing "public opinion", the bourgeoisie spends vast quantities of money moulding it with the aid of that very press, and nowadays with the help of television and radio as well. Bearing this circumstance in mind, Lenin almost invariably put this concept in inverted commas or added "so-called public opinion"
In treating the press as a superstructural category, Lenin arrived at a very important conclusion : the press does more than express the interests of the ruling class, it actively defends them and is a weapon used to safeguard those interests. What is more, it is always both a partisan and a class force No bourgeois paper or journal can stand aside from partisan differentiation of the big, medium and petty bourgeoisie. Lenin regarded attempts by editorial boards to advertise their publications as exclusively non-partisan or being above partisan strife as either political blindness or a deliberate ploy or device calculated to gain a wider readership and to deceive the working people. He always mocked publishers' claims being non-partisan.
You cannot divorce "freedom of the press" from bourgeoise conceptions of freedom, and if your instinct upon seeing the sanctity of the free press be rhetorically shat on is to try to justify it and defend its "utility" or find some other circumstance in which it can be "better", then that is a liberal hangup you still have. Don't determine what you believe should happen or how society should be run be determined by what you can get away with under liberalism. The concept of freedom of the press is liberal, and stating that and that the idea should be abolished and opposed has nothing to do with what progressives can or cannot manage in the US.
The attitude of a leftist towards the free press, particularly on matters of war should be at a bare minimum what Connolly says here
If each country hanged its own Foreign Minister and Cabinet before setting out to the front, wars would not last long; and if a jingo editor were hanged each week it lasted, the most jingo being the first to hang, not many angry passions would be stirred up to make the work of peaceful understanding difficult.
Wanting such a desirable result the workers must realise now that all the machinery of the State, and all the extra machinery now being set up to aid the State, are being deliberately utilised to accentuate the weakness of the individual worker, to intensify the dependence of his dear ones upon charitable and anti-labour organisations, to concentrate in the hands of the enemies of his class all the new agencies of government as well as the old, and in short, to weaken, discredit and destroy every power that the workers have hitherto built up as weapons for their peaceful social regeneration.
Our trade unions are attacked by every insidious weapon, our standard of life is menaced in a thousand evil ways, a corrupt press calls aloud for the suppression of every Irish journal that refuses to prostitute itself. The time is ripe for a forward move against all those gathering forces of evil, every man and woman who has reaped the advantages which organised Labour has won in the past must now rally to the flag. All jealousies must be forgotten, all rivalries laid aside.
Labour is the only force that can save Labour. Rally then to save Labour from its encircling enemies, and know that in saving Labour you save the most effective force for the redemption of Ireland.
Anything short of opposition to this superstructure is assistance to it
That's not a "free press" then because the gov is approving it first. free press is a bourgeois concept
Semantically you're right, but what the US had under the Fairness Doctrine was a lot better than the utter dystopian nat-sec propaganda machine we have now.
It's fair to say that there were still shitty corporate elements to the media back in, say, 1975, but at least there were credible journalists on major media outlets opposing war. The mere concept of that is unthinkable in 2022. Except if it's Cucker Tarlson who takes a good anti-war position cynically to rope in people to white nationalism.
I still would say I'd want that banned. Incrementally going back to less evil media is just acquiescing to the liberals' concern trolling and giving them some power. Look at the "free press" of WW1 or during the Russian Civil War. Or for the 70s you had some, emphasis on some, marginally anti war (really anti-draft not anti-war) media that wanted troops brought home, but at the same time couched it in virulent anti-communist and anti-Viet-Minh shit.
I see no reason to return to the days of the "soviet expert" and the cold war liberal narratives just because they sometimes didn't back every imperial action as readily. Why would you do that instead of removing the free press fetish? Any revolutionary society by necessity HAS to shut that shit down. Just giving it a bit of an opening helped spur the end of the USSR and halt popular opposition until it was too late. Under the fairness doctrine it was still a nat-sec propaganda machine, I have no clue how wanting none of that whatsoever is "semantics", its fundamental to removing liberal intelligentcia. No Marxist should back the idea of any remnant of liberal hegemony being allowed to have any power, or to yearn for it.
We don't have to say "or we could do a nicer liberal order", that is not an option. Fairness doctrine era allowed for there to be fewer monopolies on who could say the broadly same liberal capitalist consent manufacturing. That's IT. That press still in its totality was harmful to revolution and leftist movements. Any improvements over today in specific topics dont change that. Press can only be worthwhile in a socialist society when the entire system of news media is destroyed. It would have to be collectivized and highly regulated by communist views. a supposed "free press" cannot do that. Free press allows for counter-revolutionary reporting and obfuscation, with maybe the hope of regulating blatant lies.
per Gramsci
** And we’re aren’t even talking about all the facts that the bourgeois newspapers either keep quiet about, or travesty, or falsify in order to mislead, delude or maintain in ignorance the laboring public. Despite this, the culpable acquiescence of the worker to the bourgeois newspapers is limitless. We have to react against this and recall the worker to the correct evaluation of reality. We have to say and repeat that the pennies tossed there distractedly into the hands of the newsboy are projectiles granted to a bourgeois newspaper, which will hurl it, at the opportune moment, against the working masses.**
Those bolded parts are the most important, with the best point being "And we’re aren’t even talking about all the facts that the bourgeois newspapers either keep quiet about, or travesty, or falsify in order to mislead, delude or maintain in ignorance the laboring public. Despite this, the culpable acquiescence of the worker to the bourgeois newspapers is limitless. We have to react against this and recall the worker to the correct evaluation of reality. We have to say and repeat that the pennies tossed there distractedly into the hands of the newsboy are projectiles granted to a bourgeois newspaper, which will hurl it, at the opportune moment, against the working masses.**"
Even if you make them tell "the truth" bourgeoise media will always be counter-revolutionary
https://www.marxists.org/archive/gramsci/1916/12/newspapers.htm
I don't disagree with most of what you wrote, but we are a long way off from having state-controlled egalitarian media, and within the parameters of what's possible in the short term, tweaking the existing laws to make media less shitty is something that's attainable, and would do a lot of good.
I know it's "lib" to say that short term fixes are good steps to take, and a lot of times it's bullshit (ex.: ACA), but sometimes it is actually true. The media conglomerates have done so much damage to left discourse in the past 40 years, the left is on the brink of not even existing in this country. I think that before we can even think of organizing anything resembling a revolutionary narrative in this country, you have to turn the media switch back on first.
In what way was I ever talking about what is achievable for a western left? I said why I hate the free press and want it destroyed. That's like responding to someone saying "death to the american empire" with how under FDR the US was less involved in wars for those first 2 terms and we really are not close to creating a pacifistic american communist state; so really it should be "weakness to flagrant imperialism so we can fund social programs". Its totally missing the forest for the trees.
How did that come across as a statement specifically on what "the left" in america can or should agitate for in terms of policy in the present moment? deflecting to "well we cant think about that right now" or "it'd just be too hard" as if that was what was being spoken about is a kneejerk reaction. Who is "we"? why do you presume that statement was about strategy or hopes for policy for the left in america at the moment? All rhetoric does not need to be filtered through american liberal democracy brain, leftist thought let alone shit-posting is not about what is "within-reach" of american radlibs. Dont lower your views and opinions based on that shit. Its defeatism to the liberal pessimism
But even in terms of what "we the left" or whatever can do, there is no media switch for us, never has been one nor can there ever be one. Using our own party press for organizing is super important, but if we are talking pre-revolution strategies and not just what would be the correct way for things to be, then no caring about a more "free" free press is not a project for the left. Amid the most rampant yellow journalism communists organized and unions had their own papers. and when those become illegal, you just keep distributing illegally instead of caring about liberal ideals such as a free press.
We do NOT need to turn the media switch back on, that is pure liberalism . Any organizing through newsprint will, like Lenin said, be through its use as a form of collectivized organizing. Not any form of free press or news media. Empowering the media or the fetish for an informed public is not a positive short term fix. The existence of bourgeoise press means any revolutionary movement is at risk, we cannot bounce off of it or use it as a stepping stool. If we can speak openly then do so but do not push for the ability of the enemy to do the same, and do not buy into the idea that there is a "free press".
https://www.marxists.org/subject/art/lit_crit/baluyev.pdf
You cannot divorce "freedom of the press" from bourgeoise conceptions of freedom, and if your instinct upon seeing the sanctity of the free press be rhetorically shat on is to try to justify it and defend its "utility" or find some other circumstance in which it can be "better", then that is a liberal hangup you still have. Don't determine what you believe should happen or how society should be run be determined by what you can get away with under liberalism. The concept of freedom of the press is liberal, and stating that and that the idea should be abolished and opposed has nothing to do with what progressives can or cannot manage in the US.
The attitude of a leftist towards the free press, particularly on matters of war should be at a bare minimum what Connolly says here
Anything short of opposition to this superstructure is assistance to it