Be Aware of the Power of the Media...

Today, I read about a video aired by CNN recently in Breakpoint, an excellent Christian worldview daily email that I highly recommend. The video was made by insurgents in Iraq and shows a sniper shooting and killing an American soldier. In the video, the insurgents can be overheard talking about being careful to not harm any innocent people. CNN, after coming under fire for airing the video, has defended itself as simply showing the whole truth about what is happening in Iraq.

Now, I don't want to simply rehash the points made by Chuck Colson on Breakpoint, but they do bear a brief overview. First, it is clear from the large numbers of civilians who have been killed in the fighting in Iraq that the insurgents are not interested in protecting innocents. In fact, the death of these people, especially women and children, is known by the insurgents to be the most effective way of influencing us in America. So, their talk about protecting the innocents is meant only for us, to make Americans think that the insurgents are the heros and our soldiers the villians. Second, it is clear that the insurgents wanted CNN to air this video to help their position. It is timed close to our elections and obviously tilted to show the insurgents in a good light. Thus, I really think it should be considered a crime to have aired it, call it aiding the enemy, and I certainly hope that the US military follows through on its threat to ban CNN reporters from military units and operations. Third, Colson made the point that CNN's claim that it is simply showing the whole truth cannot possibly be true. This last point is what I would like to expand upon further.

I guess I need to start out by saying that it is impossible to communicate anything more complex than a simple fact (such as "my shoes are red") without shading the information with presuppositions and desired outcomes. This is mostly true just because of the enormous amount of information that is involved in any significant event. The information simply must be narrowed down into something that can be related easily. For example, think of a car crash. If all the information about that crash was related to a person, it would include full interviews of each person involved, each police officer that responded, each witness, a police report detailing the event and who was responsible, insurance reports about what it might cost to fix the damage, and on and on. If this were put on the evening news, it would take literally days of video to relay, and it would never be complete as it would be impossible to get inside the people's heads and know what they were thinking/feeling at that moment. So, we should always remember that the events related to us are incomplete.

Added to this, we must consider the motives of the executives in control of the news programs. First, they are motived by money. They receive money through their advertising, and they can charge more for commercial spots when they have more people watching the show. So, they are motivated to air the most emotive and exciting events that they can to draw attention. Unfortunately, because of the condition of fallen man, we seem to be most attracted to events that are gruesome and evil. Second, many of these executives are among what has been called the cultural elite of America, which is a loosely defined group of people using their power to mold American thought how they see fit - following a liberal agenda. They often use TV as a tool, and an effective one, to push their ideas. Usually this is not overt, but hidden in the messages of popular shows.

Speaking of that, it is important to point out the impact media has on our thoughts by introducing ideas in a prepackaged way. This is especially true of TV, since it does so through images. At least print media allows people to play with the ideas in their heads through their imaginations. TV takes that away by presenting the idea in an image that is already set for people. It literally does our thinking for us. We shouldn't be surprised by that, since TV dictates to such a great degree our clothing and hair styles and even our social mores. It also plays on the old idea that seeing is believing. However, anyone who delves a little deeper knows that, with TV, seeing is not necessarily believing.

In conclusion, I am suggesting that, even here where the freedom of the press is written into our Constitution, the press needs to be held accountable. Certainly, freedom has never meant lack of responsibility/accountability. We Christians should be careful to not buy the media's point of view without examining it. To allow such a powerful influence past our defenses is a giant mistake.