smoke screens

[TMA_1]

Hey guys, I have asked this before, but the results given were not really satisfactory. The mass media, especially in broadcast news, is currupted by wealth and special interests, so much so that it is beyond mockery. Now when I watch it from time to time, it disturbs me. It makes me wonder how far the western world has declined. the mass media has even taken some good minds, and brainwashed them with issues of little importance compared to the issues that should really be talked about. it has become a whitewash of moral and ethical platitudes, and outside of the mock news services of radio,television, and the press, pop culture has things that are now playing to the most debased and animal instincts of humankind. Television can be summed up now to sex, violence, gossip, and intrigue. Anyways I am going off track. I was going to ask if there are any websites that give out the real beef, the real meat and potatoes. The stuff that is not talked about through the mass media and the mass of humanity. Where can I go to find the real truth about whats happening in this world? are there any blogs or websites that bring out what the heck is truly happening in this world? please help!! thanks :)

[Tatar Khan]

Media like anything else goes with what is demanded by the public as they see that ex, violence and etc are deanded by the public they provide more of it. The fact that they also contribute to this demand is true. The mass media find things that have the biggest appeal and the cheapest to produce. The appeal to basic instincts such as sex is easily done and has much wider appeal, slowly people will get saturated with this stuff and ask for something else.

As for the sites that tell the truth, well every single newspaper, radio, television station are all biased. The best way to find out more information is to look on mutiple sources, look not only at media in your country look into other countries. If you don't know their language many have versions in english of the same articles. look for Associated Press and Reuters associated sources they for sure have english translations.

[TMA_1]

thanks :-) could you direct me to some of these news outlets? Also, any good blogs that you know about? I really want to get to the core of whats really happening. Lately what I have been doing is looking at different biased forms of the media, and analysing them to dissect the truth from them.

Yes, it is understandable why sex and violence sells, the people watch it and the various forms of the media give what the people want. So really the people are to blame just as much as the media. But I cant help and think that if more constructive forms of entertainment and information were shown, that people would like to watch those things tht are more constructive. I could be wrong, maybe people really just want escapism through the sex and violence and simple story plots. In fact it probably is what most people want, which is why these things are growing to supply the desires of the people. It just kinda sucks I guess.

where do you guys get your news? where can I find the news not talked about in popular media?

[Andrew]

I visit fark.com to get the latest news/articles about what's going on in the world (mostly N.A.).

I watch The National for Canadian news, they usually have good segments that last the last 20 minutes or so about certain things. Last night was about crime in Toronto. CBC gave a black person a camera and he videotaped all the problems and such with crime/black community. Really Good. If you are fast you can watch that episode at the website (skip to about 1/2 way through) before they update sometime in the next 3 hours with tonights episode. The past couple weeks they did segments on the Muslim population in Toronto and the world. (warning last nights segment has disturbing language, which shows how nice CBC is not to censor out everything, to get to the truth/show reality)

Stop what you're doing and start searching!

Missing White Girl Syndrome is real.

Yah, The major networks in the US seem pretty bad for reporting news nowadays.

OMG Iran has nukes everybody panic! Seems they invaded the wrong country..., and they want everyone to live in fear.

[erjin999]

Try Al-Jazeera  ;D

[nemafakei]

You can get a lot of info from even 'mainstream' news, if you read between the lines. Things such as The Economist and (I think) the Wall Street Journal, which are designed with a high 'reagership' value rather than 'circulation' - i.e. people with a fair bit of money - tend to be more candid. Biased and dismissive of differing analyses, yes, but they actually report intelligently on the matters. So if The Economist says 'Mr So-and-so, a keen golfer and a close friend of President Uribe, whom he backed last election, is doing well out of the arms business, which has been burgeoning in Colombia as the government fight the Marxist FARC rebels, but he's worried about competition from smaller rivals...', you can read between the lines that Uribe gets campaign money from So-and-So Corp, who are paid handsomely by the Colombian taxpayer for their arms. How can they be so open? Well, it doesn't matter to their readers that this is happening. All that matters to them is the evidence and conclusion 'his fears may be right' (back the competition), or 'ultimately the problems of the small nterprise in arms are too large to overcome, especially at a time when the major player has a big state contract' (Back So-and-so).

Now, I've just made that story up (I'm almost certain that some such businessman does exist, mind), but it's worth looking at things from a really cynical point of view.