Between the image and the reality, falls a shadow. Marco Weeks explores the nature of this shadow as it is created in the mass media in the United States.

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One evening last September (2003) I pulled up the BBC international news on the web. The home page of the international section showed a chaotic, littered urban setting with a scruffy young guy hurling a rock. The caption of the photo read: “Everyday life in Ramallah.” Ordinarily I suppose my first reaction would have been ... what a terrible place; I’ll never go there. Except, I was there. In fact I had been in Palestine for several weeks on an assignment to help evaluate a Forum Theatre project which is promoting human rights. Most of my assignments end up being in countries with some form of civil disturbance and a high risk for violence going on somewhere, but ironically my assignment in Palestine was one of the most peaceful assignments which I’ve ever had. Except for the Israeli military check points, I never saw nor heard one indication of violence. Of course I realize that there are many incidents of horror, pain and suffering for both Israelis and Palestinians. Even several events occurred while I was there, including the bombing of an apartment complex in Ramallah. But I was fortunate, always at a different location and at a different time. All I ever saw were people, like anywhere, going about their daily lives: getting to and from work, shopping, or perhaps going to meet with friends and relatives.

The people with whom I worked and met in Palestine are highly educated, very skilled, and with a consistent purpose: improving the quality of life for people. They are emotionally opposed to violence; any form, any side. In fact high school students told us that even excluding a classmate from your social circle is a form of violence. But instead, the media consistently reports on the few, those youth without work, without hope, and without a future who in despair elect to destroy themselves and anyone else who happens to be around them. Sadly, many of my African friends and colleagues seem to view Palestine and terrorism as the same. Yet ironically, many of my acquaintances from outside of Africa view “Africa” as one state, inhabited only by malnourished children, AIDS victims, and people mutilated from senseless violence. So why do we have these similar yet distorted views on other cultures? Because this is what the media feeds us. Presenting violence and evil stereotypes sells.

Remember Smallpox? Probably not. But it wasn’t too long ago that the American news media, from prompting by the White House, was frightening Americans with the idea of massive bioterrorism from smallpox. Smallpox is probably the earliest use of mass bioterrorism. The Europeans used it quite effectively on the native populations in the Americas. But it is a pretty difficult to comprehend that several hundred years later, it’s still being used by a government for controlling people, even after having been eliminated as a disease threat in 1978. Never mind that the United States and Russia still maintain stockpiles of the virus, and that Russia can’t even successfully launch a missile these days. The news media’s coverage of the Whitehouse’s smallpox scare only reported on statements by scientists and government officials, whose salaries come from where? Of course there is a “risk” for smallpox. But there is also a risk for a meteorite landing on my head as I type these very words. And it doesn’t require too much analytical thought to ask yourself: Why would any “terrorist” go to all of the trouble of even trying to find an obscure virus and then go to the extreme efforts of trying to smuggle and transmit it effectively, when all they have to do in America is go the neighborhood gun shop and pick up a military assault weapon or high powered rifle?

And who is a “terrorist” anyway? Well don’t worry, you don’t have to think too much; the media defines it for us. A terrorist is male from the Middle East who practices Islam and wants to destroy democracy and undermine the values of Europeans and Americans. But while the political leaders and the corporate media were frightening, or controlling Americans with Smallpox and an invasion of foreign terrorists, look what was happening in Washington D.C. Two lone individuals, without any political, national, or religious motives, were terrorizing communities with random sniper attacks. Domestic terrorism, the daily tally of gun shot victims, continuing school violence, hardly newsworthy is it? And where is the smallpox threat in today’s news? Didn’t work; forget about it. Doesn’t sell anymore, or make people watch the media’s corporate funders advertising.

While the media presents today’s war as hi tech with laser guided bombs and video clips provided by the military on precision hits on the “enemy,” and uses the standard Hollywood themes like: “weapons of mass destruction” or getting the bad guys, really the most effective weapon for the US military today is very unsophisticated, media control. The American military learned the power of the press from the Vietnam “conflict.” Back then, the political leaders naively tried to control Americans by calling the involvement in Vietnam a “conflict,” not a war. Didn’t work. In those days the press worked in a more democratic environment, with wider freedom to cover and report on what they were seeing. However, the media’s freedom presented video coverage of American soldiers and innocent women and children suffering, and daily body counts on American soldiers killed. Today, the media is spoon fed by the military. Now the media uses the military’s terms, like: “friendly fire,” “collateral damage,” “non combatant injury.” A while back I was watching a press briefing by the an army press officer after the American military had blown up a family of several children and their father in Afghanistan. The soldier presenting the briefing on this “collateral damage” coolly stated that the children had died because “a wall had fallen on them.”

Today’s “body counts” of American soldiers and contractors in Iraq are obscure and disconnected. Two here, three there ... not really big news is it? The military says that they cannot present figures on soldiers wounded, because ... they can’t define “wounded.” You really have to search deeply, use European news sources and the internet to get the true picture. The media corporations tell the American public that about 500 American soldiers have been killed so far. But in reading “Yes!” a journal published in the USA, which unfortunately is not too widely circulated, I learned that at the end of 2003, 10,854 US troops had been killed, wounded, or medically evacuated from Iraq.

While the alarming increased rate of suicide among US troops in Iraq began receiving attention in the European press about 5 months ago, the American media is only now giving front page coverage. I suppose that it has been considered unpatriotic and unsupportive to raise the issue of the immediate and long term mental health difficulties for those very young Americans who have elected to serve their country, but are now suddenly thrust into a life threatening environment among people with a language they cannot speak, a religion they do not understand, and a history and they know nothing about.

The Washington Post reports that it is very difficult getting information from the military on their actual suicide rate. The 20% increase in suicide reported by the military is no doubt an underestimate. For example, any suicide which occurs after an evacuation from the country is not attributed to serving in Iraq. The military labels a self inflicted wound as “a non hostile gun shot wound,” or as “friendly fire.” Some suicides may never even be reported.” Well, if a trained soldier becomes wounded or dies from a “non hostile gun shot wound,” then such incidents demonstrate that, at the very least, a critical evaluation of the US military’s weapons training program is urgently needed.

Not only the military, but the politicians have also become masters of control using the media. Mainstream America has been conditioned to believe that questioning the actions of the political leaders in power is unpatriotic, “United we stand.” Anti war demonstrations receive little coverage, unlike the daily coverage of the anti Vietnam war demonstrations of the sixties. U.S. Government Park officials in Washington D.C. wisely no longer give crowd estimates on demonstrations, which could harm the president’s approval rating. If it wasn’t for today’s independent internet, we would hardly know about opposition or scheduled demonstrations at all.

While violent and despotic regimes control simply by eliminating the opposition, the passive aggressive approach in the industrialized world applied by certain politicians and the corporate controlled media, eliminates thinking. Politicians want their constituents to believe that they are protecting them; and if they don’t get re-elected, the opposing candidate will let terrorists into the back door of their homes. The corporations want people to consume, mindlessly. Happiness is being a “TV saturated consumerist.” Think about cell phone plans, a new and bigger four wheel drive vehicle; surf 200 channels.

There’s no need to be concerned about children dieing and suffering because of bombed out power and water systems. Watch “reality;” you don’t have to experience or think about it. While Hollywood spends money on productions, sets, actors and actresses to present “reality,” all they really have to do is send these sexy actors and actresses to Bangladesh for one day and have them try to earn a days wage pedaling a rickshaw. Of course such a show would not provide any action, for these young, over fed people showing TV viewers “reality” wouldn’t even be able to walk given the amount of calories that a rickshaw puller gets in one day. This is reality. And why think about the ethical, moral and political issues of occupying Iraq, when the media emphasizes greater issues like revealing a rock stars breast on television, and government control on with whom one can partner. Now the politicians can divert the voters from Iraq to “decency in the media.” Never mind that every night TV sitcoms bombard viewers with adolescent jokes about casual sex. Never mind that there is a global pandemic of a sexually transmitted disease with casual sex as the greatest risk factor.

While the “TV saturated consumerist,” media control epidemic has infected most Americans, sadly, the epidemic is spreading globally with the increased availability of satellite television and the global networks. I was on an assignment in Uganda when the Bush administration launched its invasion of Iraq. As much as I could stand, which was very little, I watched CNN show the “shock and awe,” the flashes in the sky, the high tech war. What they didn’t show or mention were the civilians. What they didn’t tell, which I later learned through the Guardian, is what happens before the high tech stuff. The military’s real target is the civilian population, the life support systems. First the military sends unmanned drones which drop metal fragment bombs to knock out power systems, this means everyone’s water supply, electricity for hospitals, and no way to contact your loved ones by telephone. So while we hear on CNN about the few “bad guys” who have been killed by highly selective bombing of a GPS programmed bunker, communication or radar site, thousands of children die of dehydration and lack of functioning health facilities. But this isn’t news worthy, is it? In fact if you think about it for a few seconds, in today’s “hi tech” war it’s actually safer to be in the opposing army, than a civilian.

As the satellite TV networks presented their video clips of the ‘shock and awe,’ a 12 year old student in Uganda provided this analysis of the invasion of Iraq, much more insightful, and as we now know more accurate than the sophisticated technology and newscasters of CNN had to offer.

“I hear the war is about Bin Laden. He is sort of a witch and might not be a human being. They failed to get him when Afghanistan was bombed. Now America says he is in Iraq. I feel sorry for the Iraqis because they are going to shed a lot of blood. I feel sorry for Bush because Bin Laden destroyed their biggest buildings, but I don’t support war. Saddam is not a dangerous man like Bin Laden. I think Bush wants to rule Iraq and take her oil.”

Sadly, most places I travel to are now watching CNN, American “reality” shows, videos of police catching a supposed criminal, or a commercial wrestler banging a chair on someone’s head. This is our role model from the developed world for the rest of the world.

Despite what I have just written, I’m optimistic about the future. History shows that people can be controlled only so long. The people will not allow the corporate and self interest of politicians to control them forever, this time by the media. As I mentioned earlier, the internet increasingly provides independent and alternative information, countering the corporate and political propaganda. While the web also has elements of control and disinformation, it promotes movements and organization against oppression and control. With increasing access to non corporate information sources like Politics of Health, more and more will learn from independent analysis about the real issues, rather than just from media corporation sound bites and video clips. And, as the 12 year old boy in Uganda shows us, while many adults educated in the ‘developed’ world have lost interest in thinking, the children of the world have not.