Aug

30

Mair on Media

August 30, 2005 |

Surely, in this highly technical age where billions of dollars move from account to account in a nano-second, where one’s car has probably been made in four countries, where my Amex Bill is processed in India and I get my long distance phone information from Texas, in an era where there are no secrets, where the police can scan your emails and where the state becomes more powerful by the minute — surely there is a greater need for tough journalism than there ever was. Is it just possible that the potential for the muckraker would be greater than ever if the media hadn’t become so corporate? Is the media so tightly controlled and so in bed with government and big business, so in thrall to the bean counter, that it doesn’t want anyone to make too many big waves?
rafe mair the tyee

Rafe is writing about a particular political culture which existed in BC from about 1960 to around 1990. Call it Webster land. The Oatmeal Savage was perfectly capable of saying, “There were seven drunks on the Supreme Court bench, I’ve got two, five to go.” Fotheringham, before he became a duke, was more than capable of digging on a political story and was not in the least adverse to a bit of juicy business gossip. These guys were fearless, smart and very much a part of the political landscape.

Now we have the boringly predictable, feminine, CBC which confuses investigative journalism with the repetition of Naomi Klein’s latest lunacy, a bunch of information radio shows where authors show up to pitch their books, newspapers which have ceased to do any sort of serious investigative journalism and are concentrating on brad Pitt’s relative gayness, a bunch of freebie tabloids which are good news all the time.

The problem is, as Mair points out, the fact that the bean counters know that the general public does not want to know. They do not want journalists or talk show hosts with a position because having a position means that you will alienate at least part of the audience. Can’t have that. So the poor public gets pap served up as news and the politicians get a free pass.


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