“The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum.” -Noam Chomsky
We’ve heard a lot about Fake News recently. But “Project Censored” exposes an even bigger problem than Fake News: Real News.
The news is pure trash. The only possible way that an American can understand what is going on in the world is to turn off the news for good. The powerful and important documentary “Project Censored” explains why the news is so harmful and offers an exciting alternative to the nightly propaganda.
The film likens the Corporate Media to a magician. The news is a big, showy misdirection. Elites uses the news to avert your eyes away from the real world and the real issues that the Establishment doesn’t want you to think about.
Strategy #1 – the film says – is to feed us a daily dose of Junk Food News. Junk Food News is scandal, fluff, and celebrity gossip. While it is certainly true that we are less-informed and worse off due to Junk Food News, I think that the problem is our fault more than it is the Media’s.
We need to get together as a society and decide that the personal lives of politicians, sports stars, and celebrities are none of our business. We need to say: “Tiger Woods didn’t know about it when my marriage was falling apart and Tiger Woods didn’t judge me that time that I drove to the store after taking a prescription pill. So I have no right to know about his love life or judge him for his bad decisions.”
Strategy #2 – the film says – is to practice News Abuse. News Abuse is a more insidious problem. This is where the Media takes an important current event but twists it so much that we end up ignoring the important core issues. For example, “Project Censored” reminds us of the Jessica Lynch story. For a few weeks in 2013, Jessica Lynch was the face of the Iraq War. She was an adorable army private who was captured by the enemy and dramatically rescued.
The News Abuse misdirection worked like a charm. Millions of Americans were asking “did you hear about Pvt Lynch?” And few were asking the important question: “Which companies are benefitting financially from the War in Iraq? Let’s find out and boycott them until they go bankrupt.”
Project Censored isn’t just a movie, it is an active alt-News website that covers the substantive stories that the Corporate Media ignores.
To Project Censored, the most important story of the 21st Century is how the Federal Government has robbed us of our 800-year-old right to Habeas Corpus. If Washington labels you an enemy combatant, you can be arrested this very day and detained for the rest of your life without ever seeing a judge.
Be warned, left-wing readers: if you’re expecting to agree with the Project Censored guys, you will be disappointed and infuriated. This film is slightly more anti-Democrat than anti-Republican.
The ultimate hero to Project Censored is Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Everyone interviewed admires his selfless commitment to releasing unedited government documents that the Establishment doesn’t want you to read. They talk about Mr. Assange like he is literally Lady Liberty born into human flesh.
“Project Censored” is a forceful reminder that the same cadre of elites who run our government also own the Media.
On the surface, MSNBC and Fox News appear to be wildly different, but they are both on the same side. They argue back and forth about a few minor current events, while they work hand in hand to shield us from the major issues that face our world.