Apropos the times, in Covid-Speak government propaganda and lies spread by compliant media are a war-mongering contagion and the only vaccine is the Truth.. and where do you get it? At principled alternative media sites like Pearls & Irritations. They save lives.
The BBC and the ABC have become dangerous to democracy and humanity. When I was a kid, the posh britishness of the BBC oozed trust but something’s happened to its credibility post Iraq war. Pilger gives a clue to the happening – the hankering for the resurgence of the brutish glory days of the British empire (albeit on the coattails of the US empire);
“Not a year has passed since peace was declared in 1945 that Britain has not sent military forces to fight the wars of empire.
Not a year has passed when countries, mostly poor and riven by conflict, have not bought or have been “soft loaned” British arms to further the wars, or “interests”, of empire.”
Ever devoid of originality, moral fortitude and vision, Australia has mimicked Mother England’s blind ceding of its moral sovereignty to USA imperialism which, ironically, is in its death throes as its economy and society self-destructs.
Notwithstanding, the BBC and its sidekick the ABC are doing their bit to promote US interests by spruiking the venom of the US smear campaign this time against China.
On 15-12-20, The Drum shared the BBC report and surprisingly Fanning didn’t choke on asserting the evidence of China’s enslavement of Ughyur cotton pickers was ‘irrefutable’. Australia’s condemnation led by the US funded Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) smacks of hypocrisy: the colonial enthusiasm for slavery and stolen-never-compensated wages of Indigenous workers and the blackbirding of Pacific Islanders prevails in today’s enslavery and exploitation of Uber Eats drivers, foreign students, fruit pickers and seasonal workers.
The Uyghur ‘scandal’ is swallowed uncritically, but is it fair dinkum? You won’t find the answer in mainstream media, however Andre Vltchek’s March of the Uyghurs challenges and unmasks the destabilisation of China high on the US/UK save-our-empire agenda.
For me, Palestine activism has long ago determined anything reported by the BBC/ABC is propaganda.
Back in September 2010, the ABC Foreign Correspondent’s showing of the BBC Panorama’s highly controversial ‘documentary Dea
The BBC had cast aside its “main responsibility is to provide impartial public service broadcasting” by distorting the truth into a fantasy that morphed trigger-happy Israeli commandoes into VICTIMS!
When in fact, at 4 a.m inside international waters the Jewish commandoes slaughtered nine unarmed Turkish humanitarians one of whom was a young 19 year-old Turkish American student. No US protest was forthcoming. In the illegal raid, five Australians, including Paul McGeough were kidnapped but no protest from the Australian government was forthcoming. No intelligent condemnation of propaganda and media cover-up from MediaWatch was forthcoming.
That the BBC has waded up to its neck into the Zionist mire of war crimes coverups was brazenly obvious in its strident sham slurs of anti-semitism against Corbyn and the Labour Party in its Panorama documentary, Is Labour Anti-Semitic?
“Labour’s 28-page complaint to the BBC said the episode of Panorama did not meet the broadcaster’s standards because of “the tendentious and politically slanted script; the bias in the selection of interviewees; and the failure to identify the political affiliations or records of interviewees in a highly controversial, sensitive and contested subject produced a programme that was a one-sided authored polemic”.
The bogus anti-semitism accusations spouted by the BBC and the ABC are yet another variation of the theme of Israeli Victimhood. The milking of antisemitism and the Holocaust to ensure Israel’s impunity for atrocities dishonours real victims of real antisemitism.
The consequences of such BBC and ABC state-sponsored lies are catastrophic and criminal; our democracy is sabotaged and real victims, in the zionist matter, real Palestinian families suffer and die.
As for Australia belligerently stirring the hornet nest of China trade, no-one has yet considered the dire economic consequences if China decides to go down the cutting-exports-track whereby the majority of (mainly LNP voting) non-food retail businesses will go broke. Everything is pretty much made in China thanks to the profit-obsessed greed of western capitalists that shifted local manufacture to China. Australia, then will clone the dire forthcoming USA’s economic implosion.
At the interface of the old American Century and the new Chinese century, our government has to choose which mode of winning hearts and minds is in the best interests of all present and future Australians – the violent USA/Israel military Shock and Awe or China’s non-violent One Belt One Road infrastructure initiative.
Dr. Vacy Vlazna is Coordinator of Justice for Palestine Matters. She is the author of East Timor: Reveille for Courage, editor of a volume of Palestinian poetry, I remember my name and writes political commentary for a number of independent online magazines. She was Human Rights Advisor to the GAM team in the second round of the Acheh peace talks, Helsinki, February 2005 then withdrew on principle. Vacy was convenor of Australia East Timor Association and coordinator of the East Timor Justice Lobby as well as serving in East Timor with UNAMET and UNTAET from 1999-2001.
Comments
15 responses to “BBC & ABC threatening hearts and minds”
On December 1st, 2020, a number of American mainstream media reported this landmark US CDC findings (see link below) but this news was largely ignored by Australian MSM including our beloved and trusted ABC (and the BBC).
Study Suggests Covid-19 Was In The U.S. Weeks Earlier Than Thought, Before First Public Cases In China
https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart/2020/12/01/study-suggests-covid-19-was-in-the-us-weeks-earlier-than-thought-before-first-public-cases-in-china/?sh=1c8fba104bf8
The last time I googled, this news was not found in either of ABC and BBC archives. Perhaps it’s the search engines’ fault.
Sections of the partisan American MSM needed to exorcise one of Trump’s legacies – the “Chinese Virus”. They clearly have political motives to publicise this evidence-based US CDC serological findings which undermined Trump’s credibility and “Chinese Virus” narrative.
The “Chinese virus” continues to be Morrison’s and Australian MSM’s anti-China narrative.
Perhaps nationalism requires our beloved ABC to protect the Australian public from “foreign influence”, in this instance, a peer-reviewed US CDC serological findings that undermined one of Canberra’s key anti-China narratives.
“The lie is not in what we are told but what we are not told.”
Noam Chomsky said:
“Propaganda is to a democracy what a bludgeon is to a totalitarian state”
It is the American virus blockading the Northern Beaches.
Our elites are facing their Versaille moment, I believe
There is a long history of using state broadcasters as spies. Gatekeeper theory demands that the state keep an eye on whistleblowers and the like.
Propaganda is another duty.
Spying overseas also, now somewhat displaced by NGOs and infiltration into the UN and other agencies.
That is why the ABC budget appears so large. The “Liberals” cannot cut too much else the covert functions disappear. China has the same duties. All governments have more in common than with those they rule.
However, why do neither carry the news of a disappointing ally?
Japan has the plutonium for 5,000 warheads, is in breach of agreements to send it to Europe and has suffered destruction at Fukushima. Not a word. The obvious implication is that if there be another war, Japan will lose that plutonium. They will never see that coming, cos the propaganda outlets never warned them, right?
Republics are so called because of public discussion of issues and suggested polcy solutions. Res Publica.
The point of prpaganda is to weaken and undermine opposition. Would public opposition to retention of plutonium not be likely to effective in helping the nominally “democratic” Japan to surrender that Plutonium?
Agree in general. It is increasingly difficult to support the ABC although we do need public broadcasting. The 4 Corners trip to America to support the Russiagate hoax was disgraceful and I’m not convinced the recent attack on Porter and Tudge was in the public interest. I recently watched a fine movie on the Palestinian issue called “Paradise Now,” broadcast on SBS.
Daily instances of less than accurate reporting are found on our ABC. A small instance: an item during RN’s PM program on December 22 dealt with the new claims by Navalny re his poisoning. By way of introducing the item the presenter stated that Navalny had become ill during a flight and that “the quick thinking pilot had diverted the plane to Germany”. Which, of course, is rubbish – a point I made in an immediate text to RN. What intrigues me is why the comment was made – simple ignorance or an attempt (Blair style) to “sex up” a report ? The audio on the program website has been edited to present the actual sequence of events as distinct from what went to air on the evening of Dec 22.
Characteristically incisive, revealing appraisal of BBC/ABC Establishment interests. Those interests have promoted US/Israeli/Australian/UK brutalities for so long. All the P&I comments confirm Vacy’s verdict. A frantic shift in Australian political parties attitudes, understanding and policies desperately needed in 2021.
In 2017, in the early days of ‘fake news’ revelations, I remember watching a group of BBC journalists and commentators complimenting themselves and the BBC that there was no ‘fake news’ on the BBC. It was a rare moment of hilarity, and it’s been down hill ever since.
Ms Vlazna,
Thank you, especially for posting the article by Andre Vltchek titled “March of the Uyghurs”. It provides the best and most comprehensive account of the Uyghur problem that I have read. I read the article with an open mind, knowing that Vltcheck is a self professed communist and that he was a pro-Chinese journalist. However, in those parts of his article mentioning incidences that I am familiar with, such as the arrest of Uyghurs in Thailand and the bombing off the Thai embassy in Turkey, and the role played by the Americans in the changeover of government in Indonesia when many Indonesians of Chinese descent were murdered, they all check out. Moreover, he has given names, places and other details to authenticate his assertion. It really sums up the fact that the the Uyghur problem has been politicised into a very unconscionable and dangerous game. I would urge all my fellow readers of P&I to read the article to obtain another point of view – especially by a journalist that details his sources.
The other part of your essay that I found very interesting is the increasing use of anti-semitism as a political tool. I have just read an account of it in the book “The End of Europe” by James Kirchick.
The mainstream we have trusted and loved are now engaged in partisan politics. In doing so nothing seems to be spared. As far as I can see it, the good journalists are still out there doing their best; but it is increasingly difficult to differentiate the good from the bad and the downright ugly.
Sincerely,
Teow Loon Ti
Alarm bells rang for me, Teow. with the bizarre US,UK and Oz concern for the Muslim Uyghurs when the West doesn’t give a damn anywhere else in the world for Muslims unless there is oil or arms up for grabs. Certainly doesn’t care for Muslim refugees fleeing Western war-ravaging or Palestinians, or Syrians, or Iranians, Iraqis, Libyans, Sudanese, Afghanis, Pakistanis , Bangladeshis etc etc so its concern could only be political self-interest.
Dr Vlazna,
I agree with you. What people forget is that intemperate behaviour comes at a cost; be it the gun violence in the US or the callous disregard for the pandemic, it costs human lives. Australia’s intemperate behaviour towards its largest trading partner is now taking a heavy toll on our business. We will have higher unemployment leading to more social problems. We will be economically less well off. It will take time and a lot of effort to rebuild what we had. Meanwhile, others forge ahead in an increasingly competitive world.
What we need is not a government that promises the world and delivers little, a government that sells its high “common values” with the US without telling us what that really means. We export our animals live to be treated and slaughtered brutally and manufacture weapons for sale. We have many politicians who, on retirement from politics, immediately join the arms manufacturers as executives. They are the ones that keep international conflicts alive to keep their business viable. It is not hard to see through the hypocrisy. What we need is a “responsible” government that will take care of its people, the environment and foster humane behaviour. Are we asking too much of them?
Sincerely,
Teow Loon Ti
Absolutely Teow. It is crucial we all remember that responsible government is the 24/7 responsibility of voters. The real power is with voters. With we the people.
Seriously? You believe we are a democracy? Sorry, you undermine your credibility…
Vacy stated that “The Uyghur ‘scandal’ is swallowed uncritically, but is it fair dinkum?”
The same could be said of many scandals covered by the ABC and BBC such as MH17, the Skripals, chemical weapons attacks in Syria and the poisoning of Navalny.
It appears that the role of both organisations, particularly on foreign affairs, is to manage a narrative on behalf of their respective governments rather than report the news.
That might explain why for example the ABC has not responded to a complaint I submitted about its failure to cover the scandal at the OPCW about the doctoring of its report into the alleged Douma chemical weapons attack despite a small mountain of evidence to suggest that is what occurred.
The Anglo-culture, as presented to the world for a century by the ABC and the BBC, used to be a mixture of good and bad, enlightenment and ugly self-interest. Over my quite long lifetime, the former has been fading. Honest reporting belonged to the former. It should be a relief to humanity that the Anglos are losing the ability to work together to exploit others.