MEDIATHINK
Preface
In the aftermath of September 11, so uniform was the media perspective that it hardly matters which corporation you study. The Windsor Star, for example, carried barely a single critical word of objection (except for an occasional letter) versus literally hundreds of pages filled with faithful columnists, editorials and news stories championing the cause of war. The Montreal Gazette refused to run a mildly critical piece by regular columnist Lyle Stewart, who said in an email that it was cut "for reasons I don't completely understand."
The Globe and Mail carried a huge, 72-point headline the day after September 11, calling it "A Day of Infamy," using Franklin Delano Roosevelt's words about Pearl Harbour and indicating this was an act of war. The media drum beating saw them adopt a uniform logo ("Attack on America") and subsequent bellicose themes such as "America Fights Back," "America's New War," then "Operation Infinite Justice," and finally "Operation Enduring Freedom,"much as they did in the Gulf War with "Operation Desert Storm." With the other topics in this book I have intentionally delayed my analysis for at least one or two years, to augment the potential for greater perspective. The publisher and I felt that owing to the importance of these latest events, some instant analysis is in order. An examination of the ways in which the media justified the policies of the U.S. Administration, is instructive. I will discuss these under six categories, beginning with:
WORLD WAR III
The media response was sensational, emotional, and repetitive, soon lapsing into persistent warmongering, clamouring for vengeance. Eventually, a few commentators called for calm and a measured response: but most wanted blood. The same national security apparatus which couldn't detect anything coming, could, within just a few hours, identify Osama bin Laden as the culprit. Within a week, George Bush was demanding bin Laden's head, as "Wanted Dead or Alive." It was the return of the wild west. Soon, he would be heading up a posse of high tech vigilantes, with a national lynching on the horizon and nary a courtroom in sight.
Lorne Gunter of Southam wrote that "retaliatory measures should be brutal against those directly involved, as well as against those, like, for example, the Afghan government if bid Laden is responsible."1 Marcus Gee of The Globe and Mail wrote that the U.S. wrath would "shake the world."
"Expect an all-out war on terrorism that will almost certainly include some kind of U.S. military strike. Expect a far more assertive United States, far more willing to throw its weight around and far less likely to listen to the doubts of its allies on the United Nations,"2 Gee wrote. The way they listened to UN doubts over Kosovo, for instance. Peter Worthington of The Toronto Sun attacked George Bush's weak-kneed response. "Except for one line, George Bush was more grief counsellor than warrior leader<193>Americans want to fight back. So should we all<193>Damn caution. Fight back!"3 A column by Richard Gwynn of the Toronto Star was headlined, "Expect Americans to launch powerful anti-terrorist war."4 A Toronto Star editorial the day after referred to "an unparalleled act of barbarism that Americans took as an act of war."
And the enemy was built up, just as Saddam Hussein's "battle-hardened Elite Republican Guard" was built up before the Gulf War. Toronto Star columnist Stephen Handelman wrote September 12, "[the] U.S. administration will have to mobilize effectively for war against an enemy that has proved himself as well-organized and as efficient as any this country has seen before."
The media indicated that this calculated atrocity could only have been carried out by one man: Osama bin Laden. Within just a few hours they had zeroed in on him, and were running photos and accounts of his alleged terrorism. The analogies to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, which drew the U.S. into World War II, were rampant. While The Globe and Mail headline read, "A Day of Infamy," The Toronto Star reprinted FDR's entire speech to Congress after Pearl Harbour. Within the week, Defence Minister Art Eggleton was quoted as saying, "I think [Canada is] going to play a major role, a frontline role" in any military strike against terrorism.5 Later, as Jean Chretien scurried down to Washington to confer with Bush, columnist Gord Henderson complained bitterly that Bush didn't solicit Canadian military aid.6 With "one of the world's most illustrious military legacies," Henderson lamented, Canada has been "reduced by decades of government negligence" to just a "helpless bystander" during the "first great showdown between good and evil in the 21st century."
The presumption had been that any war would include Canada, of course. Graham Greene, an editor at The Ottawa Citizen, wrote, "the United States needs to know that its allies will stand with it, including militarily, if its retaliatory actions provoke a wider conflict."7 The Globe and Mail editorialized that "Prime Minister Jean Chrétien should establish a 'war cabinet' of senior ministers and officials."8
The U.S. media were even more warlike. USA Today declared an "Act of War," while The New York Times proclaimed "World War III." And, it wasn't just a headline. Thomas Friedman asked in The Times, "Does my country really understand that this is World War III?" Detroit TV news anchor Carmen Harlan commented, "If this isn't war, I don't know what war is."9 Within two days, The Washington Times decided it was "Time To Use The Nuclear Option." U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, spoke of "ending states who sponsor terrorism." R.W. Apple, Jr., wrote in The Washington Post, "In this new kind [of] war...there are no neutral states or geographical confines. Us or them. You are either with us or against us."10 The analysts and commentators in the media bounced back and forth with the Pentagon, State Department and White House officials, exchanging and intensifying their hyperbole and rhetoric.
In The Philadelphia Inquirer, David Perlmutter demonstrated an understanding of recent historical events in Iraq, Bosnia, and Kosovo. He warned that if states allegedly harbouring terrorists do not do Washington's bidding, they must: "Prepare for the systematic destruction of every power plant, every oil refinery, every pipeline, every military base, every government office in the entire country...the complete collapse of their economy and government for a generation."
In other words, it will be similar to what they did in Iraq, and Kosovo. As Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) indicated, American media advocated pursuing civilian targets, contrary to the Geneva Conventions. Columnist Ann Coulter wrote in The New York Daily News, for example, that:
This is no time to be precious about locating the exact individuals directly involved in this particular terrorist attack...We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity. We weren't punctilious about locating and punishing only Hitler and his top officers. We carpet-bombed German cities; we killed civilians. That's war. And this is war.11
Over at The Washington Times, guest columnist Thomas Woodrow was arguing that it's "Time to Use the Nuclear Option," as to do less would be seen "as cowardice."12
In their thirst for vengeance and war, the media ignored or dispensed with international law. Gone were international boundaries, and the presumption of innocence until guilt is proven in a court of law. After a century of fuelling wars and coups, death and destruction abroad, a single attack on the domestic U.S. was enough to see this allegedly 'civilized, free and democratic' country revert to the crude motto of: an eye for an eye.
WE ARE THE WORLD
The World War III which they anticipated was justified, according to the mainstream media, because what took place was not just an attack on three buildings in two American cities, but on the world itself. This is because the U.S. is not simply another country: it represents freedom, democracy, and civilization itself. The Windsor Star editorialized that,
The real targets of the hijackers and their flying bombs were freedom, democracy, and capitalism...It is time to draw a line in the sand. On one side lies democracy, individual freedom, and the capitalism that makes the two most essential qualities of life possible. On the other side lies terrorism.13
The Toronto Star said "The assault on America is a threat to every civilized nation."14 Lorne Gunter of Southam wrote that "Nothing less than the western way of life is at stake."15 Graham Greene of The Ottawa Citizen said, "this was not just an attack on American targets or U.S. citizens. It was a well-planned and deliberate attack on the very essence of all truly democratic countries."16 Playing the following week in his first game as a New York Ranger, the NHL's Eric Lindros told CNN, "We're all in this together. It affects all of us."
IT HAPPENED FOR NO REASON
In the mainstream media universe, whatever revenge would be taken was all the more justified because this was more than an act of violence: it was a senseless act of wanton destruction, gigantic in proportion. So, even though it was termed "an act of war," like Pearl Harbour, it was an unprovoked attack which precipitated the war that would follow. The response to it would be an act of war, but not the terrorism itself, which if it was, would lend it legitimacy. In fact, it was a criminal act, for which the appropriate response was legal rather than militaristic.
There are no reasons because these people are fanatics. Paul Rosen, an invited guest on CBC radio's Ontario Today call-in program asked in response to a question about potential negotiations, "Can you reason with the Devil?"
To the media, like the U.S. administration, there was no precipitating act. It was unimaginable that there was any discontent with U.S. foreign policy. It was impossible that such a tragedy could be backlash for (nonexistent) U.S. aggression or economic exploitation. For example, Richard Gwynn wrote in the Toronto Star that, "It was done without warning, not in response to American aggression but as an act of aggression in itself." Editorially, The 'liberal' and relatively 'progressive' Toronto Star said that it's not even possible to imagine any justification. "Prime Minister Jean Chretien has rightly denounced this 'cowardly and depraved assault,' for which there can be no imaginable justification."17
Margaret Wente, former managing editor of the Globe and Mail, wrote, within 24 hours of the attack:
Those who are responsible are most likely men from remote desert lands. Men from ancient tribal cultures built on blood and revenge. Men whose unshakable beliefs and implacable hatreds go back many centuries farther than the United States and its young ideas of democracy, pluralism, and freedom...Men capable...of giving up their lives for the greater glory of Allah...Men...with the implacable determination of fanatics.18
The Globe and Mail editorialized, "This is a show of power and strength. It is a show of cold-hearted brutality perpetrated by fanatics who have discarded all pretense of humanity or morality." What's more, even if they did have "a foreign political cause, their campaign has now lost all international support and legitimacy."19
A Globe reporter in Calgary, Dawn Walton, wrote that her husband explained to their young daughter that "some bad guys...just wanted to hurt people" and that's why they crashed into the WTC.20
"Obviously [Osama bin Laden] is filled with hate for the United States and for everything we stand for...freedom and democracy," U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney told Tim Russert on Meet The Press, September 16. He went on, "It must have something to do with his background, his own upbringing." Or perhaps it was the support he received from the CIA during Afghanistan's struggle with the Soviet Union. According to the media, terrorists are merely a product of their own personal insanity. They are not seen in a global context where there are deep divisions between rich and poor; where wealth and power are concentrated in the hands of a few. Oblivious to these conditions and the true nature of U.S. interventions abroad, they can offer us no explanations.
Hence, as with Montreal Massacrist Marc Lepine, who murdered 14 women in 1989, it was an act devoid of anything other than personal context. Lepine was portrayed as a madman, rather than as being influenced by our anti-feminist culture.
ATTACK ON CANADIAN IMMIGRATION POLICY
The media renewed their ongoing campaign to get the federal government to tighten up on immigration policy. (See chapter five). Columnist Gord Henderson of The Windsor Star lambasted "Those weak-kneed decision-makers in the Liberal government and federal bureaucracy who let Canada become a patsy for potential mass murderers from around the globe."21 Stewart Bell of The National Post said, "Through negligence and indifference, the Canadian government has permitted virtually every major terrorist organization to operate within its borders." Bell wrote that "Canada's vulnerability to infiltration by terrorists is deeply entrenched. Its refugee laws are probably the most lax in the Western world."22
Editorially, The Post said "Canada has been a porous staging area and conduit for terrorist conspiracies in the past. The Canadian government should not wait till U.S. authorities complete their investigation. They need to reform our immigration, refugee and visitor entry procedures now."23 In its editorial, The Globe and Mail said that although the federal government just finished overhauling Canada's immigration rules three months earlier, and they were still before the Senate, they "should review the issue again with particular focus on the new war on terrorism."24 The Senate was pressured to compact five weeks of debate on the news legislation into just four days. The Toronto Star quoted Jean Chretien, to the effect that "Perhaps there will be a need of changing some of the [immigration] legislations."25
REINFORCING RACISM
Media coverage was rooted in nationalism, patriotism, jingoism, but also racism. About 7000 predominantly middle and upper middle class, mostly White American lives are "worth" much more attention, grieving, and retaliation, than the 700,000 Iraqis who died during and since the Gulf War, or the 300,000 East Timorese who died since the Indonesian invasion of 1975, et cetera. Given the ease with which this information may be had, the media are willfully blind to these deaths.
In a revealing comment, a psychiatrist told The Windsor Star, "The people of America will now live with what the people of Israel have lived with for generations." No mention of the far greater tribulations the Palestinians have endured: they remain off the radar screen.26 The coverage has not simply been racist: there are elements of classism and xenophobia, as well. And although some people from around the world were in the World Trade Center, and died, this event was significant not due to them but because it was an "Attack on America," and specifically on the monied, heartland of New York.
The racist coverage, lack of context, and other elements contributed to the backlash in which a Sikh Indian was murdered in Texas. The Windsor Star ran a wire service story which began, "Those who look like Muslims<197>but aren't<197>say they are suffering from angry fellow Americans."27 But how do you look like a Muslim? What does someone who is Roman Catholic look like?
A DIVERSIONARY TACTIC
The glut of media coverage diverted attention away from the real "Attack on America," the attack on the working class and poor through elite policies which favour the rich. This takes the form of tax breaks, cuts to welfare, social programs, health and public education. "Right to work" laws are an attack on people, eliminating minimum wages, as are free trade policies which continually transfer jobs to the cheapest available labour market. There is also excessive corporate and individual profiteering. These policies have led to an increasing gap between the rich and poor.
The Attack coverage has rallied Americans and others to the cause, and led to a climate of emotional hysteria. In this atmosphere there is even less national and international monitoring of U.S. activities abroad. The U.S. Administration has capitalized on this hysteria to win funding and approval from Congress, and advanced support around the world permitting forthcoming repressive and brutal acts which, like their antecedent actions, will far outweigh the effects of the hijackings. At this writing, the Taliban government in Afghanistan has asked Osama bin Laden to leave that country, within a reasonable time period. They subsequently offered to turn him over to the U.S., in exchange for proof of his involvement in the September 11 attacks. But this response to the U.S. threats was juxtaposed against the irrepressible American war machine, which was already converging on Afghanistan, named "Operation Enduring Freedom" by the Pentagon, funded and approved by Congress, and condoned by ostensibly peace loving nations around the world. The response of the Bush administration was that they would "not negotiate" with the Taliban. They would not even provide the Taliban with the same evidence reportedly given to NATO, and other countries such as Canada.28
PROMOTING U.S. POLICIES
As evidenced by their early coverage of the "Attack on America," the media not only report on, but seldom stray from, the policies, statements and spin of the U.S. Administration and its client governments in Canada, Britain, and elsewhere. This may mean simply overlooking some things, or suffering from apparent historical amnesia, or adhering to what George Orwell called the "prevailing orthodoxy." This is what I have chosen to call "MediaThink." The consequences may lead, as in the current case, to amplification of the terror, horror and deaths. Rather than abetting U.S. geopolitics, in response to the attack on the World Trade Center the media might have chosen to demand that the U.S. cease and desist from the bloody international interventions it has perpetrated over the last century, from Cuba to the Philippines, from Guatamala to Kosovo.29 Were the U.S. Administration to agree, I suspect that the violence would greatly diminish, along with the "blowback" terrorism (to use the CIA term) inflicted in response. Obviously, as the mainstream media are a crucial component of a global agenda which involves the U.S. Administration, transglobal corporations, the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and others, it would be heretical, 'suicidal' and perhaps patricidal for them to attack, criticize, or even differ with stated policy.
As with Orwell's Winston Smith in 1984, severe penalties are in store for the foolish few who dare to stray from the one true view of the world handed down by our leaders. For example, Bill Maher, host of the TV programme Politically Incorrect wandered out onto thin ice when he ventured that, whatever you might think of the terrorists their actions were not "cowardly," as labelled by Bush and Co., compared with dropping bombs on civilians from great heights. Federal Express, and Sears Roebuck and Co. pulled their ads from Maher's programme, after indicating there were consumer complaints.
This censorship, trouncing of civil liberties and suppression of dissent, is nothing new. During the Gulf War, for example, at a war protest rally held at the SUNY college campus in New Paltz N.Y., professor Barbara Scott urged American military personnel not to kill innocent people. In the enormous brouhaha following the event, the media dubbed her "Baghdad Barbara," in reference to Tokyo Rose of WW2. Republican Senator Charles Cook went so far as to publicly accuse Scott of treason. Letter campaigns were aimed at the college president and then-Governor Mario Cuomo, urging them to fire Scott. Meanwhile, hate mail arrived at her office.30
In Canada, on October 1, 2001, University of British Columbia professor Sunera Thobani spoke out at a conference on violence against women, held in Ottawa. Dr. Thobani said the U.S. is "the most dangerous and most powerful global force unleashing horrific levels of violence." Although she empathized with the suffering caused by the September 11 attacks, she asked, "do we feel any pain for the victims of U.S. aggression?" The 500 women in the audience interrupted Thobani's speech with cheers and a standing ovation. But the media lapdogs leapt to the attack on this "feminist," and "former president of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women," condemning what they described as a "hateful, manipulative and outrageous rant."31 The National Post reached out to Gordon Campbell, premier of B.C., for his characterization of her remarks as "hateful, destructive and very disturbing," along with Alliance leader Stockwell Day and Gwen Landolt of Real Women of Canada, a reactionary women's group. Columnists such as Christie Blatchford and Claire Hoy attacked Thobani as "vicious" and "hate-filled" and a "bitter bit," and her audience as "collected wing-nuts." Because the conference received government funding, Stockwell Day said it was "unacceptable" for Thobani "to be saying the things that she did<193>at taxpayers' expense." He called for prime minister Chretien to inform the U.S. government that Canada repudiates Thobani's message.
Of course, there was no hatred in Thobani's talk, merely a call for peace and compassion for all victims.
In contrast to the corporate media hysteria, as did Sunera Thobani, the alternative media placed the terrorist attacks in the historical context of U.S. "interventions" abroad and aggression. While not excusing the terrorists, and also mourning the 7000 civilian lives taken, through the writings of Michael Albert and Noam Chomsky and others, Zmagazine, Indymedia, etc., provided information which was crucial for understanding the events. In "Five Reasons Not to Go to War," for example, Michael Albert and Stephen R. Shalom argued that war would be horribly wrong for at least five reasons: 1. Guilt hasn't yet been proven; 2. War would violate International Law; 3. War would be unlikely to eliminate those responsible for the September 11 attacks; 4. Huge numbers of innocent people will die; 5. War will reduce the security of U.S. citizens.32
In sum, as indicated earlier, at times such as this it is the media's responsibility to hold governments accountable for their decision to go to war, to defend the public interest by providing intense scrutiny, demanding evidence and reasons, and displaying a wide range of diverse perspectives. This is a time for the adversarial journalism of the fourth estate: for watchdogs rather than lapdogs. Instead, the corporate media resorted to frenzied advocacy of an illegal vigilante war, promoting violence, hatred and blindness to reason. They have functioned, with few exceptions, as an extension of the U.S. administration, demanding a violent, vengeful and bloody war.
NOTES
1. Lorne Gunter, "Retaliation is a must," The Windsor Star, September 13, 2001.
2. Marcus Gee, "The sleeping giant wakes up angry," The Globe and Mail, September 12, 2001.
3. Peter Worthington, "America Needs a Leader," Toronto Sun, September 13, 2001, A7.
4. Richard Gwynn, "Expect Americans to launch powerful anti-terrorist war," The Toronto Star, September 12, 2001, A1.
5. Quoted in Janice Tibbetts, "What can Armed Forces contribute?" The Windsor Star, September 18, 2001.
6. Gord Henderson, "Canada as bystander," The Windsor Star, September 25, 2001.
7. Graham Greene, "Time to stand with U.S.," The Windsor Star, September 12, 2001, A7.
8. Editorial, "It's time to consider how best we can help," Globe and Mail, September 18, 2001.
9. Quoted in Ted Shaw, "TV brings terrorism home," The Windsor Star, September 12, 2001, A10.
10. These U.S. headlines and quotations are taken from, Jared Israel, Rick Rozoff & Nico Varkevisser, "Washington Wants Afghanistan," www.emperors-clothes.com, September 18, 2001.
11. Ann Coulter, New York Daily News, September 12, 2001, quoted in FAIR, Media March to War, September 17, 2001.
12. Quoted in "Media Pundits Advocate Civilian Targets," FAIR, September 24, 2001.
13. Editorial, "Freedom: A struggle that involves us," The Windsor Star, September 13, 2001.
14. Editorial, "Democracy will prevail over barbarous hate," The Toronto Star, September 12, A26.
15. Lorne Gunter, "Retaliation is a must," The Windsor Star, September 13, 2001.
16. Graham Greene, "Time to stand with U.S.," The Windsor Star, September 12, A7.
17. Editorial, "Democracy will prevail over barbarous hate," The Toronto Star, September 12, A26.
18. Margaret Wente, "U.S. will never be the same." The Globe and Mail, September 12, 2001, A1.
19. Editorial, "Let loose the war on global terrorism," The Globe and Mail, September 12, 2001, A18.
20. Dawn Walton, "Explaining the day the bogeyman came," The Globe and Mail, September 12, 2001, A20.
21. Gord Henderson, "Shameful Times," The Windsor Star, September 13, 2001.
22. Stewart Bell, "A conduit for terrorists," The National Post, September 13, 2001.
23. Ibid.
24. Editorial, "It's time to consider how best we can help," The Globe and Mail, September 18, 2001.
25. CP, "Bush summons PM to White House council," The Toronto Star, September 18, 2001.
26. Quoted in Don Lajoie, "Trauma to be felt for years, doc says," The Windsor Star, September 12, 2001.
27. Thomas Hargrove, "Backlash hits non-Arab minorities," The Windsor Star, September 18, 2001, A8.
28. In the article "Canada Convinced," The Windsor Star, October 3, 2001, the newspaper quoted prime minister Jean Chretien as saying that he was convinced of Osama bin Laden's guilt, based upon the secret information provided to him by the Bush administration.
29. For a brief overview, since World War II, see William Blum, "A Brief History of U.S. Interventions: 1945 to the Present," Z magazine, June 1999.
30. For more details, see James Winter, "Truth as the First Casualty," in Common Cents: Media Portrayal of the Gulf War and Other Events, Black Rose Books, Montreal, 1992.
31. Mark Hume and Mary Vallis, "Thobani 'rant' called hateful," The National Post, October 3, 2001.
32. Michael Albert and Stephen R. Shalom, "Five Reasons Not to Go to War," Zmag.org, September 21, 2001.