“Who pulls the strings of power: who controls our reality?” by Jake Bendoff
Southern Cross University News, Student Reflection
Jake Bendoff is the student representative of the Politics and Media unit
As a proud student of the prestigious Southern Cross University, I recently participated in the student demonstration against the deregulation of university fees. My friends and I joined a mass of discontented students who marched from Spring Street towards Parliament House. We proudly carried banners advertising our outrage, while also chanting, singing, dancing and cheering. However, I was astonished to see, the very next day, the Channel 7’s video footage of our demonstration, which seemed completely obsessed with a few boisterous students who had managed to break through police barriers and grab their batons before getting whisked away into paddy wagons. The majority of us were oblivious of these isolated events that provided such “sensational” headlines for media cameras hungry for drama. Somehow, we were typecast as a bunch of radical, undisciplined students.
Not only has the portrayal of the students in the media been selective, but the flippant dismissal of both Prime Minister Abbott and Treasurer Joe Hockey of their own student activism days continues to reinforce the stereotype of naïve, opportunistic and misguided hot-heads.
Such portrayals show how powerful groups such as the media and government departments have a monopoly on the dissemination of information and often seek to control the public debate. The information they provide and the information they conceal has a direct impact on how ordinary people perceive their social and political landscape.
That the media, often in collusion with governments, fabricate our realities was evidently clear from the previous election campaign. One only needs to do a Google search on Herald Sun headlines relating to Kevin Rudd’s comeback (“It’s a ruddy mess”, “Recycled Rudd”) and one is greeted with the foregone conclusion that this leader needed to be beheaded.
I mention this because our Political and Media Unit recently screened Barry Levinson’s comic satire, “Wag the Dog” (1997) which deals with just this very issue. The government with the collusion of Hollywood spin doctors, cleverly organizes a war to distract the public from the president’s philandering. In this case, the public is convinced that it is necessary to wage a war to persevere the American way of life. As Brean says to the CIA Agent Charlie Young, “You said go to war to preserve your way of life? Well, Chuck, this is your way of life. And if your spy satellites don’t see nothin’, if there ain’t no war, then you can go home and prematurely take up golf, my friend. ‘Cause there ain’t no war but ours.” In this case the President of the United States is caught making inappropriate advances to an underage “Firefly Girl” less than two weeks before the election. Conrad Brean, a spin doctor, is engaged to divert public attention away from the scandal. In turn, he engages Hollywood producer Stanley Motss and together they construct a fake war with Albania.
Bream uses subtle psychological powers of persuasion to influence, control and define the terms of the debate. Reminiscent of what Aldous Huxley (Brave New World) labels the suggestible powers of the scientific dictator, Bream plants the seeds, nurtures them and then distracts, denies and obfuscates in order to simultaneously douse and inflame each issue. Does the government have a B3-bomber?
In this case, reality is literally constructed on the Hollywood stage set. War becomes a Hollywood by-product as the studio manufactures the sound effects, the burning bridge, the running stream, the white kitten and the burnt-out buildings in the background to create the authenticity of war.
Parallels are also evident with the Bush Administration’s representation of the war in Iraq, which once again, became a by-product of a government intent on overthrowing an inconvenient and evil dictator. Few in the media questioned the lack of weapons of mass destruction. Why? Perhaps, because the truth simply didn’t make as interesting a story as the heroics of a bunch of American soldiers who were fighting for the “American way of life” and an end to terrorism.
We could be self-righteous and suggest that the American public is simply naïve and war-hungry and that it wouldn’t happen in Australia. However, the former Liberal Government’s “children overboard” fiasco in 2001 also showed how the government manipulated images of a sinking refugee boat to suggest that the refugees were undesirable future immigrants. In this case the then Defence Minister Mr Peter Reith concealed knowledge of the sinking ship and published photos that suggested that people would be prepared to kill their own children to get into Australia
As the media representative of our unit, I am responsible for media releases and the publication of information. I am very much aware of the importance of maintaining a consistent image, and rewriting and editing stories so that they reflect the views and values of the Politics and Media Unit.
As I gain experience, I realize just how important it is to choose the right words, and the right slogans in order paint the right image.
Language is important in forging our realities. As Desmond Tutu states, “language does not just describe reality. Language creates the reality it describes.”
Indeed, George Orwell makes language a central concept in both his masterpieces, 1984 and Animal Farm. In 1984, Big Brother’s control of the party’s propaganda machine and language enables it to control the past and thereby shape people’s present and future realities. O’Brien predicts that by 2050, the language will be reduced to such an extent that no one will be able to understand a typical 1984-conversation.
We are also reminded of the many government slogans that seek to control our reality and recreate our future as Australia transitions from the mining boom. Slogans such as “the age of entitlement is over” and “we all have to do the heavy lifting” are designed to penetrate the psychic of a nation.
But from whose perspective?
Conrad Bream also loves a slogan and engages the services of the songwriter to spin the message and influence the public’s reception of the looming war. The theme song reconstructs a story of the heroic missing soldier (Old Shoe) left behind in enemy territory. This theme captures the public’s imagination and stimulates their patriotic feelings as Election Day looms. Never mind that “Shoe” is actually an unstable mental patient, who conveniently shares the same surname, who is also the focus of a welcome-home celebration.
As Bream concludes, “we remember the slogans, we can’t even remember the fucking wars. Y’know why? Cause its show business. That’s why I’m here.”
In Brave New World Revisited Aldous Huxley outlines the role of skilled mind-manipulators who, trained in the science and art of suggestibility, are able to exploit and control the thoughts, feelings and responses of both individuals and the crowd. “The science-dictator appeals neither to reason, nor to self interest, but to passion and prejudice – hidden forces in the unconscious depths of every human mind.”
So that as Huxley would say, “a child’s mind is these suggestions and the sum of these suggestions is the child’s mind … But all these suggestions are our suggestions (i.e. those of the state.) Coincidentally, Australian political lobbyist Ian Kortlang describes his work, which is to analyse and influence public opinion polls, as “digging down to the deepest layers so you can affect people subliminally”.
And just a final word on these subliminal layers. For the first time, I joined a group of students who braved the cold to pay respects to our fallen soldiers on Anzac Day.
Anzac Day defines in many ways what it is to be Australian. It is an identity born of patriotism, military glory and bravery forged by the death of 26,111 soldiers on the banks of Gallipoli.
However, as part of my History thesis, I came to realize just how selective this myth is. Why do we focus on images of far-away military glory when Federation was a democratic success? Or why don’t we celebrate the Australian troops on the Kokoda Trail in Papua New Guinea when they were actually defending Australia. As historian John Hirst asks, “what sort of cringing colonial outfit was it that thought it did not properly exist until it took part in an imperial war?
Or, to be even more bold, what of those who have fought and perished on our own soil. Historians Professor Henry Reynolds, Tony Roberts and Jonathan Richards, who studied the role of Queensland’s Native Police force from 1856 to 1900, suggest that its aim was to “kill Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Queensland” and as a result up to 30,000 aboriginals were killed owing to “dispersal” policies.
Once again, I am reminded of the footage of our demonstration. It all comes back to who is pulling the strings of power.
Can we resist? Well that’s my job and hopefully by showing how these strings work, we students can regain some control. We will keep you posted on the real stories: the way it is. Please visit www.southerncrossmediaunit.com.au