Suharto - not letting them bury the truth about Western complicity in his atrocities

Medialens, one of those sites, that revels in broadcasting the hard facts the mainstream media shies away from, today posts a lengthy piece on the death of the former Indonesian dictator, Suharto, on January 27, noting that whilst the media could have had a field day, unleashing embarrassing revelations detailing British and American support for one of the 20th century's worst mass murderers, they instead remained schtum. I post in its entirity the piece below, as it makes a good addition to a previous posting on the demise of this murderous thug here.

The 1965-6 massacres that accompanied Suharto's rise to power claimed the lives of between 500,000 and 1 million people, mostly landless peasants. A 1977 Amnesty International report cited a tally of "many more than one million" deaths. In the words of a leaked CIA report at the time, the massacre was "one of the worst mass murders of the 20th century". (Declassified US CIA Directorate of Intelligence research study, 'Indonesia - 1965: The Coup That Backfired,' 1968.

Infamously, while assuring readers of US involvement, leading New York Times commentator James Reston described these events as "a gleam of light in Asia". Max Frankel, then the New York Times' Washington correspondent, wrote an article titled, "US Is Heartened by Red Setback in Indonesia Coup." He commented:

"The Johnson administration believes that a dramatic new opportunity has developed both for anti-Communist Indonesians and for United States policies. Officials... believe the army will cripple and perhaps destroy the Communists as a significant political force."

The United States had been heavily involved, not just in bringing Suharto to power, but in arming, equipping and training his army. In May 1990, Kathy Kadane of the Washington-based States News Service reported admissions of US government officials that the US embassy in Jakarta had drawn up lists of 5,000 suspected Communist leaders. These "zap lists" were given to the Indonesian military who used them to track down and kill party members. One former embassy official told Kadane: "I probably have a lot of blood on my hands, but that's not all bad."

Ralph McGehee, a senior CIA operations officer in the 1960s, described the terror of Suharto's takeover as "the model operation" for the US-backed coup that later destroyed Chile's Salvador Allende. McGehee indicated the key deception that had sparked Suharto's massacre:

"The CIA forged a document purporting to reveal a leftist plot to murder Chilean military leaders... [just like] what happened in Indonesia in 1965." (John Pilger, 'Our model dictator,' The Guardian, January 28, 2007.

The British government was secretly involved in the slaughter. Roland Challis, BBC south-east Asia correspondent at the time, later revealed:

"British warships escorted a ship full of Indonesian troops down the Malacca Straits so they could take part in the terrible holocaust... I and other correspondents were unaware of this at the time... There was a deal, you see. In establishing the Suharto regime, the involvement of the IMF and the World Bank was part of it... Suharto would bring them back. That was the deal." (Ibid)

The "deal" involved opening up what Richard Nixon had called "the richest hoard of natural resources, the greatest prize in south-east Asia". Suharto transformed Indonesia into an "investors' paradise". Foreign investment was attracted by a law which protected property from nationalisation for 30 years. The new regime also offered to return to their original owners American, British and Dutch firms which had been taken over by Suharto's predecessor, Sukarno. In November 1967, Nixon's "prize" was delivered at a three-day conference in Geneva. The Freeport company got West Papua's copper. A US/European consortium got much of the nickel. The Alcoa company got Indonesia's bauxite. America, Japanese and French companies got the tropical forests of Sumatra.

The West, unsurprisingly, was delighted to do business with Indonesia's new "moderate" leader, who was "at heart benign," the Economist declared.

Blood Red - Green Light

The United States and Britain were also key allies supporting Suharto's December 1975 invasion of East Timor. The day before the attack, while visiting the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, secretary of state Henry Kissinger and president Gerald Ford gave Suharto the green light to invade.

In media coverage immediately following Ford's death in December 2006, we found a single sentence in the entire UK press describing his complicity in the East Timor genocide. Christopher Hitchens wrote in the Mirror:

"It was Kissinger and Ford who gave permission to the Indonesian generals for their illegal annexation of East Timor, which turned into a genocide." (Hitchens, 'The accidental president,' Mirror, December 28, 2006)

Philip Liechty, CIA desk officer in Jakarta at the time of the invasion, gave an idea of the operative ethics:

"We sent the Indonesian generals everything that you need to fight a major war against somebody who doesn't have any guns. We sent them rifles, ammunition, mortars, grenades, food, helicopters. You name it; they got it. And they got it direct... No one cared. No one gave a damn. It is something that I will be forever ashamed of. The only justification I ever heard for what we were doing was there was concern that East Timor was on the verge of being accepted as a new member of the United Nations and there was a chance that the country was going to be either leftist or neutralist and not likely to vote [with the United States] at the UN." (Quoted, John Pilger, Hidden Agendas, Vintage, 1998, pp.285-6. See our media alert for more detail.

The US supplied 90% of the weapons. Britain supplied armoured cars and advanced fighter-bombers used against East Timorese targets. The result was the death of 200,000 people out of a total of 700,000 - one of the worst genocides in history by proportion of population killed.

A month after Indonesia invaded, as tens of thousands of people were being massacred, a US State Department official told a major Australian newspaper that "in terms of the bilateral relations between the US and Indonesia, we are more or less condoning the incursion into East Timor... The United States wants to keep its relations with Indonesia close and friendly. We regard Indonesia as a friendly, non-aligned nation - a nation we do a lot of business with". (The Australian, January 22, 1976.

In December 1975, the British ambassador in Jakarta informed the Foreign Office: "it is in Britain's interest that Indonesia should absorb the territory as soon and as unobtrusively as possible, and that if it should come to the crunch and there is a row in the United Nations, we should keep our heads down and avoid taking sides against the Indonesian government". (Quoted, Mark Curtis, The Ambiguities of Power, Zed Books, 1996, pp.219-220)

US reporter Allan Nairn happened to witness, and narrowly survived, one massacre of unarmed protestors in the East Timor capital, Dili, in November 1991:

"The soldiers marched straight up to us [Western journalists]. They never broke their stride. We were enveloped by the troops, and when they got a few yards past us, within a dozen yards of the Timorese, they raised their rifles to their shoulders all at once, and they opened fire. The Timorese, in an instant, were down, just torn apart by the bullets. The street was covered with bodies covered with blood. And the soldiers just kept on coming. They poured in, one rank after another. They leaped over the bodies of those who were down. They were aiming and shooting people in the back. I could see their limbs being torn, their bodies exploding. There was blood spurting out into the air. The pop of the bullets, everywhere. And it was very organized, very systematic. The soldiers did not stop. They just kept on shooting until no one was left standing."

Burying The Dead - British Media Performance

How much of this information has been communicated by the mainstream media since Suharto's death?

Jonathan Head wrote on the BBC website of Suharto:

"His accession to power coincided with the escalation of the Vietnam War, when the United States was desperate for reliable allies in the region and willing to turn a blind eye to his human rights record." (Head, 'The lasting legacy of Suharto,' BBC online, January 27, 2008.

As we have seen, this was about far more than just turning a "blind eye". In fact, the United States played a key role in bringing Suharto to power, and in providing weapons for his genocidal army. The M-16 guns Suharto's troops used were American - the Hawk jets that bombed East Timor were British. But East Timor was not so much as mentioned in Head's high-profile BBC report. When challenged by a reader, Head replied:

"I think it is entirely inappropriate to rank Suharto alongside Sadaam [sic] Hussein. There was never anything like the pervasive terror here that existed in Iraq. I in no way wish to diminish the enormous suffering of many Indonesians under his rule." (Email forwarded to Media Lens, January 28, 2008)

In 1998, Jim Naureckas of FAIR responded to the argument that Suharto could not be compared to Saddam Hussein:

"'Suharto is no Saddam,' the New York Times' 'Week in Review' assured us on March 8. How so? The Indonesian dictator's rule is no less autocratic than Saddam Hussein's. Like Hussein, Suharto has attempted to annex a smaller neighbor - in fact, his ongoing occupation of East Timor has been far bloodier than Hussein's assault on Kuwait. While Hussein's rule has been brutally repressive, Suharto is directly responsible for one of the greatest acts of mass murder in post-World War II history: the genocide that accompanied his rise to power in 1965."

BBC News online invited readers to 'Have Your Say':

"Mr Suharto was accused of embezzling $600m (£303m) of state funds during his 32 years of power, but the criminal charges were dropped in 2006 on account of his ill health. A civil case brought by state prosecutors seeking $1.5bn in damages and funds allegedly stolen from the state was never settled.

"What are your memories of the former strongman? What is his legacy? Should the charges against him have been dropped"

The charges of mass murder apparently do not exist.

A Daily Telegraph news report accepted that Suharto was "one of the 20th century's biggest killers and greatest thieves... It began with the massacre of at least 500,000 communists in 1965. Two hundred thousand were killed when he annexed the former Portuguese colony of East Timor in 1975." (Marianne Kearney and Thomas Bell, 'Suharto death revives memories of the million killed under his rule,' Daily Telegraph, January 28, 2008)

But what of US-UK support for his killing, motivated by corporate greed for Indonesia's natural resources?

"His friends among western governments, attracted by his strong anti-communism, helped protect him in office."

As ever, media reporting promotes the alleged concern to save the world from the former bete noire, "communism" (a role currently being played by al Qaeda) - just as a sincere concern to save the world from Saddam Hussein's non-existent weapons of mass destruction was the motive for invading Iraq, not control of oil.

A single letter in the Guardian made the point that is unthinkable for mainstream journalists:

"The collusion of the British with Suharto's murderous regime is not some throwback to cold-war realpolitik, but an integral and ongoing dimension of a foreign policy in thrall to the avaricious interests of big business. In 1967, following Suharto's western-backed coup, oil companies and multinational corporations divided up Indonesia's vast natural resources. Now, 40 years later, they are doing the same in Iraq, with the British government trying to push through an oil law which, if passed, would allow Shell, BP and Exxon to take control of most of Iraq's oil reserves, depriving ordinary Iraqis of billions of dollars. Plus ca change." (Stefan Simanowitz, Letters page, The Guardian, January 29, 2008)

A Daily Telegraph obituary observed:

"Suharto, however, had made a serious mistake in 1975 when he took advantage of civil war in East Timor to overthrow the forces of the dominant Fretelin guerrilla movement. In the face of widespread international disapproval, he proceeded to annex the country to Indonesia." ('Obituary of General Suharto,' Daily Telegraph, January 28, 2008)

In fact, there was no "widespread international disapproval" - while the Timorese buried their dead, Western politicians and journalists buried the story. In 1979, when Indonesia's killings were reaching genocidal levels, there was not a single mainstream press article on the crisis in the New York Times or the Washington Post. Dissident journalist Amy Goodman reported the details:

"ABC, NBC and CBS 'Evening News' never mentioned the words East Timor and neither did 'Nightline' or 'MacNeil Lehrer' between 1975, the day of the invasion, except for one comment by Walter Cronkite the day after, saying Indonesia had invaded East Timor - it was a 40 second report - until November 12, 1991." (Amy Goodman, 'Exception to the Rulers, Part II,' Z Magazine, December 1997)

In its January 28 obituary, the Telegraph also referred to "Western revulsion" at the 1965-6 massacres. Presumably they had in mind the exultation and joy expressed on both sides of the Atlantic. ('Obituary of General Suharto President of Indonesia,' Daily Telegraph, January 28, 2008)

The Independent chose to focus on lesser crimes - how Suharto had used his power to enrich himself and his family. The dictator had clung on too long, the paper lamented:

"Had Suharto stepped down earlier, Indonesia might have agreed that his achievement of three decades of economic growth out-weighed his failings." ('Suharto: Former dictator of Indonesia,' The Independent, January 28, 2008)

As Allan Nairn notes, the idea that Suharto's record can be defended on grounds of increased prosperity - he may have presided over vast massacres but he also presided over rapid economic growth - is "Pravda thinking". The argument being, after all, "the same one once used to justify Stalin".

What of US-UK complicity in Suharto's "failings"? The Independent noted that his coup "was particularly welcome to the United States, deeply embroiled in nearby Vietnam and very willing to back anti-Communist military dictatorships. American aid was offered and accepted..."

Again, we are to understand that the goal was to stave off 'the Commies'. Nothing more was said about US-UK involvement in the killings in Indonesia or East Timor.

To its credit, the Guardian shamed the Independent's performance simply by publishing John Pilger's honest analysis of US-UK complicity in Suharto's crimes: 'Our model dictator - The death of Suharto is a reminder of the west's ignoble role in propping up a murderous regime.'

The Financial Times found that Suharto's "achievements" were punctuated by "severe shortcomings". (John Aglionby and Shawn Donnan, 'Corrupt autocrat who fostered stability,' Financial Times, January 28, 2008)

It is interesting to consider the language used. In 1998, the US media analyst Edward Herman compared press descriptions of the Suharto and Pol Pot regimes:

"When Pol Pot died in April 1998, the media were unstinting in condemnation, calling him 'wicked,' 'loathsome,' and 'monumentally evil' (Chicago Tribune, 4/18/98), a 'lethal mass killer' and 'war criminal' (L.A. Times, 4/17/98), 'blood-soaked' and an 'egregious mass murderer' (Washington Post, 4/17/98, 4/18/98). His rule was repeatedly described as a 'reign of terror' and he was guilty of 'genocide.'..."

"Although Suharto's regime was responsible for a comparable number of deaths in Indonesia, along with more than a quarter of the population of East Timor, the word 'genocide' is virtually never used in mainstream accounts of his rule." (Herman, 'Good and Bad Genocide,' FAIR.

The FT identified one of the "severe shortcomings": "Suharto drew international condemnation after he ordered the 1975 invasion of East Timor". In fact, the "international condemnation" was restricted to a small, US-based student protest, which grew over three decades to become a global mass movement. As we have seen, Western governments and media did not give a damn.

A single, cryptic comment on US-UK involvement followed: "Suharto sought a more intimate relationship with the US, which remained a strong ally."

Pilger's article aside, it would be impossible to guess from this media performance the central role US-UK political and military support played in the rise and massacres of president Suharto.

In December 2006, we reviewed, with near-identical results, media coverage of the death of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. A Guardian obituary commented on Pincohet's overthrow of Allende:

"The coup, in which CIA destabilisation played a part..." (Malcolm Coad, 'Augusto Pinochet,' The Guardian, December 11, 2006.

And that, as we noted at the time, was that! No more information was provided.

When former US president Ronald Reagan died in 2004, close to nothing was said about his crimes in Central America.

When Bill Clinton's presidency has been reviewed, his responsibility for suffering and death has been a non-issue.

And, as discussed, Gerald Ford's complicity in Suharto's crimes was also blanked.

It is crucial that the truth of US-UK violence not be admitted or seriously explored. Within that silence the myth of benevolence can be cultivated - and this is the key illusion allowing the West to attack, invade and kill with impunity, freed from decisive public opposition. We always 'had to'. We always 'meant well'. We always 'have hopes for a brighter future'.

F*** the corporate media

This entry starts with a wee story. I once took part in an election hustings with the local MP (re-standing) and the other candidates and organised by Churches Together of South Tyneside. There was a fair sized audience and they asked a lot of questions. I was the only one to give a full and considered answer to every single question. Several times the local MP and the other candidates refused to answer, or reiterated the statements made by the previous speaker. Some of the answers I gave were so opposed to the spiel imparted by the other mainstream candidates that the audience literally gasped in belief – you could see the shock on their faces. When I openly criticised the arguments of my opponents, and the chair of the meeting asked if they wanted to reply, they declined to comment.

At the end of the evening - each speaker being asked to present their case to the audience, which they did from their seated position - I got up and walked to the front of the platform. I told them I’m making no promises, that I could do nothing for them that they were not capable of doing for themselves if they decided to organise, that they asked the wrong questions, and how they had hypocritically, as good Christians (these were South Tyneside’s god-bothering elite), found my humane line, that promoted global equality and an end to waste and want and war, offensive. My parting shot was to inform the congregation that there was more truth in one page of the Communist Manifesto than in the whole Bible.

The press were there that night and whilst this was a newsworthy event – hustings here being exceptionally rare – not one word of it was published in the local press , in spite of the fact that I had also imparted info about myself they could easily have sensationalised; for instance telling the audience, while answering questions about the decriminalisation of cannabis (with my opponents were dead against) that I smoked it, along with many friends, and that it was not the devil narcotic its enemies claimed it to be. Not one word appeared in the local paper about that event!

And if there is one thing I’ve learned about talking to the media, and I have done countless times over the years, as an active socialist and a community campaigner, it is that they don’t really give a shit for what you want to say, for what you want them to say. Invariably, you will give them a decent interview, imparting some first class info, only to find that the info they have gleaned in that interview, rather than forming the basis of a brilliant piece, is defused, so to speak, the juicy stuff ignored and the piece filled with utter trivia and insignificance that will hold the reader’s interest as much as a piece on a kid whose Christmas present bicycle has been stolen.

There’s been times I’ve sent journalists in the local press first class news items, following up items they have had published in their respective papers, giving them first hand accounts, real facts, corrections to untruths they had previously published, stories that days earlier they would have bent over backwards for, and written in a style far surpassing anything that paper produces, and they’ve totally ignored, not even acknowledged. Not one journalist has ever replied and not one paper has used that info

And it’s been like that a while now with my articles to the local paper’s letters pages. You send in a first class analysis of some current event – containing more truth than you will find in that paper in a week – and it’s either rejected or totally edited, defused! I once sent in a 500 word article attacking the democratic process in Britain and all they published was the second last paragraph and made the writer of the piece appear an imbecile. In the run up to the invasion if Iraq, I bombarded the local press with letters on a daily basis, screaming my indignation, exposing the hypocrisy and the real reasons behind the coming bloodbath. Only one letter got through, and that was heavily edited, defused!

Newspapers, or rather those who own them, simply hate the truth. This is because these people are members of the capitalist class, with interests to defend, so their editor’s remit, if he he/she values his/her job, is to sit on anything that might arouse the indignation of the readership, anything that might rouse them to activity, anything that might wake them from that media-induced coma. And why? Capitalism depends for its survival on the mass production of zombies, created by the media and the state’s official brainwashing mechanisms (ie., schools, colleges, family, religion).

Let’s step back in time. William Howard Russell was the Times correspondent who sensationally exposed the Charge of the Light Brigade (1854) as the wholly hopeless bloody blunder that it was. As a reward, he and his editor, John Delane, were accused of treason.

John Swinton, a then famous New York journalist, was at a bash held in his name by leaders of his craft - this was sometime in the late 1880s When someone proposed a toast to the independent press, Swinton said:

"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.

"The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."

Whilst Swinton’s statement is true enough, it does not go far enough. Check-mate could have been delivered by a lengthy statement on just why the corporate media – or rather the ‘independent press’ in this case – needs to suppress the truth.

Exactly 120 years later, John Pilger would comments in a lecture given here how, on March 16, 1968, the day of the infamous My Lai massacre (when US troops slaughtered almost 500 mainly women, old men and children in cold blood) there were 649 reporters in Vietnam. Not one of them reported it.

Pilger further comments how during the run up to the invasion of Iraq, the BBC was right alongside Tony Blair in promoting the arguments for that bloody offensive. This was an issue that aroused the general public every bit as much as your died-in-the wool activists. Despite the many hundreds of meetings, rallies and demonstrations across the country, including a march on London by an estimated 2 million – the biggest protest march in British history – only 2% of the BBC’s coverage of the coming conflict covered the anti-war movement!

Pilger, again, does not go far enough. We get closer to the truth in a quote from Memoirs of a Media Maverick, by Boyce Richardson , a journalist for decades in New Zealand and Canada and with an 8 year stint in the UK as the Montreal Star's foreign:

"...in my view the so called objectivity of journalists is really just a set up to disguise the fact, well known to them in their hearts, that they can only work within the limits established by their bosses.

“None of this prevents journalists from bleating ad infinitum about the need to present all sides of an issue and to maintain the objectivity to ensure they can do that. I have always found such arguments particularly offensive. No one gets into a position of authority in a capitalist newspaper who does not accept the basic premise that its central purpose - apart from making money - is to propagate the values of capitalism...."

Chomsky takes the argument a step further in the video above when he says:

“Its long been understood for hundreds of years, that unless people are controlled they are going to challenge power. They will not simply willingly accept subordination, domination, hunger and so on. It is therefore important for those in control of decision making, who monopolise wealth…to keep the population from their throats…That can either be done by force… or control of opinion – there is no other method…”

The safest option is control of public onion. Because people are misinformed, they are oblivious as to the real nature of the system that exploits them. This further makes it easy for the media to confuse the workers by hiding real power from view. The result is – and this is intentional – they blame governments, their allegiance to political parties often switching overnight because of a newspaper’s slanted coverage of certain policies and social conditions. A newspaper like The Sun can make all the difference to a political party’s electoral chances – Hence Tony Blair’s visit to Australia to prostrate himself in front of Rupert Murdoch in 1997, fully aware that the Sun can run post election headlines such as “It was the Sun that won it” (which followed one Tory election victory)” The fact that it is the capitalist system that is seriously faltering, creating problems governments just can’t cope with (because it is the system controlling them, not vice versa) would be too dangerous to print or report.

With the arrival and popularity of the internet and the consequent boom in computer use, opportunities for access to real information are now at an unprecedented high, giving anyone interested a chance to find out for themselves the real story behind news that the media otherwise would have us believe is inconsequential. There are literally terns of thousands of independent websites out there, as well as blogsites exposing the lies, the deceit, the fraud that goes on every day. The ‘information revolution’ has placed a wonderful tool at the disposal of the working class. But a tool is only useful if used correctly. If we fail to use this tool to help us pursue our own class interests, then this ‘information revolution’ becomes just so much mind-numbing entertainment the masses will get addicted to and which the ‘powers that be’ will eventually use to steer our thoughts away from the pressing matters of the day. Maybe there was more to Tony Blair’s plans to get a computer in every home by 2005 than we think! Would he really promote computer use if he thought the masses would be accessing informative websites in their spare time, websites that might expose the truth, which might reveal the true nature of the beast?

John Pilger lambasts the corporate media

This to me is Pilger at his best. Here he is speaking in Chicago at Socialism 2007: Socialism for the 21st Century and ripping into the corporate media. Any SPGBers reading this - please don't snub this coz its not a WSM related conference. This is a first class talk and you'll get some useful quotes from it.

Here we are 130 years after John Swinton's famous attack on the press and sod all has changed. One night, probably in 1880, John Swinton, then the pre-eminent New York journalist, was the guest of honour at a banquet given him by the leaders of his craft. Someone who knew neither the press nor Swinton offered a toast to the independent press. Swinton outraged his colleagues by replying:

"There is no such thing, at this date of the world's history, in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone.

"The business of the journalists is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."

Media Musings

Through the media, the working class is constantly exposed to a significant flow of mind-numbing dribble and mis-information. Important issues of the day are distorted, totally ignored or relegated to the margins of page eleven or broadcast as minor news items on the TV. Sensationalism is used to increase market shares and sell adverts, which thus brings in profits. In this latter regards newspapers can be said not to be a vehicle for telling us what we need to know but rather a means of exposing us to advertisers. The market for a newspaper is advertisers - other business out to make a profit - and the product us! It would be no bold assertion to say that the editor of a daily tabloid is far more interested in the number of advertisers he attracts than the news he reports – though the latter pulls in the former. Thus the never ending hunt by tabloid hacks for the latest sex scandal to feed a readership hungry for insignificant gossip and trivia, a readership consequently bare to hundreds of adverts a day.

It is easy to despair at endless streams of workers leaving their newsagents in the morning clutching the Sun or the Daily Star, knowing the news they will be reading during their lunch break will be that regarding the love life of a soap star, instead of a piece on US foreign policy or the situation in Israel. A recent issue of The Sun carried a full page photograph of David Beckham’s injured foot and readers were asked to put their hand on the foot at 12.00 midday and pray for its speedy recovery because the English football team were so dependent upon it. Reportedly many workers did just that in the belief that a concerted countrywide focus on the injury would miraculously heal it. If things were that easy, they could have printed a photo of the Queen Mum and asked for readers to place their hands on it and pray for her resurrection.

The fact that so many workers are prepared to buy such newspapers each day reveals how big the task facing socialists is. All these workers need a real education they will never receive via the press or TV. The capitalist are wonderfully aware of this - an uneducated working class is hardly going to pose a threat to their interests; the real threat comes from a class conscious majority, hungry for useful information, who don’t give a shit about how many hamsters Freddy Starr eats or how many women Jack-the-lad from Coronation street has bedded.

Everyday, British people are subject to the media for an estimated 4 hours a day, either via newspapers, radio or TV, so it is important for the master class that they can control and manipulate the media for their own ends. Major media corporations in Britain are enjoying a growing monopoly. Just five companies account for 85% of all newspaper sales, with Murdoch’s News Corporation controlling over 60% of newspaper circulation. As well as this it also has vast shares in Twentieth Century Fox, Harper Collins publishers, BskyB and StarTV, which covers most of Asia and the Middle East, numerous newspapers and TV stations in Australia, Stream in Italy and Sky Perfect TV in Japan – giving it access to the minds of almost two-thirds of the global population. AOLTimeWarner – the world’s largest media company – owns CNN, 40% of US cable TV, 50 record labels, countless magazines, as well as being the world’s largest Internet Service Provider.

Needless to say, such media corporations and the likes of Rupert Murdoch, the right-wing media mogul, have interests that conflict with those of the workers. Thus it is in their interests that news and important issues we should know about are distorted and kept from us, or presented to us in such a way that we end up with tunnel and distorted vision, unable to make informed decisions or engage in intelligent discussion. Thus, the media is very much a part of the doctrinal system, reinforcing the basic social values that ensures the survival of capitalism – passivity and submissiveness to authority, the virtue of greed and personal gain, lack of concern for others, fear of real or illusory enemies, a suspicion of anything outlandish or threatening to the status quo and national pride etc.

Because people are misinformed, they are oblivious as to the real nature of the system that exploits them. This further makes it easy for the media to confuse the workers by hiding real power from view. The result is – and this is intentional – they blame governments, their allegiance to political parties often switching overnight because of a newspaper’s slanted coverage of certain policies and social conditions. A newspaper like The Sun can make all the difference to a political party’s electoral chances – Hence Tony Blair’s visit to Australia to prostrate himself in front of Rupert Murdoch in 1997, fully aware that the Sun can run post election headlines such as “It was the Sun that won it” (which followed one Tory election victory)” The fact that it is the capitalist system that is seriously faltering, creating problems governments just can’t cope with (because it is the system controlling them, not vice versa) would be too dangerous to print or report.

With the arrival and popularity of the internet and the consequent boom in computer use, opportunities for access to real information are now at an unprecedented high, giving anyone interested a chance to find out for themselves the real story behind news that the media otherwise would have us believe is inconsequential. The ‘information revolution’ has placed a wonderful tool at the disposal of the working class. But a tool is only useful if used correctly. If we fail to use this tool to help us pursue our own class interests, then this ‘revolution’ becomes just so much mind-numbing entertainment the masses will get addicted to and which the ‘powers that be’ will eventually use to steer our thoughts away from the pressing matters of the day. Maybe there is more to Tony Blair’s plans to get a computer in every home by 2005 than we think! Would he really promote computer use if he thought the masses would be accessing informative websites in their spare time?