Blog Assignment Topic 7

Critical Reflection 1

The documentary entitled "The Power of Nightmares (Part 3 - Shadow in the Cave)" by Adam Curtis was shown in class on Monday. How do you relate the information given to you in the documentary to the theory of Media Imperialism that we talked about in lecture?

Media imperialism is a theory stating that smaller countries are losing their identity due to the force-feeding of media from larger nations. It can be equated to small community shops closing down due to large superstores moving in, taking over and having a monopoly. As the larger media corporation begin to take over, smaller media companies are either being forced out or swallowed up.

Media imperialism is not just seen internationally. When large amounts of media output are produced by just a few, or even one company, then this too is media imperialism. Countries such as Canada and Italy are often accused of media imperialism. A large amount of the media output in these two countries is controlled by just one company.

The problem with just one company or owner controlling the media is that media output can be biased. The owner can decide on what information is shown, as well as what to censor. This can sometimes come down to an influence from the country's government. Media imperialism has often been linked with a lack of freedom of information. A large number of 24-hour news channels have been found to be acting without regard to journalistic integrity. Some countries' governments will even be dictated to by large manufacturing companies. This is because a great amount of the country's wealth is brought in from these manufacturing companies. If there is any bad press about these companies, the company will simply move somewhere else.

Source:wiseGEEK


Critical Reflection 2

The documentary is really interesting by showing how media really "works". Take the Us government as an example, the most powerful country is spreading their thought about terrorism through media. They are trying to make everybody follow their foot steps and think how they want everybody to think. This brainwashing treatment is working extremely well because mostly every country rely heavily on Western news sources. The most obvious incident is when 2 planes crashed the World Trade Center, they broadcast the news repetitively trying to instill the thought that Al-Qaeda did it and Muslims are terrorist into viewers' mind. Then President Bush declare a war towards Iraq and Afghanistan as a revenge for the terrorist attack against US and he did it. This is what media imperialism is all about, the person in charge decides what information he wanted to deliver and what not because the media is fully under his control. Media imperialism is bias because it may contain a lot of personal feeling and opinion which makes the output unfair and lack of trust from the public.