One for the political communication kids

So this post is completely unrelated to KCB201 Virtual Cultures, but it is related to another QUT unit that I am undertaking this semester; KCB302 Political Communication.

For any of you struggling with the last couple of weeks of semester, here is something that might take your mind of it for a short while and bring a laugh to your lips. Even if you know nothing about the contest between democrat presidential candidates Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama it may still be mildly amusing...

Don't get too excited - it's not quite as risque as the YouTube still looks below.




It brought a whole new meaning to political communication for me.
Kudos to creator wolf084.
Enjoy.


For those of you who take politics a little more seriously, I wish I had been in Parliament on the day John Howard and Paul Keating went head to head on the "great censure motion"! At the beginning of the parliamentary year in 1995, where Australia had the worst current account deficit on record, this was an amazing moment in Question Time where Howard introduced a censure motion against Keating. Poor Mr Speaker (the Hon. Stephen Martin) had a difficult time with this one.

It begins...



Who ever said John Howard was unflappable? If you ask me he was absolutely riled! You don't see this sort of high dudgeon from Howard these days - perhaps it's because as (former) Prime Minister he felt he had to tone things down and maintain an unemotional refined image. What a shame.

Even better is the reply by Keating...



As always it is done with a fair amount of personal invective and spiteful vigour. And people say politics is stale and yet they can watch programs like Big Brother?

This sort of fervourous debate gives me faith that Australian politics is not quite as dead-beat and boring as we are sometimes criticised of.

Playing The Election Game: Politics In The Movies

Dogs Show Their True Colours

Released in the midst of the “monicagate” era in the United States, the films Wag the Dog [1997] and Primary Colors [1998] deliver some biting political satire that takes “all the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players” to a whole new level. In the worlds of Wag the Dog and Primary Colors life is like a play, but it is a play promoted by the media and directed by the politically savvy. There might be nothing new to movies that poke fun at people, politics, the media, and the government, but the thought provoking cynicism on the theme of power and control hits uncomfortable close to home.

Wag the Dog, like Stanley Kubrick’s Dr Strangelove, is somewhat disconcerting as the concept is so absurd, yet potentially plausible. After being caught in a scandalous situation just days before the election, the President’s chances of being re-elected are slim. The president’s political consultants move swiftly to manipulate the media (and the voting public) and direct their attention away from the allegations – focusing it instead on terrorism and a manufactured war with Albania. It is the parallels we can draw to reality here that make Wag the Dog so effective. While the president is not named in the film, references are made to the Gulf War and the assumption can be drawn that George Bush Senior is the president in question. The film also eerily pre-empted President Clinton’s actions in his second term of office, where the Lewinsky scandal broke and questionable military operations like Desert Fox were undertaken.

Based on Larry Beinhart’s book American Hero, the film satirises the relationship between politics, the media, and public opinion. The film implies that politics is about mass entertainment and that the political process is about being bigger, better, and louder than your opponent. Playing on the notion that the media also pursue these noisier stories, in the world of Wag the Dog the press can be fed anything and they will lap it up, as long as it is going to sell more news. Here the truth becomes of little consequence as “truth” is defined by whatever the public is convinced to be true. Wag the Dog alludes that reality is constructed for us by media advisors who use the media to showcase their latest political agenda – and in a hall of smoke and mirrors it is difficult to tear your eyes away from the Hollywood glamour, even if you wanted to.

The real-life resemblance in Primary Colors is more overt. The film was based on then-anonymous author Joe Klein’s 1996 roman à clé. Klein’s politically charged novel by the same name was a fictionalised account of Clinton’s run for the presidency in 1992. It drew considerably from his own notes at the time (as a reporter for Newsweek) as well as Pennebaker and Hegedus’s documentary The War Room [1994]. Primary Colors (the film) exploited the use of a visual medium and candidly parodied the Clintons and their campaign team. Primary Colors is “a neat examination of the power of the American media machine and its insatiable appetite for political intrigue” [Harvey 1998]. Here the political process is seen as dominated by the media, with politicians at their mercy. The goal of this crazy game is to stay a step ahead of your opponent, be ready to counter any censure in an instant, and be prepared to sling some mud of your own.

Primary Colors illuminates that ideals are often compromised throughout the political process in the pursuit of victory. But what for victory if at any price? In Primary Colors our heroes are portrayed as sacrificing their morals on the premise that flaws are redeemed, and underhanded tactics are justified, when it is in the pursuit of loftier goals. While this may cause a crisis of conscience for a time, once caught up in the momentum it is all too easy to lose sight of reality. The media further capitalises on this excitement, whipping the public into a frenzy, with little care as to how or why they do so as long as they’re receiving the attention and the revenue that follows. It is unfortunate that both the media’s and the public’s appetite for intrigue is essentially undoing us. Truth, if there is such a thing, is distorted either in pursuit of a scoop, or simply by anyone looking to discredit people in power. It is an environment where you are guilty until proven innocent – and even if you are innocent it will often be too late.

Wag the Dog and Primary Colors may differ in their representations, but they both ultimately deal with the concept of power and control – power over the people and public opinion, and control of information and truth. Wag the Dog insinuates that it is political operatives who wield the power, with the media as their conduit to control. Primary Colors suggests that power is shared between opinion leaders (and of course their advisors) and the media, with both having a level of control over publicising information and creating truth. Whichever notion you side with, it is obvious that the issues of power and control have not dissipated with time. A decade on, these films are still as relevant as if they had been released recently. Today we can relate to the issues in the films from our experiences with the “wars” in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the constant scandals paraded in the media, but it is the core themes that really play with our conscience. While we may be sceptical of the things we see and hear in the media, we have little reason not to believe in the information we are given. Can we trust politicians and their advisors? Do the ends always justify the means? Who is public opinion and “truth” constructed by? How would we know if it our reality is being manufactured for us? We will all have different answers to these questions, and it is up to us to find them.

I would like to believe that we, as individuals, have both power and control. I would like to believe that we all have the power over our own lives, and as such have control over our thoughts and behaviours. Perhaps it’s because I just don’t like the idea that I am being subtly manipulated by other forces. But whether I like it or not the question remains; how would I know if I am, and would it make a difference? At the end of the day they might just be entertainment, but it is films like Wag the Dog and Primary Colors that advance the rational, critical, and independent thinking of audiences and encourage us to form our own opinions. It is my hope that if we know the rules of the game then we can, at least in part, play the game ourselves.

Memorable Quotes

Wag the Dog

Conrad Brean: What difference does it make if it’s true? If it’s a story and it breaks, they’re gonna run with it.

Conrad Brean: We’re not gonna have a war, we’re gonna have the appearance of a war.

Stanley Motss: I’m in show business, why come to me?
Conrad Brean: War is show business, that’s why we’re here.

Conrad Brean: What’s the thing people remember about the Gulf War? A bomb falling down a chimney. Let me tell you something: I was in the building where we filmed that with a 10-inch model made out of Lego.
Stanley Motss: Is that true?
Conrad Brean: Who the hell’s to say?

Stanley Motss: It’s all, you know, thinking ahead, thinking ahead.
Conrad Brean: It’s like being a plumber.
Stanley Motss: Yea, it’s like a plumber – do your job right and nobody should notice. But when you fuck it up, everything gets full of shit.

Conrad Brean: Why does the dog wag its tail? Because the dog is smarter than the tail. If the tail were smarter, it would Wag the Dog.

Primary Colors

Henry Burton: A man who believes what I believe and lies about it to get elected, as opposed to a man who just doesn’t give a fuck… well, I’ll choose the liar.

Richard Jemmons: The media giveth and go fuck yourself.

Governor Fred Picker: You know this is a terrific country, but sometimes we go a little crazy. Maybe that’s part of our greatness, part of our freedom. But if we don’t watch out and calm down, it might just spin out of control. You know the world is getting more and more complicated, and politicians have to explain things to you in simpler terms, so they can get their little oversimplified explanations on the evening news. And eventually instead of even trying to explain things they give up and just start slinging mud at each other. And it’s all to keep you excited. To keep you watching, like you watch a car watch or a wrestling match. As a matter of fact, that’s exactly what it’s like – professional wrestling. It’s staged and its fake and it doesn’t mean anything. And that goes for the debates. We don’t hate our opponents, hell half the time we don’t even know them. But it seems it’s the only way we know how to keep you all riled up. So what I want to do with this campaign is kind of quieten things down and start having a conversation, about what sort of country we want this to be in the next century.

Libby Holden (on pandering to the media): Lets just scrape away your last little shreds of dignity and wallow in the trash.

Governor Fred Picker: … no matter what I do, the press is still going to find out the rest of it, aren’t they?
Governor Jack Stanton: If they think it will sell one newspaper, yes.

Governor Jack Stanton: We can do incredible things. We can change this country. I’m gonna win this thing. Look me in the eye and tell me that you don’t want to be part of it.

Recommendations

If you liked Wag the Dog or Primary Colors then Chorazy Thoughts recommends the following films:

The Great Dictator [Chaplin 1940]
Dr Strangelove [Kubrick 1964]
The War Room [Pennebaker and Hegedus 1994]
Canadian Bacon [Moore 1995]
Thank You For Smoking [Reitman 2006]
Land of the Blind [Edwards 2006]
All the King’s Men [Zaillian 2006]

We are the gatekeepers

Truth.

What is it? How do you define it? Does it even exist in the first place?

I believe truth is whatever you want it to be. It is what you make of it, as simple as what you yourself believe to be true. The real challenges lies in figuring out what we believe in. This is what I see as the outstanding benefit of citizen journalism.

Citizen journalism is not a new phenomenon. Predating even the photocopier and the printing press, it has risen in profile over the last decade thanks to new and emerging technologies, and more specifically; the internet [Bruns 2008]. Citizen journalists finally have a medium where there is an open inflow and outflow of information in which they can freely engage as produsers. The impartiality, neutrality, and non-discriminatory nature of the internet has also reinstated the democracy of media and encouraged us to shake free of traditional closed news processes [Jenkins 2008; Bruns 2008].

Citizen journalists are defined as average, ordinary people, without professional journalistic training, who are using new media technologies as tools to create and distribute material and content that is often alternative to main stream media representations [Glaser 2006; Bruns 2008]. The need for space to host and promote the prodused material of citizen journalists has pushed the global development of independent media centres and popularity of sites like Slashdot, PlasticsNews, Current_TV, OhmyNews, and even YouTube [Bruns 2008]. Much to the despair of professional journalists and traditional news producers [see Farmer 2006], this is clear evidence that humanity is craving a greater level of diversity and independence than media gateways are providing.

Bruns [2005; 2008] calls citizen journalists “gatewatchers”; describing the behaviour of citizen journalists as monitoring the output “gateways” of news publications, media outlets, and other information sources (including government and NGOs). It is from this watching that Bruns [2005; 2008] suggests information is drawn with the intention of re-evaluating, reinterpreting and/or re-contextualising it to produce new media and content that is alternative or corrective to the mainstream. However I believe many people engaging in citizen journalism today are surpassing their roles as gatewatchers, instead becoming gatekeepers.

Citizen journalists, or more specifically investigative journalists, are actively seeking new information, information not made available through traditional media gateways. Pursuits like that of Peter Joseph (see Zeitgeist) or Jeremy Scahill (see the shadow of citizen journalism) are opening new gateways to information otherwise kept under lock and key. The internet facilitates the open publishing of this information, allowing it to be communally evaluated, responded to, and built on in a palimpsestic process [Bruns 2008].

The best part about all of this? Anyone can pursue their own zeitgeist, with the knowledge that they will have the means of legitimately reporting their findings as a citizen journalist in a context in which they can be heard [Katz 1997; Bowman and Willis 2003]. We are in an incredibly privileged position to take charge of our own lives, and discuss and reflect on what is happening around us. We have the means to search for new information, and open new gateways whenever necessary.

We have a right to our opinion, and we have the right to be informed. We also have the right to choose. The right to choose between what we are told is true, and what we actually believe to be true. We hold the keys to make this choice. We are the gatekeepers.

REFERENCES

Bowman, S. and C. Willis. 2003. We Media: How Audiences are Shaping the Future of News and Information. In American Press Institute: The Media Centre, ed. J. D. Lasica. http://www.hypergene.net/wemedia/weblog.php (accessed May 13, 2008).

Bruns, A. 2005. Chapter Two: Gatewatching. In Gatewatching: Collaborative Online News Production, A. Bruns, 11-30. New York: Peter Lang.

Bruns, A. 2008. News Blogs and Citizen Journalism: Perpetual Collaboration in Evaluating the News. In Blogs, Wikipedia, Second Life, and Beyond: From Production to Produsage, A. Bruns, 69-100. New York: Peter Lang.

Farmer, J. 2006. Citizen Journalism Sucks. In The Age. http://blogs.theage.com.au/media/archives/2006/10/citizen_journal.html (accessed May 11, 2008).

Flew, T. 2005. New Media: An Introduction. New York: Oxford.

Glaser, M. 2006. Digging Deeper: Your Guide to Citizen Journalism. In PBS: Media Shift, M. Glaser. http://www.pbs.org/mediashift/2006/09/digging_deeperyour_guide_to_ci.html (accessed May 11, 2008).

Katz, J. 1997. Birth of a Digital Nation. In Wired, Iss. 5.04. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/5.04/netizen.html (accessed May 11, 2008).

Jenkins, H. 2007. Videoblogging, Citizen Journalism, and Credibility. In The Official Weblog of Henry Jenkins, H. Jenkins. http://henryjenkins.org/2007/03/videoblogging.html (accessed May 13, 2008).

Jenkins, H. 2008. From Production to Produsage: Interview with Axel Bruns. In The Official Weblog of Henry Jenkins, H. Jenkins. http://henryjenkins.org/ (accessed May 13, 2008).

The future of Zeitgeist

For anyone who knows of Zeitgeist or read my earlier post on it, this is for you!
The sequel is coming! Check out the preview below or access it from YouTube...



I say bring on October.

Otherwise if anyone is studying (or has studied) political communication at QUT you may also recognise the opening scene of the preview from Lyndon Johnson's 1964 Daisy TVC. Just another one of those quirky coincidences.

Love it.

COMMENT in response to Brendam's Blog

The following is a response to a post by fellow blogger Brendan Yates entitled Online communities, and the offline hype, that he published to his blog on Thursday, May 1, 2008:

Brendan, while I found your post online communities and the offline hype reasonably well-informed and engaging to read, you made some remarks that I was compelled to comment on.

You question the validity of virtual links and whether these relationships are actual relationships. I believe that virtual links are valid and that the relationships established in online communities are no less “real” than those occurring offline. While there may be a greater capacity for deception online [Sclove 1995; Bruns 2008], this should not detract from the significance and value of relationships built online, especially those built from mutual respect and honesty. While Flew [2005] is a very credible source, your post would have benefited from a wider reading into what elements are conducive to forming a prosperous community. I would suggest Peck’s The Different Drum [1987] and Rheingold’s The Virtual Community [2000]. You may also find my post shaking the stigma stuck to life online relevant.

I also seriously disagree with your statement that “by using the internet to expose ourselves social, we are really hiding behind the digital projection of ourselves, and can end up shutting out real-world physical relationships”. I am not contesting the inability of online relationships to embody a physical connection, or suggesting online communities should usurp offline relationships. However using the internet as a communication tool and medium for social interaction does not mutually exclude what you call “real-world” relationships (for a well reasoned discussion on this see Wellman and Gulia’s article Virtual Communities as Communities).

What is wrong with a person who finds the most enjoyment in life from playing xbox live or second life (see my post why we fear the influences of electronic games), or uploading videos onto YouTube (see my post a revelation of the “real” value in YouTube), or simply hanging out in internet chat rooms? How are these activities any different from (or lesser than) the activities we participate in offline? In online environments there is a much greater scope to explore who we are as people, and find our niche in the pursuit of acceptance and self-satisfaction [Cobcroft 2008; Bruns 2008]. While online communities might not be a “cure” for our social inadequacies they are certainly not “corrupting to people’s lives”. Perhaps read Smith and Kollock’s Communities in Cyberspace [1999], or reread Flew [2005] if you are still wondering on this matter.

REFERENCES

Bruns, A. 2008. KCB201 Virtual Cultures: Week Six Podcast. http://www.slideshare.net/Snurb/kcb201-week-6-slidecast-online-communities?src=embed (accessed April 10, 2008).

Cobcroft, R. 2008. KCB201 Virtual Cultures: Week Six Lecture. Public Lecture, Brisbane: Queensland University of Technology. April 10, 2008.

Flew, T. 2005. Virtual Cultures. In New Media: An Introduction, by T. Flew, 61-82. Melbourne: Oxford University Press.

Peck, M. S. 1987. The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace. 2^nd ed. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Rheingold, H. 2000. The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Sclove, R. 1995. Technology and Democracy. New York: Guilford.

Smith, M. A. and P. Kollock. eds. 1999. Communities in Cyberspace. New York: Routledge.

Wellman, B. and M. Gulia. 1999. Virtual Communities as Communities: Net Surfers don’t Ride Alone. In Communities in Cyberspace, ed. M. A. Smith and P. Kollock, 167-194. New York: Routledge.

PLEASE NOTE

Due to technical difficulties this comment was unable to be posted directly to Brendam’s Blog and the post online communities and the offline hype. As an alternative I emailed this comment to Brendan for his reference.

Shaking the stigma stuck to life online

I’d like to kick this off with a somewhat dated quote from Morgan Scott Peck:

We know the rules of community; we know the healing effect of community in terms of individual lives. If we could somehow find a way across the bridge of our knowledge, would not these same rules have a healing effect upon our world? We human beings have often been referred to as social animals. But we are not yet community creatures. We are impelled to relate with each other for our survival. But we do not yet relate with the inclusivity, realism, self-awareness, vulnerability, commitment, openness, freedom, equality, and love of genuine community. It is clearly no longer enough to be simply social animals, babbling together at cocktail parties and brawling with each other in business and over boundaries. It is our task – our essential, central, crucial task – to transform ourselves from mere social creatures into community creatures. It is the only way that human evolution will be able to proceed.

[Peck 1987, 165]

Twenty years on, have we made any progress? It perplexes me that despite the widely acclaimed benefits and value of the internet as a way to connect, network, and communicate with people, there remains a stigma attached to online communities. These communities are stuck in a quagmire of pessimism and stereotypes, with their members unable to be liberated. The irony in this is that life online is one of the most liberating and democratic environments that we have the opportunity to exist and participate in [Rheingold 2000; Flew 2005; Pesce 2007].

With the exception of the issues arising from the global digital divide (which I will not deal with here) the internet is fundamentally neutral, impartial, and non-discriminatory [Reid 1999; Hartley 2005; Flew 2005; Bruns 2008]. In an online environment you can communicate across boundaries irrespective of nationality, culture, gender, income, and any other demographically defining feature that would otherwise restrict you in the 'real' world [Flew 2005; Bruns 2008; Cobcroft 2008]. Logically these conditions should be conducive to moving humanity forward [Schuler 1996; Kollock and Smith 1999; Rheingold 2000], reflecting what Peck [1987] describes as a genuine, or true, community. Yet spending too much time on the internet (regardless of what you might be doing online) is still commonly perceived as unproductive and unhealthy [Wellman and Gulia 1999]. It is unfortunate that investing time and attention in these online communities is exactly what makes the majority of them prosper.

Rheingold defines online communities as “social aggregations that emerge from the Internet when enough people carry on public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships” [2000, 5]. I see this as only the first brick in a much bigger building. Like offline communities they emerge from the coming together of people who share similar interests/values/goals etc. [Flew 2005; Cobcroft 2008; Bruns 2008]. However, online communities differ in that they come from a context that transcends physical limitations and circumvents traditional social hierarchies [Cobcroft 2008; Bruns 2008]. Online communities are defined by their users, where expression is through participation and your value is defined by the contributions you make [Hartley 2005; Bruns 2008]. Over time these communities are shaped by their members; expanding, contracting, and evolving accordingly, increasing in complexity and adapting to change in ways that are not foreseeably possible by offline communities.

There are two broad identifiable arguments tarnishing the reputation of online communities. The first stems from the fear that we will see a rise in hate groups and negative communities [Flew 2005; Bruns 2008]. I understand that the internet provides a medium for the development of socially destructive communities, such as pro-ana groups, homophobic groups, racist groups – the list goes on – but like it or not, these communities existed offline long before they went live on the internet. While it is true that existence online may have accelerated the contact and communication between these negative communities [Bruns 2008], why should these bad apples ruin the reputation of all the 'healthy' online communities? The second entails the concern that the increase in online communities, and the pervasiveness of the internet in our lives, is leading to a wider social disconnect, that threatens societal stability [Bruns 2008]. While I think this argument has some merit, particularly in that no online activity can ever replace our physical senses, it seems to echo the voices of those who are resistant to change. There is always a risk with change. Fear of this risk should only hold us back when the risk outweighs the possible benefits. I think these fears are unfounded and are holding back the real potential of online communities.

I believe that there has been too much focus on how people are connected, and we have lost touch with why people are connected. If the main difference between online and offline communities is the forum in which they choose to communicate [Flew 2005; Bruns 2008; Cobcroft 2008], does it really matter what this forum is as long as the purpose of communication is being achieved? If interactive communication is pivotal to social growth and communal enrichment [Peck 1987; Reid 1999; Kollock and Smith 1999], it stands to reason that as long as we are connected, and communicating in a positive and effective manner, how we are connected is irrelevant.

We may be a long way from attaining Peck’s [1987] "genuine community" status, but on the path to this nirvana shouldn’t we nurture what is good about the communities we do have? Online communities in virtual space deserve our respect and acceptance just as much as offline communities in the 'real' world. I remain hopeful that those of us immersed in life online will (eventually) be able to shake off the negativity that shrouds virtual communities and paints them as lesser than real. Only then will they be able compliment and coexist peacefully with the offline world.


Please note:

Online communities are also called virtual communities. These terms are commonly used interchangeably and construe the same meaning.

See also the following posts:

Why we fear the influence of electronic games (parts one and two) – for an extended case-study on gaming, media effects, and our fear of technology.

A revelation of the “real” value in YouTube – for further understanding of the value and importance of online communities, specifically the YouTube community.

REFERENCES

Bruns, A. 2008. KCB201 Virtual Cultures: Week Six Podcast. http://www.slideshare.net/Snurb/kcb201-week-6-slidecast-online-communities?src=embed (accessed April 10, 2008).

Cobcroft, R. 2008. KCB201 Virtual Cultures: Week Six Lecture. Public Lecture, Brisbane: Queensland University of Technology. April 10, 2008.

Flew, T. 2005. Virtual Cultures. In New Media: An Introduction, by T. Flew, 61-82. Melbourne: Oxford University Press.

Hartley, J. 2005. Communication, Cultural and Media Studies: The Key Concepts. 3^rd ed. New York: Routledge.

Kollock, P. and M. A. Smith. 1999. Introduction: Communities in Cyberspace. In Communities in Cyberspace, ed. M. A. Smith and P. Kollock, 3-26. New York: Routledge.

Peck, M. S. 1987. The Different Drum: Community Making and Peace. 2^nd ed. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Pesce, M. 2007. The Human Network: Mob Rules. http://blog.futurestreetconsulting.com/?p=27 (accessed March 3, 2008).

Reid, E. 1999. Hierarchy and Power: Social Control in Cyberspace. In Communities in Cyberspace, ed. M. A. Smith and P. Kollock, 107-133. New York: Routledge.

Rheingold, H. 2000. The Virtual Community: Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier. Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Schuler, D. 1996. New Community Networks: Wired For Change. Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley.

Wellman, B. and M. Gulia. 1999. Virtual Communities as Communities: Net Surfers don’t Ride Alone. In Communities in Cyberspace, ed. M. A. Smith and P. Kollock, 167-194. New York: Routledge.