*** Forty days into the Kashmir “lockdown”—stupid American jargon for a brutal and undemocratic suppression of fundamental rights—there are three, possibly four, “narratives” of what is happening in the valley. There is the local Kashmiri view, which we do not know much about, and possibly they themselves don’t. There is the mainland India view, which…
With large sections of Indian mainstream media engaged in the patriotic duty of “manufacturing consent” for the Narendra Modi government’s undemocratic actions in Kashmir, the onus is increasingly on foreign media to provide the real picture, or the closest approximation to it. BBC Radio, for long seen to be “reliable” news provider by previously colonised…
Like so much else since the dawn of civilisation in 2014, journalistic coverage and assessment of the situation in Kashmir after the removal of Article 370 in the Valley has been severely polarised. On the one side is a contest between the establishment view of the Narendra Modi government, and the independent view of foreign news…
Channels calling for war. Studios populated with former generals talking military tactics. Social media messaging apps flooded with fake news and propaganda. Al Jazeera‘s excellent media programme ‘The Listening Post‘, hosted by Richard Gizbert, takes a look at the war-mongering, hate-spewing, “unjournalistic ranting” of primetime TV in India. *** Rohit Chopra, an associate professor at…
*** The weaponisation of Indian broadcast and digital media by Hindutva forces has been a key force-multiplier in coarsening the discourse and manufacturing consent, to be encashed at the ballot boxes. In this, the first of a two-part excerpt from his new book Freedom, Civility, Commerce, journalist and academic Sukumar Muralidharan argues that the eagerness…
The point has been made before but bears repetition. If Britain can have a BBC, if America can have CNN, if Qatar can have Al Jazeera, if China can have CCTV, if Russia can have Russia Today, why cannot India? Why do Indian broadcasters, public, private or autonomous, not have the vision or the resources…
Al Jazeera’s media show The Listening Post on how 24×7 media is dangerously inflaming passions against US President Barack Obama with lies, untruths, rhetoric—a little like the way a newspaper advertisement greeted John F. Kennedy the day he arrived in Dallas in 1963. Also read: How global media covered Barack Obama inauguration ‘The media’s obsession…
Al Jazeera‘s media show The Listening Post on how the mainstream media reacted—and over-reacted—to the H1N1 virus, secure in the knowledge that no one would ever accuse them of overkill. And how the digital purveyors of the rumours on blogs, Twitter, Facebook, etc, were themselves victims. Also read: 8 dos (and don’ts) on how to…
One hundred million views on YouTube later, Richard Gizbert, host of Al Jazeera‘s media show Listening Post, declares that the Susan Boyle phenomenon was “no car crash, but no accident either.” Also read: The 10 craziest things about Susan Boylemania
Blogs, internet chats, Jaago Re, Jai Ho!, Lead India, microsites, rock concerts, TV commercials… The 2009 general election has not been short of media noise. But has it really spurred youngsters to shut up and vote? Or is it all blather and brand building with an embedded social message? Meenakshi Ravi of Al Jazeera‘s media…
It’s not just authoritarian governments that are preventing citizens and activists from accessing news and views that they would not like them to lay their eyes and ers on. Transnational corporations that supply the technology to make access possible in the first place are playing a hand, according to Al Jazeera‘s media show, The Listening…
Sri Lanka is on the verge of winning the war against the Tamil Tigers in the North, but will it ever win the peace? Thousands of civilians are missing, and efforts to trace them are weak. Nine journalists have died at work in the last three years, and the number may be even higher. Al…
“Over two days, newspapers around the world published 1.2 million articles. Over one 24-hour period, the global radio and television coverage combined added up to 20 million minutes; to watch it all it would have taken a human being 38 years,” reports Richard Gizbert of Al Jazeera English on the inauguration of Barack Obama as…
Israel’s land, sea and air attack on Gaza to smoke out Hamas men firing daily rockets on the Jewish homeland, has been remarkable for the near-complete blackout of information from inside Gaza City. Journalists are barred from reporting from inside Gaza City for “operational reasons”. Result: As the relentless bombardment continues, no one knows what’s…
The strange thing about the so-called Global Village is that it has turned us all provincial. We relate to, are interested in, connect with, and remember news events with an insularity that would befuddle Marshall McLuhan. And in the process, we forget that stuff happens outside of the bubble we inhabit. The Listening Post, the…
The cynicism of the public in the media is a global sunrise industry. Fed by politicians, businessmen, sportsmen, celebrities and other newsmakers who feel the wrong end of it, or no longer have any use for it, news consumers can never resist the temptation to run it down. Till…. Video: courtesy Al Jazeera
Who’s to blame for the mounting crude oil prices? Oil producing countries? India and China for their voracious appetite? Speculators wanting to make a quick buck or ten? In the latest episode of its media showThe Listening Post, hosted by Richard Gizbert, Al Jazeera English throws light on how the global media has failed to…
News has not been in short supply in the global village in the satellite age. There are the “Indian” English news channels: NDTV 24×7, CNN-IBN, Times Now, Headlines Today. And the Hindi news channels: Aaj Tak, Star News, NDTV India, IBN 7, DD News, India TV. And the language news channels: Udaya, Sun, Suvarna, TV9,…
Al Jazeera English, the global news channel launched by the Qatar-based Arabic channel, continues to be unavailable in the land of the free, but in the age of Web 2.0 what is beyond anybody’s reach if you want it badly enough? The best of the channel’s critically acclaimed output is there for those who make…
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