The rise and fall of TV journalism

Written By: - Date published: 6:59 pm, January 19th, 2010 - 11 comments
Categories: Media - Tags:

Not sure I agree with it all but the rise and fall of the TV journalist is an interesting micro-documentary:

11 comments on “The rise and fall of TV journalism ”

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  1. BLiP 1
    19 January 2010 at 8:13 pm

    Adam Curtis rocks.

  2. oscar 2
    19 January 2010 at 8:44 pm

    Yeah! Check out his other doco’s. You will need to download them off the net as it seems the local T.V channels think they might hurt our brains.

  3. oscar 3
    19 January 2010 at 9:01 pm

    Yeah! Check out his other doco’s. You will need to download them off the net as it seems the local T.V channels think they might hurt our brains.

  4. bobo 4
    19 January 2010 at 10:15 pm

    Why bother telling the public whats going on when you can play endless weather news to pad out a bulletin ? I dont like the idea that the public need to be told whats going on instead of just showing whats going on minus the opinion, isn’t that what the BBC used to be? cold , clinical and factual news, now it seems everyone is following the fox news model of opinion infotainment.

    • Craig Glen Eden 4.1
      20 January 2010 at 7:58 am

      I have to agree bobo I am sick of the likes of Duncan Garner giving his opinion on politics instead of just telling us what happened and then letting us decide what we think of the event/situation.Espiner is the same by the way in my opinion.

      • Bill 4.1.1
        20 January 2010 at 11:23 am

        @ CGE and bobo,

        Agreed. And it’s all deliberate. The corporate agenda is unpalatable and so must never be allowed to form a part of our media diet. A dumbed down media is the solution. Easily brought about.

        Then, in the name of choice they will avalanche us with an indeterminate number of channels of soap opera/ ‘infomercial as news’ shit so that should the nasty spectre of quality information somehow raise it’s ugly head it will be immediately buried or, more likely, float on by unnoticed.

        Just look at the unintelligent, uninformative and utterly propagandistic msm coverage of Haiti if you want a working example.

  5. Graeme Edgeler 5
    20 January 2010 at 10:16 pm

    He talks about the US, and Watergate being the breakthrough, but completely ignores Edward R. Murrow.

    From “Harvest of Shame”

    This scene is not taking place in the Congo. It has nothing to do with Johannesburg or Cape Town. It is not Nyasaland or Nigeria. This is Florida. These are citizens of the United States, 1960. This is a shape-up for migrant workers. The hawkers are chanting the going piece rate at the various fields. This is the way the humans who harvest the food for the best-fed people in the world get hired. One farmer looked at this and said, “We used to own our slaves; now we just rent them.”

    …

    The migrants have no lobby. Only an enlightened, aroused and perhaps angered public opinion can do anything about the migrants. The people you have seen have the strength to harvest your fruit and vegetables. They do not have the strength to influence legislation. Maybe we do.

    And from the See it Now episode “A Report on Senator Joseph McCarthy”:

    No one familiar with the history of his country can deny that Congressional committees are useful. It is necessary to investigate before legislating. But the line between investigating and persecuting is a very fine one, and the junior senator from Wisconsin has stepped over it repeatedly.

    Weak.

    We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men — not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular.

    This is no time for men who oppose Senator McCarthy’s methods to keep silent, or for those who approve. We can deny our heritage and our history, but we cannot escape responsibility for the result. There is no way for a citizen of a republic to abdicate his responsibilities. As a nation we have come into our full inheritance at a tender age. We proclaim ourselves, as indeed we are, the defenders of freedom, wherever it continues to exist in the world, but we cannot defend freedom abroad by deserting it at home.
    The actions of the junior Senator from Wisconsin have caused alarm and dismay amongst our allies abroad, and given considerable comfort to our enemies. And whose fault is that? Not really his. He didn’t create this situation of fear; he merely exploited it — and rather successfully. Cassius was right. “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves.”

    Yeah. TV journalists were tame until the 70s.

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