The Chant of the Barbie Dolls

How low can you go?


Dear Mr Rugman,
Re your report of March 27th on Chavez in Venezuala: http://www.channel4.com/news/special-reports/special-reports-storypage.jsp?id=2046
The overall impression this report carefully crafts is of a slightly crazy,
paranoid President tending towards dictatorship, bent on keeping power by
rearming and ingratiating himself to the population by giving handouts to,
for example cooperatives that are 'haemorraging money'.
I would contrast your report with that of Kim Bartley and Donnacha O'Briain.
Their wonderful documentary shows a courageous Chavez returned to power by
sheer popular demand after 48 hours of a coup attempt. Who knows for sure
if the US was behind this coup, but it was clearly welcomed by them, as the
clips of the Whitehouse spokesmen at the time show. 'Chavez: Insdie the
Coup' is particularly interesting from a media point of view because it
shows both the extradordinary level of control of the media by Chavez
opponents and also the freedom that they have to do that. There is a clip,
for example, of a serious looking commentator who rasies the question 'Is
the President mad ?'. In addition they show what is actually happening on
the ground during the coup. This documentary constitutes a real life
experiment in how a business dominated media mis-reports reality to push the
population in a certain direction. Thankfully, this coup attempt failed,
despite the massive media propaganda.
So not only is Chavez not paranaoid, but he has every right to consider how
he should defend himself in the future! Let alone the general context of US
intervention in Latin America.
You protray him as making kind of limp gags. But his offer of cheap oil to
poor comunities in the US (which has been taken up by some) is, if you wish
to evaluate in those narrow terms, a stroke of PR genious.
What I see in Chavez is a courageous man doing a great job for his people in
the face of significant pressure from elite interests at home and abroad.
What I see in your report is an attepmt to throw dirt, an attepmt to smear
this man. It's true that in your report you do allow Chavez supporters to
speak, but the tone of the narrator is deeply condecending and patronising,
a constant tone of sneering running through it as if saying 'Just look at
this guy, why should we believe anyhting he would say ?'. I read this
report as the compliant mainstream media taking it's cues from the powers
that be to assist softening up the publics view of Chavez in preperation for
the day when the US eventually gets around to attacking him. Paranoid ? Might I remind you of tre recent similar case of media passivity in the face
of irrational build up to war in Iraq ?. Not to mention, I repeat, the very
well documented US interventions in Latin America. You provide none of
thisfactual context that would show Chavez's concerns about US agression to
be perfectly reasonable.
Sometimes I wonder whether journalists like yourself are just, as Dylan
wrties 'only a pawn in their game', or rather active manipulators. I think
though a better anthem for you all would be the chant of the Barbie dolls in
'Toy Story': 'How low can you go ? How low can you go ?' as you limbo your
way downwards, towards ever lower journalistic standards.
yours,
Robert Byrne.
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