Bourgeois media

2025-09-02T20:25:34Z

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'''Bourgeois media''' is means of communication (usually news media) that is owned, controlled, or otherwise serves the interests of the [[Bourgeoisie|bourgeois]] class.<ref name=":1">{{Citation|author=[[Lenin]]|year=1917|title=Draft Resolution On Freedom Of The Press|chapter=|page=|quote=|pdf=|city=|publisher=|isbn=|doi=|lg=|mia=https://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1917/nov/04.htm|title-url=|chapter-url=|trans-title=|trans-lang=}}</ref><ref>{{News citation|newspaper=Swiss Policy Research|title=The American Empire and its Media|url=https://swprs.org/the-american-empire-and-its-media/}}</ref> Bourgeois media can be either state-owned, such as the [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland|UK]]'s [[British Broadcasting Corporation|BBC]] or [[Qatar]]'s [[Al Jazeera]], or for-profit private media, such as [[AT&T]]-owned [[Cable News Network|CNN]]. In common political discourse, the term "'''corporate media'''" is also used to specifically refer to means of communication controlled by for-profit corporations promoting their own interests.<ref>[https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/08/17/corporate-media-the-enemy-of-the-people/ Corporate Media: the Enemy of the People] by Paul Street on [[CounterPunch]] on Aug 17, 2018</ref><ref>[https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/09/22/after-20-years-of-failed-war-corporate-media-stills-give-wars-of-empire-a-pass/ After 20 Years of Failed War, Corporate Media Still Give Wars of Empire a Pass] by Robin Andersen on [[CounterPunch]]</ref>

A young [[Karl Marx]] described the role of the media as "the most powerful lever for promoting culture and the intellectual education of the people" because of "the fact that it transforms the material struggle into an ideological struggle" while writing for his own newspaper, the [[Rheinische Zeitung]].<ref>{{Citation|author=Karl Marx|title=Karl Marx 1835-43|title-url=https://wikirouge.net/texts/en/Collection:Marx-Engels_Collected_Works/Volume_1|chapter=The Supplement to Nos. 335 and 336 of The Augsburg Allgemeine Zeitung on the Commissions of the Estates in Prussia|chapter-url=https://wikirouge.net/texts/en/The_Supplement_to_Nos._335_and_336_of_The_Augsburg_Allgemeine_Zeitung_on_the_Commissions_of_the_Estates_in_Prussia|section=Rheinische Zeitung No. 345, December 11, 1842|page=292|quote=What makes the press the most powerful lever for promoting culture and the intellectual education of the people is precisely the fact that it transforms the material struggle into an ideological struggle, the struggle of flesh and blood into a struggle of minds, the struggle of need, desire, empiricism into a struggle of theory, of reason, of form.|pdf=https://www.hekmatist.com/Marx%20Engles/Marx%20&%20Engels%20Collected%20Works%20Volume%201_%20Ka%20-%20Karl%20Marx.pdf|publisher=Lawrence & Wishart|series=Marx-Engels Collected Works|volume=1}}</ref> For [[Vladimir Lenin|Lenin]], bourgeois "freedom of the press" could only be the freedom to [[Private ownership|privately own]] the press and the [[Dictatorship of the proletariat|proletarian dictatorship]] would be tasked with ending its private ownership.<ref name=":1" />

== United States ==
[[File:Media_consolidation_in_the_US_2.jpg|thumb|211x211px|Another infographic with more logos of subsidiaries]]
Individual billionaires also bankroll their own propaganda outlets, ranging from liberal [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democrats]] like [[Bill Gates]]<ref>{{News citation|journalist=[[Alan Macleod]]|date=2021-11-15|title=Revealed: Documents Show Bill Gates Has Given $319 Million to Media Outlets|url=https://www.mintpressnews.com/documents-show-bill-gates-has-given-319-million-to-media-outlets/278943/|newspaper=[[Mintpress News]]|archive-url=|archive-date=|retrieved=}}</ref> to right-wing oil billionaires behind the [[Anti-communism|anti-communist]] [[PragerU]].<ref>{{News citation|journalist=Claire Goforth|date=2019-10-25|title=PragerU is conservatism for the youths—brought to you by old billionaires|url=https://www.dailydot.com/debug/prager-u-benefactors-dan-wilks-sheldon-adelson/|newspaper=|archive-url=|archive-date=|retrieved=}}</ref><ref>{{News citation|journalist=|date=|title=Right-Wing Views for Generation Z, Five Minutes at a Time|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/04/us/politics/dennis-prager-university.html|newspaper=|archive-url=|archive-date=|retrieved=}}</ref> Additionally, one of the richest individuals in the world, [[Jeff Bezos]] (the owner of [[Amazon.com, Inc.|Amazon]]), owns and controls the [[The Washington Post|Washington Post]] in order to promote his own financial interests.<ref>{{News citation|journalist=[[Alan Macleod]]|date=2021-06-18|title=With Bezos at the Helm, Democracy Dies at the Washington Post Editorial Board|url=https://www.mintpressnews.com/jeff-bezos-at-helm-democracy-dies-at-washington-post-editorial-board/277738/|newspaper=[[MintPress News]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211203143509/https://www.mintpressnews.com/jeff-bezos-at-helm-democracy-dies-at-washington-post-editorial-board/277738/|archive-date=|retrieved=}}</ref>

In recent times, the [[far-right]] section of the [[United States of America|Statesian]] corporate-news has increasingly radicalized their content, often taking advantage of the desperate economic state among the [[Petty bourgeoisie|petite-bourgeoisie]], and spreading racist, xenophobic, and nativist propaganda, particularly in regards to undocumented immigration in the southern border of the USA, which many far-right news corporations, such as [[FOX]], have used to spread [[White Genocide Conspiracy Theory|white-supremacist]] [[Conspiracy theory|conspiracy theories]].<ref>{{News citation|author=Dan Kennedy|newspaper=GBH|title=Tucker Carlson Is A White Supremacist. And He's Giving Fox Viewers Exactly What They Want.|date=2021-4-15|url=https://www.wgbh.org/news/commentary/2021/04/15/tucker-carlson-is-a-white-supremacist-and-hes-giving-fox-viewers-exactly-what-they-want}}</ref>

Only 11% of North Americans trust television news, and only 16% trust newspapers.<ref name=":0">{{Web citation|author=[[Ben Norton]]|newspaper=[[Multipolarista]]|title=Polls show almost no one trusts U.S. media, after decades of war propaganda and lies|date=2022-07-30|url=https://multipolarista.com/2022/07/30/trust-us-media-war-propaganda/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220806143950/https://multipolarista.com/2022/07/30/trust-us-media-war-propaganda/|archive-date=2022-08-06|retrieved=2022-08-07}}</ref>
==Support for war==
[[File:UsaMediaLies1.jpg|thumb|211x211px|Some of the most famous lies perpetuated by [[United States|Statesian]] big media]]
As US General Smedly Butler said, [[Library:War is a racket|war is a racket]]. The corporations that own the media are usually the beneficiaries of this racket, either directly through investments, or indirectly through the economic activity as a result of imperialist war.<ref>[https://miscellanynews.org/2021/05/13/opinions/the-improper-meshing-of-the-corporate-media-and-the-military-industrial-complex/ The (im)proper meshing of the corporate media and the military-industrial complex]</ref><ref>[https://www.huffpost.com/entry/push-for-war-highlights-need-for-independent-media_b_58ee8b0ce4b04cae050dc423 Push for War Highlights Need for Independent Media]</ref><ref>[https://truthout.org/articles/corporate-media-are-erasing-uss-long-term-culpability-for-afghanistan-war/ Corporate Media Are Erasing US’s Long-Term Culpability for Afghanistan War] on [[TruthOut]]</ref>

U.S. bourgeois media promoted the U.S. colonization of [[Republic of Cuba|Cuba]], the [[Republic of the Philippines|Philippines]], and [[Commonwealth of Puerto Rico|Puerto Rico]] in 1898. ''[[The New York Times]]'' denied that the 1945 nuclear bombing of Hiroshima caused dangerous levels of radiation.<ref>{{Citation|author=Charles Perrow|year=2016|title=Nuclear denial: From Hiroshima to Fukushima|title-url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0096340213501369|quote=Based on government reports, a headline in the New York Times claimed, “No Radioactivity in Hiroshima Ruin.” Three weeks later, under the headline “Survey Rules Out Nagasaki Dangers,” the subhead in the New York Times said, “Radioactivity after Atomic Bomb Is Only 1,000th of that from Luminous Dial Watch” (Greene, 2012).|pdf=https://sociology.yale.edu/sites/default/files/nuclear_denial.pdf|doi=10.1177/0096340213501369}}</ref> In the 1960s, [[United States of America|Statesian]] media claimed that [[Democratic Republic of Vietnam (1945–1975)|Vietnam]] attacked the United States in the Gulf of Tonkin. In the 1980s, U.S. media blamed the [[Sandinista National Liberation Front|Sandinistas]] for war crimes committed by the [[Central Intelligence Agency|CIA]]-backed [[Contras]].<ref name=":0" /> They completely ignored the 1992 war crimes tribunal against [[George H. W. Bush|George Bush]].<ref>{{Web citation|date=2023-04-12|title=Ramsey Clark, human rights fighter – 1927-2021|url=https://www.workers.org/2021/04/55760/|newspaper=[[Workers World]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230131173503/https://www.workers.org/2021/04/55760/|archive-date=2023-01-31|retrieved=2023-04-23|author=Sara Flounders}}</ref> In 2003, they tried to justify the [[Iraq War|U.S. invasion of Iraq]] by falsely claiming that [[Saddam Hussein]] had weapons of mass destruction.<ref name=":0" />
==Attacks against progressive candidates==
Despite the fact that many "progressives" are merely [[Social Democracy|social-democrats]] who do not challenge the [[Capitalism|capitalist]] system, they're still attacked by the corporate media for weakly threatening the control that corporations hold over society.<ref>[https://politicsdoneright.com/2019/11/corporate-media-progressive-candidates/ Corporate media attacks Progressive candidates after Democratic Debate]</ref><ref>[https://btlonline.org/bias-against-progressive-candidates-evident-in-corporate-media-coverage-of-democratic-primary/ Bias Against Progressive Candidates Evident in Corporate Media Coverage of Democratic Primary]</ref><ref>[https://truthout.org/articles/the-people-vs-the-democratic-establishment-the-coming-attack-on-progressive-candidates/ The People vs. the Democratic Establishment: The Coming Attack on Progressive Candidates]</ref>

== Alternatives ==

*[[:Category:Anti-imperialist news outlets|Anti-imperialist media outlets (category)]]
*[[:Category:Targets of censorship|Targets of censorship (category)]]

== See also ==

* [[Operation Mockingbird]]

== References ==
[[Category:Capitalist progaganda]]
<references />
[[Category:Bourgeois media]]

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Bourgeois media