Propaganda comes in all shapes and sizes, whether this be soft, sweet, obvious, discreet or downright blatant. It can be political, financial, religious, racial, military, or stem from a multitude of other reasons.
The media in general will always try to impose their own thinking on those who follow them, that is human nature. But they are also influenced by propaganda of one kind or another, in this modern world there is very little pure thought, or totally unbiased source of information.
Thought manipulation is now a way of life, from advertising to international politics, nothing is exempt anymore.
The trick is to remember this fact when watching TV or reading newspapers.
One must learn to read between the lines and understand what these people are really trying to say and why......
Especially the why part !
That is why it is so important to chose as many sources of information as possible, in order to get a more balanced approach of internal and world affairs. It is also important to study history in order to understand how the world has arrived at the way it is now.
If you don't, then all you are doing is reaffirming your own limited thinking and restricted beliefs.
In which case you can never evolve properly, nor think independently or exercise your democratic rights correctly, because you will only chose what your limited sources tell you to.
You simply become a mushroom who is kept in the dark and fed bullshit, and willingly so.
Mass media slant their reporting according to polls to gain market share if it's in a small town, big city or nationwide. Most people could care less about the news unless it's local or will affect their wallet. That's why most news outlets tend to sensationalized stories to get viewers attention. Fracking is a good example. A few Green organizations were needing a new issue to promote so more contributions would come their way, so they chose fracking. They showcased a few homes who had water wells that were naturally emitting methane and claimed it was caused by hydraulic fracturing. Those were proved to be false but the MSM never reported that. They find it to be more profitable to show ignorant landowners agonizing over watersheds, wells and earthquakes since their viewers like seeing crap like that. They don't mention that fracking has been done 1 million times since 1948 without one incident of ground water pollution. They also don't show the interviews of respected geologists who say quakes occur in these areas because there's existing faults (which trapped the oil and gas in the first place) that do shift on occasion and have in those spots earlier so it's much ado over nothing.
The only news I listen to is NPR. They actually do a decent job presenting both sides of the story.
A massive amount, principally because people still seem to have a belief in the theory that says "If it wasn't true it wouldn't be published" or "if it wasn't true it wouldn't be on TV". People seem to conveniently forget that every news story and TV program is made by a person, and people have agendas. It is also a very useful thing to keep in mind this: Nobody will ever tell you anything unless it suits their agenda to have you believe it.
The fact that people tend to read a newspaper every day, on the train or bus going to work, during lunchbreak etc, means that viewpoints can be subtly drip fed to people without them really being aware of it. It is quite astounding how many people will only ever cite "it said in the paper...." as evidence for something (as opposed to: "I saw...." "I know someone who witnessed...." "It happened to me"....."It happened to someone I know").
The big contraversies over the phone hacking that tabloids have been engaged in has probably made some difference, but it doesn't appear to have had a big impact. I saw plenty of people on trains reading newspapers reporting on the News of the World scandal without realising that the paper they were reading was also produced by, and controlled by, the same publisher as the News of the World (i.e. Murdoch).
Very large numbers of people will use the statements in newspapers to form their "own opinions" on things, and certainly many many people will vote in elections according to what their newspaper instructs (which is why the conservatives won the 1992 election against the odds - The Sun advised people to vote Tory - former conservative party MP Cecil Parkinson even admitted it).
So the answer is: in many cases, they have a massive amount of power.
Journalists will swear blind that newspapers/broadcasters have no influence but I would beg to differ.
From what I have read of UK newspapers it is blatantly obvious they have their own political agendas. Personally they should be made to declare there political leanings. I have read so many articles laced with self opinion and a liberal sprinkling of facts to support their arguments. The truth is often masked in a lack of detail to twist the picture.
I read an article in the Guardian not so long ago that was an awful piece of journalism with no fact & full of self opinion leaning to the far left. The journalist had absolutely no integrity.It was a rant. It was from someone who was pissed off and used his power as a journalist to spout incredible biased supported with no fact. Like wise from the Daily Mail another paper that should declare its political leanings as it is so light on the facts and full of self opinion.
The sad thing is people do buy in to it. It would be nice if they concentrated on the facts
Media has become the biggest source of information these days. People now use the media not just as a way of getting information but to let others know about their views as well.
each person has his own views, so it is difficult to say if a person may or may not be highly impacted by it.
People buy specific papers because they agree with the editorial line that the newspaper adopts i.e. right wing people buy newspapers that express right wing views.
However, some newspapers can change which political party they support and then slant their stories to praise the party they have adopted and denigrate the parties they do not support.
Newspapers/broadcasters seem to clearly have a particular view on a certain subjects (immigration, welfare, foreign policy, etc). Do these views have an impact on those who read stories day after day?
