View Point                                                                         Abid Ullah Jan

The Darkest Times Ahead

It is alarming to note the ways in which media of a neutral county, such as Canada, attempted to manipulate public opinion in favour of war. It shows that we may never witness global anti-war protests touching the recent levels when the US decides to go after another country. Definitely, more people will support bloodletting; the list of Allies will grow and so will the number of victims.

It may sound bizarre, but keeping advance tactics of pro-war media specialists in mind, one can safely predict the darkest times ahead. Since the US was imposing a war on an Arab state, media on both the Arab and American side could be assumed as biased. Canada, on the other hand, officially refused to side with the aggressor. Still the bias in its media is a discouraging sign for what is in store of the human race.

Apart from the full scale pre-war attempts to influence public opinion in favour of a war, the post-factum explanations of the tragic "war" have started with self-validating assumption that it was logical, determined and therefore inexplicable. It shows majority will approve more destruction and more bloodshed in the future. Instead of protests and condemnations, there will be more participation in the coming wars and more satisfaction over the "collateral damage."

Canadian media dutifully fed the collective consciousness with reasoning, explanations and justification of the necessity and inevitability of war, along with dubious ethical prevarication. Such attempts at moulding public opinion will never go waste. This homework has ensured, at least, Canada will not be on the side lines of future wars.

The media here is basically playing two different roles, similar in nature but with different consequences. The first is related to the slow but steady deconstruction of commonalities between Islam and West - the reconstruction of evil - and the promotion of divisiveness. This fulfills the necessary condition for defining difference, and later justifying separation, antagonism, demonization and war. The second role is to add to that matrix of non-negotiable differences the seeds of hate and to create demands that "something must be done" - thereby justifying concrete political acts and military actions.

Analysing the role of supposedly neutral Canadian media, one sees both the creation of the same matrix, the "otherness" of the Muslim world, as well as the creation of the pressure that "something must be done," with little consideration - even active disregard - of the consequences.

The situation becomes more worrisome when looked in the context of the fact that Canadian is not controlled by Pentagon. Apparently no one else controls it. It is, thus, an extremely dangerous trend to note that an independent media is justifying and glamorising war to implant in public the courage to digest death and destruction and help their government rush off into war without facing any anti-war protests.

The following examples from just two recognized mainstream Canadian newspapers over a period of three weeks in March, 2003 show how the public is being prepared and how it will effect public reaction and government policy when the US is set to invade and occupy another country.

1. Demonizing the "enemy" who does not fit the picture of what is "right" Canadian media seek to prefigure perceptions of a subject using positive or negative labels and that the label defines the subject without having to deal with actual particulars that might lead us to a different conclusion.

The best shot at demonising a people and legitimising war comes from National Post front-page headline: "Reared with riches, rules by terror, sons of tyrants and raised by sadists: Bad to the bone."[1] The same papers paid tributes to a 19-year-old US ammunition leader through carrying his quarter page colour picture on front page. A headline below the picture reads: "Everything is going great."[2] A title at its right says: "Try Saddam for War Crimes." It is a typical package for readers that simultaneously mixes the making of heroes, with justifying a stand, ignoring victims and blaming "the enemy." >

2. Slighting of Content There is a lack of context or detail to almost every story related to war. It means, readers would find it hard to understand the wider ramifications and/or causes and effects, etc. There is always too much focus on little picture that the bigger picture or what is to come afterwards is taken for granted.

A page-width headline in Globe and Mail reads: "Bush went to bed early as bombing began". "He is very focused, very collected.He's a person who know he's made the right decision'."[3] It gives the impression that a peaceful person has made the right decision to attack Iraq and that the paper endorses this decision by putting a quote in the headline. Think of the impression it leaves on readers' mind.

The same day Globe and Mail makes the war legal through ignoring the basic principal on which Canadian government refused to participate in the war. Instead, it highlights another quote that fit its objective: "Americans have the right to attack Iraq, Chrétien says."[4] Answers to questions such as: Who blessed Americans with this right, or did Iraq attack Americans or America, are missing from the discourse.

The same day Irwin Cotler concludes nothing in his column, "Is the war on Iraq illegal," other than judging Saddam that he "should have been indicted long ago for his international crimes."[5]

Again, the same day, Globe and Mail makes headline of the comments, "I have been waiting for this all my life,"[6] from an Iraqi primary school teacher to give the impression that all Iraqis were waiting for this war to happen. This tactic of putting biased quotes as leads helps making opinion in favour of a desired objective. For example, headlines, like "Time to stop trying to be Mr. Nice guy,"[7] pave the way for exonerating the aggressors from war crimes in advance. Readers take such comments given in titles as expert opinion of analysts - not as quotes from an irrelevant person who is party to the conflict.

All these doses in a single edition are enough for a reader to get biased and eventually stop criticising the war.

2. Framing
Canadian media rely more on framing rather than on falsehood. It relies on >bending the truth rather than breaking it. It is achieved in the expert way the news is packaged - the amount of exposure, the placement, the tone of presentation, the headlines and photographs, everything call for more war.

There are countless examples of this practice. For instance, National Post relegated death of 55 Iraqis to a one-column news report with a neutral title: "Bomb hit a second Baghdad market" - thus effectively turning death of 55 persons to merely a collateral damage. Whereas, the paper glamorised the war with paying rich tribute to a "Canadian Lieutenant, 23, serving with Desert Rats" [8] on the same page with a four-column, two-line headline, accompanied by a 6 x 8 inch picture of Angie Little.

Deep buried in the pages is the story of 10 Palestinians killed by Israeli forces. The Caption, "Ten Palestinians die."[9] reflects nothing more than a routine, acceptable event. Front page of the paper, however, carries a banner headline: "Tyrant will fall" in Baghdad. The sidelined story of 10 Palestinians doesn't reflect the reality that a worst tyrant is living in the neighbourhood of Iraqi tyrant. His killing a dozen civilians a day is fully legitimate and approved.

A column by Christine Blatchford begins with the words: "Substitute nice Arabic name every time James Kopp's appears in the 35 page of 'stipulate facts' read into the record here yesterday by Deputy District Attorney Joseph Marusak, and America would be scared out of his wits."[10] As if Arabic name is the final stamp of approval that someone is a terrorist. The story doesn't come to an end unless it mentions that "Islamic terrorists" are "operating on some "higher moral plane." It ignores that Bush is also trying hard to let the world believe that he is doing God's work. Instead of needlessly linking everything to Islam for not losing an opportunity of frame it, there is no attempt to resemble James Kopp's saga with Bush naked terrorism in the name of God.

Another example is the four-column front-page story of National Post, declaring: "Days of Saddam numbered as allies pouring into Iraq."[11] Note the phrase "pouring into Iraq." The same day Globe and Mail's main headline news is: "Troops punch into Iraq." Compared to the use of punching and pouring for the American aggression, National Post gives a full six column title: "Awaiting Saddam's 'blaze of evil'"[12] written by former CIA analysts Kenneth Pollack.

3. Pre-emptive Assumption Canadian media frequently accepts as given the very US policy position that needs to be critically examined. Instead of discussing if the war was really inevitable, it kept on discussing what will happen during and after the war.

4. Even more dangerous is the trend of ingraining assumptions. For example, the US has yet to come up with the a single evidence to link Taliban or Al-Qa'eda with 9/11, but Dough Saunders confirms the official story in Globe and Mail: "While Islam and the West had come into conflict countless times over the previous dozen centuries, this was something new; here was a loose-knit network of militant cells, working underground in scattered lands, directed using new communications technologies by charismatic leaders who ordered actions from hideouts in the Middle East. The ancient forces of Islamism had discovered the diffuse power of globalisation, to deadly effect."[13] Stories have to begin with these assumptions, otherwise it is hard for them to get off the ground.

5. Deceptive titles
In most cases main body or conclusions of columns are closer to reality but titles are deceiving - a journalistic trick for opinion making, knowing that no one has time to read articles from A to Z. Glancing through the headlines is a norm and that's where the focus is. Globe and Mail article by Doug Saunders is a good example. The title reads "Which is worse - tyranny or war?"[14] It gives the impression that war is better to do away with years of tyranny, where as it rightly concludes that the American over-estimation of Saddam's tyranny is in itself tyranny.

Sheema Khan's otherwise excellent article in Globe and Mail was ruined by the headline: "Why Muslims are angry?"[15] Prove Muslims angry and achieve the purpose because angry people can do anything that a biased media blames them for.

Similarly, titles are being used to make or break opinion. For instance, National Post's editorial, "UN's loss. The world gain,"[16] forcefully supports another article on the same page: "Seven ways Chrétien got it wrong."[17] In both cases, one needs not read further. Titles are enough to make an impression on readers' mind.

A title say: "For Bush, the moral response to 'evil' is clear."[18] Public impression is made because more than 60 per cent readers do not go beyond titles. But to the contrary the article proves that neither Bush nor the US is secular: "What many foreigners miss or mock about Mr. Bush is the importance of religion for him, and for the US." What the articles don't say, however, is that this is what the US is at war with in Muslim countries.

Even Osama has not claimed what Bush is claiming. According to Anthony Westell: "Mr. Bush; he is a true believer who says he is receiving guidance from God.America Mr. Bush believes, was created by God to be a shining example to the rest of the world, and he will make sure that the rest of the world gets the message. It is one thing to worship God, quite another to believe that one is God's chosen instrument. That way lies madness."[19] But, Bush is acceptable.

Then there are misleading leads intended to make public opinion such as "could what worked in Afghanistan work in Iraq?"[20] It gives the impression that all has gone well in Afghanistan. Only those who are in Afghanistan or know the ground reality know that nothing has worked there and nothing will work in Iraq. Killings and occupations have never solved any problem.

Coverage of the war through photographs was also as sympathetic to the invading forces as it could be. Globe and Mail published a half page colour photograph of US Marines giving an Iraqi soldier water.[21] Another picture shows, "Iraqi children watch a US army convey." No picture of the Iraqi children that we witnessed on the internet - dead, blood soaked, or all limbs and eyes gone. The children shown to us in Globe and Mail are those holding a white humanitarian aid package "delivered by British Royal Marine."[22]

6. Suppression by Omission
By using this tactics, stories are often "downplayed or avoided outright" and sometimes, "the suppression includes not just vital details but the entire story itself" even important ones. For instance, thousands of Iraqi civilians as well as combat troops died in a "war" that was imposed on them. However, the public is forced to read headlines like: "Captured, dead U.S. soldiers - they are my flesh: Achingly painful to watch Americans on video tape."[23] Missing from discourse is the suffering inflicted on Iraqis through the 12 years long sanctions and days of cluster bombing.

What the Canadian media say: "Could anyone have watched the bombing of Dresden and still had the stomach for war?"[24] What it omits: "Yes we have the stomach because of the media making war a moral obligation and its horrors acceptable for us." Anyone who disagree, should read: "For Bush, the moral response to 'evil' is clear"[25] (Globe and Mail, March 11). The media say: "The Arab world can no longer be entrusted to the present Arab leadership."[26] What it downplays: "yes the present Arab leadership cannot be entrusted to the present Arab leadership because they can no longer tame the masses in the interest of US any more."

7. Face-Value Transmission
For glamorising and justifying war, Canadian media is taking the American official position as is, without critique or analysis - except an anti-war article here and there, perfectly neutralised with a twisted headline.

Columns, such as "Undreamed-of precision"[27] with quarter-page colour photograph of US ships firing cruise missiles, miss where these missiles land - in civilian bedrooms. Globe and Mail's top of the page, 6-column title, "Setting up for the really cool Iraq war show,"[28] romanticises war. Spreads misconceptions is another way to paving the way for war, with margin to margin headlines based on official version of the story, such as: "Defiant Shia Muslims poised to revolt."[29]

8. False Balancing
Apparently it seems that Canadian media is showing two sides of the story but Saddam was shown equally responsible in every story both of present loss of life and destruction, as well as past suffering. While giving the appearance of being objective and neutral, the media actually neutralised stories of war damage and thereby drastically warped them.

Globe and Mail, gave a big picture showing devastation by US bombing but it was neutralised with the caption and the headline of a story on the left side. The focus was masterfully turned from devastation to "delight" of residents due to "liberation from fundamentalists." The report says, "US bomb demolished the small commercial building," However, its owner claims: "I am not angry at America." [30]

9. Ideological Appeals
Common sign of Canadian journalist involved in ideological appeal is the way they appeal to patriotism and safeguarding the often unarticulated "national interest"
Front page headline of National Post reads: "Marines are set to flatten enemy."[31] The word "enemy" is used to give collective impression of an Iraq that has attacked US and Canada.

National Post titles an editorial "The War Canada Missed,"[32] giving the message: "Chrétien doesn't speak for all Canadians." The editorial ignores the fact that Bush also doesn't act on behalf of all Americans. It gives the impression as if Canada missed something like a dinner party. The guilty feeling for not joining the war has also been very obvious across the pages of leading newspapers. Globe and Mail's article: "Canada has become the black sheep of the white House family,"[33] and Globe and Mail's editorial "Canada's place is with the US," are good examples. [34]

National Post Editorial "A lack of principle"[35] is supported by other pieces, such as a headline from left to right margin of the page: "Chrétien turns his back on principle,"[36] "Chrétien's theory seductive but unworkable,"[37] and a three line title, covering two columns: "America is justified in striking first,"[38] only serve to ignite patriotic passions without any rationale.

Another typical example of glorifying war and unseen national interest on a single page of National Post[39] (March 22) are three columns: "Tony Blair is my moral compass"; "Mr. Bush, don't rescue the UN from irrelevance"; and "In Robert Fisk's world, Arabs are always the victims." One doesn't see Canadian interest until opening Page a-4, where it reads: "Seizure of Iraq air bases quells threat to Israel,"[40] as if the war was only to protect Israel.

Conclusion
Above is a quick review of just two recognised, mainstream newspapers published over a period of three weeks. Imagine the extent of combined influence of all media sources on public opinion, which are in operation round the clock since years and for years to come.

The time, resources, and expertise invested in glamorising war by the media of a neutral country shows that these efforts will definitely bear fruit when combined with intellectual horrors from the US. The time is not far away to witness blood flowing in the streets of Muslim countries, targeted by the US and a long list of Allies, one after another and the rest of the world enjoying the "cool show"[41] as the Globe and Mail calls it.

End Notes
[1] Front Page story, "Reared with riches, rules by terror, sons of tyrants and raised by sadists: Bad to the bone," National Post, March 15, 2003.
[2] News report, "Everything is going great," National Post, Font Page, March 18, 2003.
[3] Page-width headline, "Bush went to bed early as bombing began," Globe and Mail, March 21, 2003, Page A-5.
[4] News report, "Americans had the right to attack Iraq, Chrétien says," Globe and Mail, March 21, 2003, Page-12.
[5] Cotler, Irwin (2003), "Is the war on Iraq illegal," Globe and Mail, March 21, Page A-15.
[6] News report, "I have been waiting for this all my life," Globe and Mail, March 21, 2003, Page A-6.
[7] Poole, Oliver (2003), "Time to stop trying to be Mr. Nice guy," National Post, March 25, Page A-3.
[8] National Post, Front page. March 29, 2003.
[9] Globe and Mail, March 18, 2003, Page A-19
[10] Blatchford, Christine, (2003) "A provider of 'religious terrorism'" National Post, March 18, Page, A-14.
[11] Front-page story of National Pos, "Days of Saddam numbered as allies pouring into Iraq," March 21, 2003.
[12] Pollack, Kenneth, (2003), "Awaiting Saddam's 'blaze of evil'" National Post, March 21page A-5.
[13] Saunders, Dough (2003), "The volcano that launched the world's first war on terrorism," The Globe and Mail, March 08, Page F-3.
[14] Saunders, Doug (2003), "Which is worse - tyranny or war?" Globe and Mail, March 22, page F-3.
[15] Khan, Sheema (2003), "Why Muslims are angry?" Globe and Mai, March 12, page A-17.
[16] Editorial, "UN's loss. The world gain," National Post, March 21, 2003, page A-19
[17] Coyne, Andrew (2003), "Seven ways Chrétien got it wrong." National Post, March 21, 2003, page A-19
[18] Simpson, Jeffrey (2003) "For Bush, the moral response to 'evil' is clear," Globe and Mail, March 11, Page A-13.
[19] Westell, Anthony (2003) "Saddam has to go, but we can't trust Bush to do it," Globe and Mail, March 11, page A-11.
[20] Saunders, Doug (2003) "Could what worked in Afghanistan work in Iraq?" Globe and Mail, March 15, Page F-3.
[21] Globe and Mail, March 22, 2003, page A-6.
[22] Globe and Mai, March 26, 2003, page A-8.
[23] Blatchford, Christie (2003), ""Captured, dead U.S. soldiers - they are my flesh: Achingly painful to watch Americans on video tape." National Post, March 24, Page A-5.
[24] Blatchford, Christine (2003), "Could anyone have watched the bombing of Dresden and still had the stomach for war," National Post, March 21, A-12.
[25] Simpson, Jeffrey (2003) "For Bush, the moral response to 'evil' is clear," Globe and Mail, March 11, Page A-13.
[26] Steyn, Mark (2003) "The Arab world can no longer be entrusted to the present Arab leadership," National Post, March 20, A-18.
[27] Friscolanti, Michael (2003), "Undreamed-of precision" National Post, March 24, Page A-18.
[28] Doyal, John, (2003) "Setting up for the really cool Iraq war show," >Globe and Mail, March 12, Page R-2.
[29] News report: "Defiant Shia Muslims poised to revolt." Globe and Mal,l March 11, 2003, Page A-10.
[30] Globe and Mail, March 31, 2003, Page A-5.
[31] Fisher, Mathew, 2003, "Marines are set to flatten enemy," Front page, National Post, March 18.
[32] Editorial, National Post, (2003) "The War Canada Missed," March 20, 2003, Page A-19.
[33] Ibbitson, John (2003), Globe and Mail, "Canada has become the black sheep of the white House family," March 26.
[34] Editorial, Globe and Mail (2003) "Canada's place is with the US," March 27.
[35] Editorial, "A lack of principle," National Post, March 22, 2003, page A-8.
[36] National Post, "Chrétien turns his back on principle" March 24, 2003, A-15.
[37] Gee, Marcus (2003) "Chrétien's theory seductive but unworkable," Globe and Mail, March 11.
[38] Orwin, Clifford (2003) "America is justified in striking first," National Post, March 11, page A-16.
[39] Blatchford, Christie (2003), "Tony Blair is my moral compass"; Krauthammer, Charles (2003) "Mr. Bush, don't rescue the UN from irrelevance"; Fulford, Robert (2003), "In Robert Fisk's world, Arabs are always the victims," National Post, March 22, Page A-8.
[40] Ibid, page A-4.
[41] Doyal, John, (2003) "Setting up for the really cool Iraq war show," Globe and Mail, March 12, Page R-2.