Mass Media Quotes – Perspectives on Communication and Society

"Without some form of censorship, propaganda in the strict sense of the word is impossible. In order to conduct propaganda there must be some barrier between the public and the event"

Walter Lippmann

"Friends, the press and the government have begun a relationship so intimate and immoral that it would make Satan himself blush with shame. Journalists used to question reasons for war and denounce abuses of power. Now they are like toothless babies, sucking on pacifiers of misinformation, only to poop it out into the diaper we call the 6 o'clock news."

Kent Brockman

"Not a day goes by without the mainstream media reporting on some war, epidemic, or other problem in the world. The problem is that this type of reporting, as we find it, is sheer madness. Information is distorted or not mentioned at all. It is the partial truths that make the press so dangerous. Wars are sold as “humanitarian interventions,” diseases are pushed to play into the hands of the pharmaceutical industry. There are always two sides to every coin, but we are only shown one side, which is supposed to be the “truth.” They show us what they want us to see and leave out what does not fit into their desired worldview. At this point, we should ask ourselves whether we want to continue consuming this filth and supporting it financially by buying certain tabloids such as Bild, Spiegel & Co. “Either you rebel, or you become complicit.”"

Ignazio Silone

"When you're watching television, you're watching the news, you're being pumped full of fear. there's floods. There's AIDS. There's murder. Cut to commercial. Buy the Acura. Buy Colgate. If you have bad breath, they're not going to talk to you. If you have pimples, that girl isn't going to fuck you. It's just a campaign of fear and consumption. That's what I think it's based on. This whole idea of 'keep everyone afraid and they'll consume"

Marilyn Manson

"During lectures, I have repeatedly noticed that it is beneficial to clarify this obvious fact: No, the news is not a reflection of reality, not even a poor one. When we use mainstream media, we observe power relations in terms of definition. Who brings their topics and their view of things to the public? Who can I safely quote, who or what can or must I refer to? Which terms are appropriate and which are not? If the mainstream media say that there is a virus and a disease that I should be afraid of, then I have to take that seriously because those who decide about my life take it seriously. I can claim the opposite and attack the power of definition, but then I have to expect to lose all reputation (Wendler, Hildmann), being transferred (like Friedrich Pürner, head of the health department in the Aichach-Friedberg district until November 2020), or being kicked out of important committees (like Christoph Lütge from the Bavarian Ethics Council in February 2021) without any public resistance."

Prof. Dr. Michael Meyen

"In former times, torture was used. Nowadays, the press is used. That is certainly progress."

Oscar Wilde

"The possibilities for manipulation have, of course, increased considerably in the age of mass media."

Arthur Miller

"People aren’t actually that stupid — we’re going to make them that way through television."

Hans Joachim Kulenkampff

"Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic disease of the 20th century and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press. Such as it is, however, the press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, more powerful than the legislative power, the executive, and the judiciary. And one would then like to ask: By what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? In the communist East a journalist is frankly appointed as a state official. But who has granted Western journalists their power, for how long a time, and with what prerogatives?"

Alexander Solschenizyn

""Freedom of the press is the freedom of two hundred rich people to spread their opinions. As the production of newspapers and magazines requires ever greater capital, the circle of people who publish press organs is becoming smaller and smaller. This makes our dependence ever greater and ever more dangerous. There are oases in the German press where the air of freedom still blows, but how many of my colleagues can say the same? Those who are rich are free. That's not from Karl Marx, but from Paul Sethe. Since journalists are not rich, they are not free either.""

Paul Sethe

"Freedom of the press in the West, which is much better than elsewhere, is ultimately the freedom of 200 rich people to publish their opinions."

Peter Scholl-Latour

"We all know by now how dangerously the media's normal watchdog function has been transformed into a ruthless destruction machine for the sake of maintaining its own economic success."

Edzard Reuter

"A handful of people control the world's media. Today there are about six people, soon there will be only four people who will take over everything: all newspapers, magazines, all films, all television channels. There was a time when there were different opinions in the media, there was a variety of directions in the media. Today there is only one opinion, which is formed within four to five days, then it becomes the opinion of everyone"

Mike Nichols

"Social media has degenerated into a deafening cacophony of groups signaling and repeating their shared myths."

Naval Ravikant

"There is no such thing, at this stage of the world’s history in America, as an independent press. You know it and I know it. There is not one of you who dare write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinions out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my papers, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone. The business of the journalist is to destroy the truth, to lie outright, to pervert, to vilify, to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread. You know it and I know it, and what folly is this toasting an independent press? We are the jumping jacks, they pull the strings and we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of other men. We are intellectual prostitutes."

John Swinton

"History will show that humanity in the 21st century was not enslaved by whips, chains, knives, or guns. It was enslaved by a small black box with around 666 (or so) channels, known as the television. They pump bullshit into our brains and expect us to regurgitate it to the next farmer we talk to."

Unbekannt

"I say we close down the national media for 30 days and watch 80% of the world's problems go away."

Unbekannter Autor

"As proposals for action along new lines arise to compete for the moral and physical support of masses, propaganda attains eminence as the one means of mass mobilization which is cheaper than violence, bribery or other possible control techniques."

Harold D. Lasswell