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> The moment we no longer have a free press, anything can happen. What makes it possible for a totalitarian or any other dictatorship to rule is that people are

> The moment we no longer have a free press, anything can happen. What makes it possible for a totalitarian or any other dictatorship to rule is that people are not informed; how can you have an opinion if you are not informed? If everybody always lies to you, the consequence is not that you believe the lies, but rather that nobody believes anything any longer. This is because lies, by their very nature, have to be changed, and a lying government has constantly to rewrite its own history. On the receiving end you get not only one lie — a lie which you could go on for the rest of your days — but you get a great number of lies, depending on how the political wind blows. And a people that no longer can believe anything cannot make up its mind. It is deprived not only of its capacity to act but also of its capacity to think and to judge. And with such a people you can then do what you please. -- Hannah Arendt, https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1978/10/26/hannah-arendt-from-an-interview/ https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1978/10/26/hannah-arendt-fr...

jacquesm 7y ago
Worth a Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Arendt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Arendt
deogeo 7y ago
Corporate media control is just as dangerous [1], but much better hidden. They present themselves as countless different TV stations and newspapers, yet we allow them to conceal their common ownership: "In 1983, 90% of US media was controlled by 50 companies; as of 2011, 90% was controlled by just 6 companies and in 2017 the number was 5." [2] We could force them to identify their owners, just like drugs have to list side-effects. Make them change 'NBC' to 'NBC (Comcast)'. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military%E2%80%93industrial%E2%80%93media_complex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military%E2%80%93industrial%E2... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentration_of_media_ownership#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentration_of_media_ownersh...

jacquesm 7y ago

Worth a Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Arendt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hannah_Arendt

deogeo 7y ago

Corporate media control is just as dangerous [1], but much better hidden. They present themselves as countless different TV stations and newspapers, yet we allow them to conceal their common ownership: "In 1983, 90% of US media was controlled by 50 companies; as of 2011, 90% was controlled by just 6 companies and in 2017 the number was 5." [2] We could force them to identify their owners, just like drugs have to list side-effects. Make them change 'NBC' to 'NBC (Comcast)'. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military%E2%80%93industrial%E2%80%93media_complex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military%E2%80%93industrial%E2... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentration_of_media_ownership#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concentration_of_media_ownersh...