4 ms·

I think it is not owned by the government, rather by the state. In a democracy, how is this a bad thing?

by yls 2mo ago

lcnPylGDnU4H9OF 2mo ago
What is the distinction between government and state? As for your question, Russia is nominally a democracy but I wouldn't trust the veracity of their state media reports.
- walrus01 2mo ago
  > What is the distinction between government and state? In a parliamentary democracy the "government" is the prime minister, president (whatever the titles are), cabinet ministers and the party that happens to be in power at any given time. The "Government" might be a coalition of 2, 3, or 4 medium sized political parties that have come to some sort of arrangement to have enough votes to pass a budget and laws. The "state" are the persons who perform the longer term functions of the state not directly controlled by the whims of any political thing that might happen in a specific year. For instance when France made a decision to build its previous series of nuclear powered, missile carrying submarines, and the decision to build a new series that will enter service some time in the 2030s, that's implemented by the civil servants who run the state. Various political parties have waxed and waned and leadership has come and gone since the French nuclear program began, but various successor governments have continued it. Less specific than that program, the state implements other basic services for the people of the country, all the things that have their day to day work done by people who aren't elected members of parliament. The parliamentarians who happen to be occupying various seats at any given time are the government. In a more specific Canadian example: The government funding that comes to the CBC each year is actually from what would we would call the state. https://cbc.radio-canada.ca/en/impact-and-accountability/finance/annual-reports/ar-2021-2022/financial-sustainability/revenue-and-other-funds https://cbc.radio-canada.ca/en/impact-and-accountability/fin... You'll see terms used like "the government has collapsed as the result of a non confidence vote" or "there's been a leadership challenge inside the government (eg: how Trudeau lost power recently)", it doesn't mean the functions of the state have collapsed.
- mdp2021 2mo ago
  > the distinction between government and state The State would be the organization that uses governments as the branch of executive power (and also organizes a legislative activity, and a judiciary activity...). The kind and amount of power held by the Head of the State and the Head of the Government can vary.
kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 2mo ago
> In a democracy, how is this a bad thing? Because democracy is effectively mob rule, which means minority voices may get shut out.
- alt227 2mo ago
  How is this any different to any private news outlet which might hold a bias?
  - deleted 2mo ago
    [deleted]
- jfengel 2mo ago
  Ah, but they were aware of that, and built in protections for minorities. Which means that everything leads to the status quo, and the majority voices get shut out in favor of the most entrenched minority. Those clever founders.
- dredmorbius 2mo ago
  Advertising-funded media is inherently plutocratic, in which those with the most money influence direction. Sometimes more overtly than others. There've been many treatments of this: Jerry Mander's Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television (1978), Edward S. Herman & Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent (1988), Neil Postman's Amusing OUrselves to Death (1985), Hamilton Holt's Commercialism and Journalism (1909) <https://archive.org/details/commercialismjou00holtuoft/page/n11/mode/2up?view=theater https://archive.org/details/commercialismjou00holtuoft/page/...>. That last is particularly good for a number of reasons, including that it's short and information dense, and lays out the clear conflicts inherent to advertising-driven media just at the time it was first gaining influence, and at a fraction of its present size and influence. If you prefer video, media critic Isadore F. "I.F." Stone gave an excellent 1973 interview on the PBS series Day at Night on the state of newspaper journalism in the United States, contrasting the relative independence of big-city dailies vs. rural papers. The former were large enough that no single advertiser could threaten editorial independence. Link will offer a choice of instances to redirect to: <https://redirect.invidious.io/watch?v=qV3gO3zxQ1g https://redirect.invidious.io/watch?v=qV3gO3zxQ1g> (video).
snowpid 2mo ago
The government it can use its media to influence its citizen and try it to change election results or create propangada. France is executive heavy democracy similar to US and Latin American States. This is a very big flaw and state owned media might be contribute to.
sunaookami 2mo ago
>Since 2008 the channel has been wholly owned by the French government Explain to me why reading news from the state is a good thing? Kinda shocked that people here applaud state-owned media (there is no difference between "government-owned" or "state-owned").
- ceejayoz 2mo ago
  I tend to prefer public media over corporate media. It’s not like the Murdochs are more trustworthy than Macron.
  - bananamogul 2mo ago
    Interesting how people like it use sympathetic terms (“public media”) while those who don’t use pejorative terms (“state-owned”, “government-run”). I’m not saying it’s good or bad, just observing the language.
    - inigyou 2mo ago
      The former is euphemistic. The latter two are objective.
      - yls 2mo ago
        Sarcasm? In a democracy, how would state owned be different from public? Do you also call libraries state-run? IMHO both terms are heavy with bias depending on context.
        inigyou 2mo ago
        Public means accessible to everyone. State-owned means owned by the state. These are orthogonal axes. X is a public square that is not owned by the state. The CIA situation room is owned by the state but is not public.
        eth0up 2mo ago
        I think if certain books happened to not appear in that library, it being state-run might be something to consider. What ever it truly is, America is called a 'democracy', and it had Project Mockingbird, which some, myself included, say never ended. And even being maximally fair, I must question whether democracy has any meaning in the context of media after Ellison buys half of it. Does he not own CNN? No point in mentioning who, or what owns Fox. And Bezos? I know it comes off offensive, despite being unintended, but 'democracy' means nothing to me. We have some useful principles of it, which I value, but as a thing, I don't see it.

I think it is not owned by the government, rather by the state. In a democracy, how is this a bad thing?

by yls 2mo ago

I think it is not owned by the government, rather by the state. In a democracy, how is this a bad thing?

What is the distinction between government and state? As for your question, Russia is nominally a democracy but I wouldn't trust the veracity of their state media reports.

walrus01 2mo ago
> What is the distinction between government and state? In a parliamentary democracy the "government" is the prime minister, president (whatever the titles are), cabinet ministers and the party that happens to be in power at any given time. The "Government" might be a coalition of 2, 3, or 4 medium sized political parties that have come to some sort of arrangement to have enough votes to pass a budget and laws. The "state" are the persons who perform the longer term functions of the state not directly controlled by the whims of any political thing that might happen in a specific year. For instance when France made a decision to build its previous series of nuclear powered, missile carrying submarines, and the decision to build a new series that will enter service some time in the 2030s, that's implemented by the civil servants who run the state. Various political parties have waxed and waned and leadership has come and gone since the French nuclear program began, but various successor governments have continued it. Less specific than that program, the state implements other basic services for the people of the country, all the things that have their day to day work done by people who aren't elected members of parliament. The parliamentarians who happen to be occupying various seats at any given time are the government. In a more specific Canadian example: The government funding that comes to the CBC each year is actually from what would we would call the state. https://cbc.radio-canada.ca/en/impact-and-accountability/finance/annual-reports/ar-2021-2022/financial-sustainability/revenue-and-other-funds https://cbc.radio-canada.ca/en/impact-and-accountability/fin... You'll see terms used like "the government has collapsed as the result of a non confidence vote" or "there's been a leadership challenge inside the government (eg: how Trudeau lost power recently)", it doesn't mean the functions of the state have collapsed.
mdp2021 2mo ago
> the distinction between government and state The State would be the organization that uses governments as the branch of executive power (and also organizes a legislative activity, and a judiciary activity...). The kind and amount of power held by the Head of the State and the Head of the Government can vary.

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS 2mo ago

> In a democracy, how is this a bad thing? Because democracy is effectively mob rule, which means minority voices may get shut out.

alt227 2mo ago
How is this any different to any private news outlet which might hold a bias?
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
jfengel 2mo ago
Ah, but they were aware of that, and built in protections for minorities. Which means that everything leads to the status quo, and the majority voices get shut out in favor of the most entrenched minority. Those clever founders.
dredmorbius 2mo ago
Advertising-funded media is inherently plutocratic, in which those with the most money influence direction. Sometimes more overtly than others. There've been many treatments of this: Jerry Mander's Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television (1978), Edward S. Herman & Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent (1988), Neil Postman's Amusing OUrselves to Death (1985), Hamilton Holt's Commercialism and Journalism (1909) <https://archive.org/details/commercialismjou00holtuoft/page/n11/mode/2up?view=theater https://archive.org/details/commercialismjou00holtuoft/page/...>. That last is particularly good for a number of reasons, including that it's short and information dense, and lays out the clear conflicts inherent to advertising-driven media just at the time it was first gaining influence, and at a fraction of its present size and influence. If you prefer video, media critic Isadore F. "I.F." Stone gave an excellent 1973 interview on the PBS series Day at Night on the state of newspaper journalism in the United States, contrasting the relative independence of big-city dailies vs. rural papers. The former were large enough that no single advertiser could threaten editorial independence. Link will offer a choice of instances to redirect to: <https://redirect.invidious.io/watch?v=qV3gO3zxQ1g https://redirect.invidious.io/watch?v=qV3gO3zxQ1g> (video).

snowpid 2mo ago

The government it can use its media to influence its citizen and try it to change election results or create propangada. France is executive heavy democracy similar to US and Latin American States. This is a very big flaw and state owned media might be contribute to.

sunaookami 2mo ago

>Since 2008 the channel has been wholly owned by the French government Explain to me why reading news from the state is a good thing? Kinda shocked that people here applaud state-owned media (there is no difference between "government-owned" or "state-owned").

ceejayoz 2mo ago
I tend to prefer public media over corporate media. It’s not like the Murdochs are more trustworthy than Macron.
- bananamogul 2mo ago
  Interesting how people like it use sympathetic terms (“public media”) while those who don’t use pejorative terms (“state-owned”, “government-run”). I’m not saying it’s good or bad, just observing the language.
  - inigyou 2mo ago
    The former is euphemistic. The latter two are objective.
    - yls 2mo ago
      Sarcasm? In a democracy, how would state owned be different from public? Do you also call libraries state-run? IMHO both terms are heavy with bias depending on context.
      - inigyou 2mo ago
        Public means accessible to everyone. State-owned means owned by the state. These are orthogonal axes. X is a public square that is not owned by the state. The CIA situation room is owned by the state but is not public.
      - eth0up 2mo ago
        I think if certain books happened to not appear in that library, it being state-run might be something to consider. What ever it truly is, America is called a 'democracy', and it had Project Mockingbird, which some, myself included, say never ended. And even being maximally fair, I must question whether democracy has any meaning in the context of media after Ellison buys half of it. Does he not own CNN? No point in mentioning who, or what owns Fox. And Bezos? I know it comes off offensive, despite being unintended, but 'democracy' means nothing to me. We have some useful principles of it, which I value, but as a thing, I don't see it.