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(Camera clicks)
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Three, two, one, take two.
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Good morning.
Welcome to Erin Mills town centre.
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Home of the world's largest, permanent,
point-of-purchase video wall installation.
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My name is Kelvin Flook
and I'm your video host all day here at EMTV.
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I want to take this opportunity to extend
a special and warm welcome
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to the film crew from Necessary Illusions.
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We've got an excellent line-up
of television programming today,
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so... let's get on with it.
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So, how long have they been working
on this documentary?
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Gosh, they've been working on it
I don't know how long.
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Every country I show up, they're always there.
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They're in England, they're in Japan.
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All over the place.
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MILLER: Jesus.
CHOMSKY: They must have 500 hours of tape.
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MILLER: Bet they put together a really doozy
when they're done, huh?
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CHOMSKY: I can't imagine who's going to want
to hear somebody talk for an hour.
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But I guess they know what they're doing.
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So, where are you all from?
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ALL: Florida.
- Florida?
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ALL: Yeah, Gulf Coast.
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You all talk like in chorus.
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We're making a film about Noam Chomsky.
Does anybody know who Noam Chomsky is?
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ALL: No!
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(Whistle blows)
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MILLER: Good aternoon and welcome
to Wyoming Talks.
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My guest today is well-known intellectual
Noam Chomsky.
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Thank you for being on our programme today.
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CHOMSKY: Very glad to be here.
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I know probably the main purpose for your trip
to Wyoming
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is to discuss thought control
in a democratic society.
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Now, all right, say I'm just Jane USA.
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And I say, "Well, gee, this is a democratic
society, what do you mean - thought control?"
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"I make up my own mind.
I create my own destiny".
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What would you say to her?
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Well, I would suggest that Jane take
a close look at the way the media operate,
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the way the public relations industry operates.
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The extensive thinking that's been going on
for a long, long period,
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about the necessity for finding ways
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to marginalise and control the public
in a democratic society.
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But particularly to look at the evidence
that's been accumulated,
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about the way the major media,
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The agenda-setting media,
I mean, the national press,
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and the television and so on,
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the way that they shape and control
the kinds of opinions that appear.
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The kinds of information that comes through,
the sources to which they go.
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I think Jane will find some very surprising things
about the democratic system.
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BAUSLAUGH: I'd like to welcome all of you
to this lecture today.
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Several years ago,
Professor Chomsky was described
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in The New York Times Book Review
as follows:
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"Judged in terms of the power, range, novelty
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and influence of this thought, Noam Chomsky is
arguably the most important intellectual alive."
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Professor Noam Chomsky.
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(Audience applauds)
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I gather there are some people
behind that blackness there.
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But if I don't look you in the eye, it's because
I don't see you, all I see is the blackness.
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Perhaps I ought to begin
by reporting something that's never read.
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The line about "arguably the most important
intellectual in the world," and so on
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comes from a publisher's blurb
and you got to watch those.
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If you go back to the original,
you'll find that that sentence is actually there.
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This is in The New York Times.
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But the next sentence is,
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"Since that's the case, how can he write such
terrible things about American foreign policy?"
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They never quote that part.
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If it wasn't for that second sentence, I'd begin
to think that I'm doing something wrong.
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And I'm not joking about that.
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It's true that the Emperor doesn't have
any clothes but he doesn't like to be told it.
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The Emperor's lap dogs, like The New York
Times, will not enjoy the experience if you do.
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Good evening. I'm Bill Moyers.
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What's more dangerous:
The big stick of the big lie?
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Governments have used both
against their own people.
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Tonight I'll be talking with a man
who has been thinking about
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how we can see the developing lie.
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He says that propaganda is to democracy
what violence is to a dictatorship.
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But he hasn't lost faith in the power of
common people to speak up for the truth.
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You have said that we live
entangled in webs of endless deceit,
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that we live in a highly indoctrinated society,
where elementary truths are easily buried.
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Elementary truths such as...
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Such as the fact
that we invaded South Vietnam.
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Or that we're standing in the way of significant,
and have for years,
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of significant moves towards arms negotiation.
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Or the fact that the military system
is to a substantial extent,
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not totally, but to a substantial extent,
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a mechanism by which the general population
is compelled to provide a subsidy
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to high-technology industry.
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Since they're not going to do it if you ask them
to, you have to deceive them into doing it.
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There are many truths like that.
We don't face them.
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Do you believe in common sense?
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Absolutely.
I believe in Cartesian common sense.
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I think people have the capacities to see
through the deceit in which they're ensnared.
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But you got to make the effort.
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It seems a little incongruous
to hear a man from the ivory tower
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of Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
a scholar... a distinguished linguistics scholar,
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talk about common people
with such appreciation.
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I think scholarship, at least the field I work in,
has the opposite consequences.
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My own studies in language and human
cognition demonstrate to me, at least,
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what remarkable creativity
ordinary people have.
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The very fact that people talk to one another
just in a normal way, nothing particularly fancy,
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reflects deep-seated features
of human creativity,
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which separate human beings
from any other biological system we know.
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TV: Tonight, scientists talk to the animals.
But are they talking back?
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(Chimp shrieks)
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The Journal with Barbara Frum
and Mary Lou Finlay.
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Communicating with animals
is a serious scientific pursuit.
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This is Nim Chimpsky.
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Nim, jokingly named ater
the great linguist Noam Chomsky,
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was the great hope of animal communication
in the 1970s.
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For four years Pettito and others coached him
in sign language,
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but in the end they decided it was a lost cause.
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Nim could ask for things, but not much more.
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PETITO: I would have loved
to have a conversation with Nim
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and understand how he looked at the universe.
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He failed to communicate that information to
me, and we gave him every opportunity.
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STEINBERG: Noam Chomsky,
theorist of language and political activist,
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has had an extraordinary career.
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I can think of none like it in recent American
history and few anywhere any time.
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He has literally transformed
the subject of linguistics.
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He also has become one of the most consistent
critics of power politics in all its protean guises.
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Scholar and propagandist, his two careers
apparently reinforce each other.
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In 1957, he published his Syntactic Structures,
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which began what has frequently been called
the Chomskyan Revolution in Linguistics.
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Like a latter-day Copernicus,
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Chomsky proposed a radically new way
of looking at the theory of grammar.
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Chomsky worked out the formal rules
of the universal grammar
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which had generated the specific rules
of actual or natural languages.
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The general approach I'm taking seems to me
rather simple minded and unsophisticated,
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but, nevertheless, correct.
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Later he came to argue that such systems
are innate features of human beings.
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They belong to the characteristics
of the species
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and have been, in effect, programmed
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into the genetic equipment of the mind
like the machine language in a computer.
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One needn't be interested in this question.
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Of course, I am interested in it.
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The interesting question from this point of view
is what is the nature of the initial state?
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That is, what is human nature in this respect?
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That in turn explains the...
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...astonishing.
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Try the next one.
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Fa-cki-li-ty
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- Facility.
- Facility.
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STEINBERG: That in turn explains the
astonishing facility children have
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in learning the rules of natural language,
no matter how complicated, incredibly quickly,
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from what are imperfect
and oten degenerate samples.
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- Compli...
- Complicated.
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It's a complicated word.
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Do you know what "complicated" means?
It means it's complicated.
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CHOMSKY:
If in fact our minds were a blank slate
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and experience wrote on them, we would be
very impoverished creatures indeed,
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so the obvious hypothesis is that our language
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is the result of the unfolding
of a genetically determined programme.
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Well, plainly there are different languages.
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In fact, the apparent variation of languages
is quite superficial.
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It's certain - as certain as anything else is -
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that humans are not genetically programmed
to learn one or another language.
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So, you bring up a Japanese baby in Boston,
and it'll speak Boston English.
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You bring up my child in Japan,
it'll speak Japanese.
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And that means that... From that it fol...
from that it simply follows by logic
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that the basic structure of the languages
must be essentially the same.
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Our task as scientists is to try to determine
exactly what those fundamental principles are
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that cause the knowledge of language to unfold
in the manner in which it does
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under particular circumstances.
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Incidentally,
I think there is no doubt the same must be true
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of other aspects of human intelligence,
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and systems of understanding
and interpretation,
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and moral and aesthetic judgement, and so on.
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STEINBERG: The implications of these views
have washed over the fields of psychology,
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education, sociology, philosophy,
literary criticism, and logic.
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R�E: In the '50s and '60s
the bridge between your theoretical work
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and your political work seems to have been
the attack on behaviourism,
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but now behaviourism is no longer an issue,
or so it seems,
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so how does this leave the link
between your linguistics and your politics?
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Well, I've always regarded the link... I've never...
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really perceived much of a link,
to tell you the truth.
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Again, I would be very pleased to be able to
discover intellectually convincing connections
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between my own anarchist convictions
on the one hand,
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and what I think I can demonstrate,
or at least begin to see
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about the nature of human intelligence
on the other.
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But I simply can't find intellectually satisfying
connections between those two domains.
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I can discover some tenuous points of contact.
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FOUCAULT (in French)
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If it is correct, as I believe it is,
that a fundamental element of human nature
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is the need for creative work,
or creative inquiry for...
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...for free creation without the...
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...arbitrary, limiting effects of coercive
institutions,
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then of course it will follow that a decent society
should maximise the possibilities
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for this fundamental human characteristic
to be realised.
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Now, a federated, decentralised...
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...system of free associations incorporating
economic as well as social institutions
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would be what I refer to as
anarcho-syndicalism,
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and it seems to me that
it is the appropriate form of social organisation
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for an advanced technological society
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in which human beings do not have to be forced
into the position of tools, of cogs in a machine.
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STEINBERG: Since the 1960s
Noam Chomsky has been the voice
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of a very characteristic brand
of rationalist libertarian socialism.
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He's attacked the abuses of power
wherever he saw them,
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he's made himself deeply unpopular
by his criticism of American policy,
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the subservience of the intelligentsia,
the degradation of Zionism,
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the distortions of media,
and self-delusions of prevailing ideologies.
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CHOMSKY:
Under the liberal administration of the 1960s
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the club of academic intellectuals
designed and implemented the Vietnam war,
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and other similar, though smaller, actions.
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This particular community is a very relevant one
to consider at a place like MIT
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because of course you're all free
to enter into this community.
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In fact,
you're invited and encouraged to enter it.
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The community of technical intelligentsia,
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and weapons designers,
and counter-insurgency experts,
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and pragmatic planners of an American empire,
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is one that you have a great deal of inducement
to become associated with.
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The inducements, in fact, are very real.
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The rewards in power, and affluence,
and prestige, and authority...
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Jamie?
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This came with the mail.
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Be with you in a second.
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Oh, God, they've still got their cameras.
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OK?
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We'll start.
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In your essay Language and Freedom,
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you write, "Social action must be animated
by a vision of a future society".
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I was wondering what vision of a future society
animates you?
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I have my own ideas
as to what a future society should look like.
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I've written about them.
I mean, I think that we should...
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At the most general level, we should be
seeking out forms of authority and domination,
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and challenging their legitimacy.
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Sometimes they are legitimate -
that is, let's say they're needed for survival.
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So, for example, I wouldn't suggest
that during the Second World War...
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the forms of authority...
We had a totalitarian society, basically.
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I thought there was some justification for that
under wartime conditions.
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00:16:45,687 --> 00:16:47,678
And there are other forms of...
229
00:16:47,727 --> 00:16:51,925
Relations between parents and children,
for example, involve forms of coercion
230
00:16:51,967 --> 00:16:53,958
which are sometimes justifiable.
231
00:16:54,007 --> 00:16:58,797
But any such... Any form of coercion and...
232
00:16:58,847 --> 00:17:02,840
control requires justification,
and most of them are completely unjustifiable.
233
00:17:02,887 --> 00:17:08,405
Now, at various stages of human civilisation
it's been possible to challenge some of them,
234
00:17:08,447 --> 00:17:09,800
but not others.
235
00:17:09,847 --> 00:17:13,078
Others are too deep-seated,
or you don't see them, or whatever,
236
00:17:13,127 --> 00:17:19,043
so at any particular point you try to
detect those forms of authority and domination
237
00:17:20,047 --> 00:17:24,165
which are subject to change, and which...
238
00:17:24,207 --> 00:17:25,765
do not have any legitimacy,
239
00:17:25,807 --> 00:17:28,401
in fact which oten
strike at fundamental human rights,
240
00:17:28,447 --> 00:17:32,076
and your understanding
of fundamental human nature and rights.
241
00:17:32,127 --> 00:17:34,277
Well, what are the major things, say today?
242
00:17:34,327 --> 00:17:36,921
There are some
that are being addressed in a way.
243
00:17:38,247 --> 00:17:42,399
The feminist movement is addressing some.
The civil rights movement is addressing others.
244
00:17:42,447 --> 00:17:44,961
The one major one
that is not being seriously addressed
245
00:17:45,007 --> 00:17:47,919
is the one that's really
at the core of the system of domination,
246
00:17:47,967 --> 00:17:50,959
and that's private control over resources.
247
00:17:51,007 --> 00:17:55,364
And that means an attack
on the fundamental structure of state capitalism.
248
00:17:55,407 --> 00:17:58,956
I think that's in order.
That's not something far off in the future.
249
00:17:59,487 --> 00:18:01,478
VOICEOVER: Your life work.
250
00:18:03,007 --> 00:18:05,601
The alphabet has only 26 letters.
251
00:18:06,207 --> 00:18:09,005
With these 26 magic symbols, however,
252
00:18:09,047 --> 00:18:11,322
millions of words are written every day.
253
00:18:13,127 --> 00:18:15,118
Nowhere else are people so addicted
254
00:18:15,167 --> 00:18:18,239
to information and entertainment
via the printed word.
255
00:18:19,287 --> 00:18:22,359
Every day the world comes thumping
on the American doorstep,
256
00:18:22,407 --> 00:18:24,637
and nothing that happens anywhere
257
00:18:24,687 --> 00:18:28,282
remains long a secret
from the American newspaper reader.
258
00:18:29,327 --> 00:18:32,205
It comes to us pretty casually, the daily paper,
259
00:18:32,247 --> 00:18:34,317
but behind its arrival on your doorstep
260
00:18:34,367 --> 00:18:36,756
is one ofjournalism's major stories.
261
00:18:36,807 --> 00:18:38,206
How it got there.
262
00:18:41,007 --> 00:18:48,800
There is a standard view about democratic
societies, and the role of the media within them.
263
00:18:48,847 --> 00:18:52,635
It's expressed for example
by Supreme Court Justice Powell
264
00:18:52,687 --> 00:18:56,043
when he spoke of the crucial role of the media
265
00:18:56,087 --> 00:18:59,682
in effecting the societal purpose
of the First Amendment,
266
00:18:59,727 --> 00:19:05,597
namely enabling the public to assert
meaningful control over the political process.
267
00:19:07,367 --> 00:19:10,598
That kind of formulation
expresses the understanding that
268
00:19:10,647 --> 00:19:17,280
democracy requires free access
to information, and ideas, and opinion,
269
00:19:17,327 --> 00:19:22,845
and the same conceptions hold
not only with regard to the media,
270
00:19:22,887 --> 00:19:28,803
but with regard to educational institutions,
publishing, the intellectual community generally.
271
00:19:31,607 --> 00:19:33,916
NARRATOR:
It is basic to the health of a democracy
272
00:19:33,967 --> 00:19:37,926
that no phase of government activity
escape the scrutiny of the press.
273
00:19:37,967 --> 00:19:43,485
Here reporters are assigned to stories
fateful not only to our nation, but to all nations.
274
00:19:43,527 --> 00:19:45,757
"Congress", says the First Amendment,
275
00:19:45,807 --> 00:19:48,401
"shall pass no law
abridging the freedom of the press".
276
00:19:48,447 --> 00:19:52,565
And the Chief Executive himself
throws open the doors of the White House
277
00:19:52,607 --> 00:19:56,316
to journalists representing papers
of all shades of political opinion.
278
00:20:01,447 --> 00:20:05,918
But is worth bearing in mind
that there is a contrary view,
279
00:20:05,967 --> 00:20:10,245
and in fact the contrary view is very widely held,
and deeply rooted
280
00:20:10,287 --> 00:20:12,278
in our own civilisation.
281
00:20:13,287 --> 00:20:16,882
It goes back to
the origins of modern democracy,
282
00:20:16,927 --> 00:20:19,964
to the 17th-century English revolution
283
00:20:20,007 --> 00:20:23,920
which was a complicated affair
like most popular revolutions.
284
00:20:23,967 --> 00:20:26,356
There was a struggle between Parliament
285
00:20:26,407 --> 00:20:30,195
representing largely
elements of the gentry and the merchants,
286
00:20:30,247 --> 00:20:33,159
and the Royalists
representing other elite groups,
287
00:20:33,207 --> 00:20:34,959
and they fought it out.
288
00:20:35,007 --> 00:20:36,759
But like many popular revolutions,
289
00:20:36,807 --> 00:20:41,005
there was also a lot of popular ferment going
that was opposed to all of them.
290
00:20:41,047 --> 00:20:44,403
There were popular movements
that were questioning everything -
291
00:20:44,447 --> 00:20:49,157
the relations between master and servant,
the right of authority altogether...
292
00:20:49,207 --> 00:20:51,402
All kinds of things were being questioned.
293
00:20:51,447 --> 00:20:55,725
There was a lot of radical publishing - the
printing presses had just come into existence -
294
00:20:55,767 --> 00:20:59,396
and this disturbed all the elites
on both sides of the Civil War.
295
00:20:59,447 --> 00:21:04,521
So as one historian pointed out at the time
in 1660...
296
00:21:04,567 --> 00:21:06,603
He criticised the radical democrats,
297
00:21:06,647 --> 00:21:09,445
the ones who were calling for
what we would call democracy, because...
298
00:21:19,887 --> 00:21:24,278
Now, underlying these doctrines
which were very widely held
299
00:21:24,327 --> 00:21:26,443
is a certain conception of democracy.
300
00:21:26,487 --> 00:21:28,717
It's a game for elites.
301
00:21:28,767 --> 00:21:30,962
It's not for the ignorant masses
302
00:21:31,007 --> 00:21:35,080
who have to be marginalised,
diverted and controlled
303
00:21:35,127 --> 00:21:37,118
of course, for their own good.
304
00:21:37,167 --> 00:21:42,036
The same principles were upheld
in the American colonies.
305
00:21:42,087 --> 00:21:46,558
The dictum of the founding fathers
of American democracy that:
306
00:21:46,607 --> 00:21:49,917
"People who own the country
ought to govern it",
307
00:21:49,967 --> 00:21:51,958
quoting John Jay.
308
00:21:52,007 --> 00:21:54,316
MAN: Fire!
(Gunfire and screaming)
309
00:21:54,367 --> 00:21:56,164
(Military band plays)
310
00:21:56,247 --> 00:21:58,238
(Gunfire)
311
00:22:00,927 --> 00:22:03,236
Now, in modern times for elites,
312
00:22:03,287 --> 00:22:08,156
this contrary view about the intellectual life,
and the media, and so on,
313
00:22:08,207 --> 00:22:13,520
this contrary view in fact is the standard one,
I think, apart from rhetorical flourishes.
314
00:22:16,167 --> 00:22:20,604
SIKOROVSKY: From Washington DC,
he is intellectual, author and linguist
315
00:22:20,647 --> 00:22:22,638
Professor Noam Chomsky.
316
00:22:22,687 --> 00:22:27,283
Manufacturing Consent -
what is that title meant to describe?
317
00:22:27,327 --> 00:22:34,438
Well, the title is actually borrowed from a book
by Walter Lippmann written back around 1921
318
00:22:34,487 --> 00:22:38,162
in which he described
what he called the manufacture of consent
319
00:22:38,207 --> 00:22:41,882
as a revolution in the practice of democracy.
320
00:22:41,927 --> 00:22:45,124
What it amounts to is a technique of control,
321
00:22:45,167 --> 00:22:48,318
and he said this was useful and necessary
322
00:22:48,367 --> 00:22:53,805
because the common interests, the general
concerns of all people, elude the public.
323
00:22:53,847 --> 00:22:56,202
The public just isn't up to dealing with them,
324
00:22:56,247 --> 00:22:59,956
and they have to be the domain
of what he called a specialized class.
325
00:23:01,487 --> 00:23:05,924
Notice that that's the opposite
of the standard view about democracy.
326
00:23:06,887 --> 00:23:12,564
There's a version of this expressed
by the highly respected moralist and theologian
327
00:23:12,607 --> 00:23:14,086
Reinhold Niebuhr
328
00:23:14,127 --> 00:23:18,518
who was very influential
on contemporary policy makers.
329
00:23:18,567 --> 00:23:22,480
His view was
that rationality belongs to the cool observer,
330
00:23:23,327 --> 00:23:29,038
but because of the stupidity of the average
man, he follows not reason but faith,
331
00:23:29,887 --> 00:23:35,086
and this na�ve faith
requires necessary illusion
332
00:23:36,007 --> 00:23:39,044
and emotionally potent over-simplifications
333
00:23:39,087 --> 00:23:43,478
which are provided by the myth maker
to keep the ordinary person on course.
334
00:23:51,407 --> 00:23:53,967
It's not the case, as the na�ve might think,
335
00:23:54,007 --> 00:23:56,999
that indoctrination
is inconsistent with democracy.
336
00:23:57,047 --> 00:24:00,119
Rather, as this whole line of thinkers observes,
337
00:24:00,167 --> 00:24:01,885
it's the essence of democracy.
338
00:24:03,527 --> 00:24:07,122
The point is that in a military state,
or a feudal state,
339
00:24:07,167 --> 00:24:09,727
or what we would nowadays
call a totalitarian state,
340
00:24:09,767 --> 00:24:12,076
it doesn't much matter what people think,
341
00:24:12,127 --> 00:24:16,518
because you've got a bludgeon over their head,
and you can control what they do.
342
00:24:16,567 --> 00:24:17,966
(Crowd chants)
343
00:24:18,007 --> 00:24:22,398
But when the state loses the bludgeon,
when you can't control people by force,
344
00:24:22,447 --> 00:24:25,007
and when the voice of the people can be heard,
345
00:24:25,047 --> 00:24:29,120
you have this problem -
it may make people so curious and so arrogant
346
00:24:29,167 --> 00:24:32,716
that they don't have the humility
to submit to a civil rule,
347
00:24:32,767 --> 00:24:35,725
and therefore you have to
control what people think.
348
00:24:37,527 --> 00:24:39,165
And the standard way to do this
349
00:24:39,207 --> 00:24:43,644
is to resort to what in more honest days
used to be called propaganda.
350
00:24:43,687 --> 00:24:45,120
Manufacture of consent.
351
00:24:46,127 --> 00:24:48,766
The creation of necessary illusions.
352
00:24:48,807 --> 00:24:51,480
Various ways of
either marginalising the general public,
353
00:24:51,527 --> 00:24:53,916
or reducing them to apathy in some fashion.
354
00:25:13,447 --> 00:25:15,244
(Applause)
355
00:25:28,407 --> 00:25:30,398
(Woman speaking Japanese)
356
00:25:32,927 --> 00:25:34,758
TRANSLATOR: The oldest of two boys,
357
00:25:34,807 --> 00:25:39,756
Avram Noam Chomsky was born in
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1928.
358
00:25:40,807 --> 00:25:44,561
As a Jewish child,
the anti-Semitism of the time affected him.
359
00:25:45,607 --> 00:25:49,361
Both parents taught Hebrew,
and he became fascinated by literature,
360
00:25:49,407 --> 00:25:53,195
reading translations
of French and Russian classics.
361
00:25:53,247 --> 00:25:57,035
He also took an interest
in a grammar book written by his father
362
00:25:57,087 --> 00:25:58,839
on Hebrew of the Middle Ages.
363
00:25:59,847 --> 00:26:04,045
He recalls a childhood
absorbed in reading curled up on the sofa,
364
00:26:04,087 --> 00:26:07,682
oten borrowing up to 12 books at once
from the library.
365
00:26:07,727 --> 00:26:11,322
He is married to Carol,
and they have three children.
366
00:26:11,367 --> 00:26:14,439
CHOMSKY: I don't like to
impose on my wife and children a form of life
367
00:26:14,487 --> 00:26:16,842
that they certainly
haven't selected for themselves,
368
00:26:16,887 --> 00:26:20,163
namely one of public exposure,
exposure to the public media.
369
00:26:21,167 --> 00:26:24,682
That's their choice, and I don't believe
they themselves have selected this.
370
00:26:24,727 --> 00:26:28,606
I don't impose it on them,
and I would like to protect them from it, frankly.
371
00:26:28,647 --> 00:26:34,438
The second sort of perhaps principled point
is that I'm rather against the whole notion
372
00:26:34,487 --> 00:26:39,163
of developing public personalities...
373
00:26:40,527 --> 00:26:42,916
...who are treated as stars
of one kind or another,
374
00:26:42,967 --> 00:26:46,482
where aspects of their personal life
are supposed to have some significance.
375
00:26:46,527 --> 00:26:48,279
Take one in the reception room.
376
00:26:49,287 --> 00:26:53,519
WOMAN: You said you were just like us -
you went to school, got good grades.
377
00:26:53,567 --> 00:26:56,035
What made you start being critical, you know,
378
00:26:56,087 --> 00:26:57,918
and seeing the different...
379
00:26:57,967 --> 00:26:59,958
What started the change?
380
00:27:00,007 --> 00:27:03,716
Well, you know, there are all kinds
of personal factors in anybody's life.
381
00:27:03,767 --> 00:27:05,917
Don't forget I grew up in the Depression.
382
00:27:05,967 --> 00:27:07,400
(Tyres squeal)
383
00:27:07,447 --> 00:27:09,438
(Crashing)
384
00:27:23,727 --> 00:27:28,198
My parents actually happened to have jobs,
which was kind of unusual.
385
00:27:28,247 --> 00:27:31,762
They were Hebrew school teachers,
so lower middle class.
386
00:27:31,807 --> 00:27:35,516
For them,
everything revolved around being Jewish.
387
00:27:35,567 --> 00:27:38,877
Hebrew, and Palestine in those days,
and so on.
388
00:27:39,767 --> 00:27:42,804
I grew up in that milieu, so I learned Hebrew,
went to Hebrew school,
389
00:27:42,847 --> 00:27:47,284
became a Hebrew school teacher,
went to Hebrew college, led youth groups,
390
00:27:47,327 --> 00:27:48,760
summer camp, Hebrew camps...
391
00:27:48,807 --> 00:27:50,126
The whole business.
392
00:27:51,407 --> 00:27:55,525
The branch of Zionist movement
that I was part of
393
00:27:55,567 --> 00:27:59,526
was all involved in socialist bi-nationalism,
and Arab-Jewish cooperation,
394
00:27:59,567 --> 00:28:01,683
and all sorts of nice stuff.
395
00:28:06,287 --> 00:28:08,243
(Whistle blows)
396
00:28:14,687 --> 00:28:17,963
BARSAMIAN: What did they think of you
hopping on a train, going up to New York,
397
00:28:18,007 --> 00:28:22,205
and hanging out at anarchist book stores
on Fourth Avenue, and talking to...
398
00:28:22,247 --> 00:28:24,283
CHOMSKY: They didn't mind, because...
399
00:28:24,327 --> 00:28:27,478
I don't want to totally trust
my childhood memories, obviously,
400
00:28:27,527 --> 00:28:29,324
but the family was split up.
401
00:28:29,367 --> 00:28:32,439
Like a lot of Jewish families,
it went in all sorts of directions.
402
00:28:32,487 --> 00:28:35,081
There were sectors that were super-Orthodox.
403
00:28:35,127 --> 00:28:39,518
There were other sectors
that were very radical, and very assimilated,
404
00:28:39,567 --> 00:28:41,364
and working-class intellectuals,
405
00:28:41,407 --> 00:28:45,605
and that's the sector
that I naturally gravitated towards.
406
00:28:45,647 --> 00:28:48,241
It was a very lively intellectual culture.
407
00:28:48,287 --> 00:28:51,802
For one thing, it was a working-class culture,
had working-class values.
408
00:28:51,847 --> 00:28:56,318
Values of solidarity, socialist values, and so on.
409
00:28:56,367 --> 00:28:58,676
There was a sense
somehow things would get better.
410
00:28:58,727 --> 00:29:03,323
An institutional structure was around, a method
of fighting, of organising, of doing things
411
00:29:03,367 --> 00:29:05,039
which had some hope.
412
00:29:05,087 --> 00:29:10,798
And I also had the advantage of having gone
to an experimental progressive school,
413
00:29:10,847 --> 00:29:12,838
to a Deweyite school which was quite good,
414
00:29:12,887 --> 00:29:17,278
run by a university there, and you know,
there was no such thing as competition.
415
00:29:17,327 --> 00:29:19,557
There was no such thing
as being a good student.
416
00:29:21,287 --> 00:29:25,405
Literally, the concept of being a good student
didn't even arise until I got to high school.
417
00:29:25,447 --> 00:29:29,326
I went to the academic high school,
and suddenly discovered I'm a good student.
418
00:29:29,367 --> 00:29:33,280
I hated high school, because I had to do
all the things you have to do to get into college.
419
00:29:33,327 --> 00:29:37,206
But until then,
it was kind of a free, pretty open system,
420
00:29:37,247 --> 00:29:38,965
and lots of other things as well.
421
00:29:39,007 --> 00:29:40,565
Maybe I was just cantankerous.
422
00:29:41,567 --> 00:29:44,161
As a historian,
I have read with interest and amazement
423
00:29:44,207 --> 00:29:47,358
your long review article
of Gabriel Jackson's Spanish Civil War.
424
00:29:47,407 --> 00:29:51,082
It's a very respectable piece of history.
I appreciate how much work goes into it.
425
00:29:51,127 --> 00:29:52,765
You know when I did that work?
426
00:29:52,807 --> 00:29:56,277
I did that work in the early 1940s
when I was about 12 years old.
427
00:30:03,127 --> 00:30:07,803
CHOMSKY: The first article I wrote was right
ater the fall of Barcelona in the school paper,
428
00:30:07,847 --> 00:30:11,886
and it was a lament
about the rise of Fascism in 1939.
429
00:30:15,807 --> 00:30:19,163
I guess one of the people who was
the biggest influence in my life was an uncle
430
00:30:19,207 --> 00:30:24,759
who had never gone past fourth grade,
had a background in crime,
431
00:30:24,807 --> 00:30:27,082
and let-wing politics, and all sorts of things.
432
00:30:28,087 --> 00:30:30,157
But he was a hunchback,
433
00:30:30,207 --> 00:30:33,119
and as a result
he could get a newsstand in New York.
434
00:30:33,167 --> 00:30:37,001
They had some programme
for people with physical disabilities.
435
00:30:37,047 --> 00:30:41,086
Some of you are from New York, I guess.
Well, you know the 72nd Street kiosk?
436
00:30:41,127 --> 00:30:42,640
WOMAN: Yes!
437
00:30:42,687 --> 00:30:45,281
CHOMSKY:
That's where I got my political education.
438
00:30:45,327 --> 00:30:49,718
At 72nd Street - where you come out of the
subway, everybody goes towards 72nd Street.
439
00:30:49,767 --> 00:30:53,237
There were two newsstands on that side
which were doing fine,
440
00:30:53,287 --> 00:30:54,606
and there's two on the back.
441
00:30:54,647 --> 00:30:57,480
Nobody comes out the back,
and that's where his newsstand...
442
00:30:57,527 --> 00:30:59,165
(Laughter)
443
00:31:00,727 --> 00:31:03,799
But it was a very lively place.
He was a very bright guy.
444
00:31:03,847 --> 00:31:06,645
It was the '30s. There were a lot of �migr�s.
445
00:31:06,687 --> 00:31:10,202
A lot of people were hanging around there,
and in the evenings especially
446
00:31:10,247 --> 00:31:13,205
it was sort of a literary-political salon.
447
00:31:13,247 --> 00:31:16,398
There were, kind of, guys
hanging around arguing and talking, and...
448
00:31:16,447 --> 00:31:19,007
as a kid, like 11, 12 years old,
449
00:31:19,047 --> 00:31:21,925
the biggest excitement
was to work the newsstand.
450
00:31:25,887 --> 00:31:27,957
You write in Manufacturing Consent
451
00:31:28,007 --> 00:31:31,317
that it's the primary function of the mass media
in the United States
452
00:31:31,367 --> 00:31:34,165
to mobilise public support
for the special interests
453
00:31:34,207 --> 00:31:36,675
that dominate the government
and the private sector.
454
00:31:36,727 --> 00:31:38,638
What are those interests?
455
00:31:38,687 --> 00:31:41,440
Well, if you want to understand
the way any society works,
456
00:31:41,487 --> 00:31:42,806
ours or any other,
457
00:31:42,847 --> 00:31:46,362
the first place to look is who makes...
who is in a position
458
00:31:46,407 --> 00:31:49,717
to make the decisions
that determine the way the society functions.
459
00:31:49,767 --> 00:31:51,803
Societies differ, but in ours
460
00:31:51,847 --> 00:31:55,442
the major decisions
over what happens in the society -
461
00:31:55,487 --> 00:31:58,843
decisions over investment, and production,
and distribution and so on -
462
00:31:58,887 --> 00:32:02,800
are in the hands of
a relatively concentrated network
463
00:32:02,847 --> 00:32:06,840
of major corporations and conglomerates,
and investment firms, and so on.
464
00:32:06,887 --> 00:32:12,166
They are also the ones who staff the major
executive positions in the government,
465
00:32:12,207 --> 00:32:14,482
and they are the ones who own the media,
466
00:32:14,527 --> 00:32:18,076
and they are the ones who have to be
in a position to make the decisions.
467
00:32:18,127 --> 00:32:22,279
They have an overwhelmingly dominant role
in the way life happens,
468
00:32:22,327 --> 00:32:24,443
you know, what's done in the society.
469
00:32:24,487 --> 00:32:28,844
Within the economic system,
by law and in principle, they dominate.
470
00:32:28,887 --> 00:32:33,039
The control over resources,
and the need to satisfy their interests
471
00:32:33,087 --> 00:32:35,123
imposes very sharp constraints
472
00:32:35,167 --> 00:32:38,716
on the political system
and the ideological system.
473
00:32:41,407 --> 00:32:46,879
When we talk about manufacturing of consent,
whose consent is being manufactured?
474
00:32:46,927 --> 00:32:49,202
To start with, there are two different groups.
475
00:32:49,247 --> 00:32:53,081
We can get into more detail,
but at the first level of approximation,
476
00:32:53,127 --> 00:32:55,118
there's two targets for propaganda.
477
00:32:56,127 --> 00:32:58,561
One is what is sometimes called
the political class.
478
00:33:02,447 --> 00:33:05,007
There's maybe 20 per cent of the population
479
00:33:05,047 --> 00:33:08,437
which is relatively educated,
more or less articulate.
480
00:33:08,487 --> 00:33:11,524
They'll play some kind of role
in decision making.
481
00:33:11,567 --> 00:33:14,764
They're supposed to sort of participate
in social life,
482
00:33:14,807 --> 00:33:20,837
either as managers, or cultural managers,
like, say, teachers, and writers, and so on.
483
00:33:20,887 --> 00:33:22,798
They're supposed to vote.
484
00:33:22,847 --> 00:33:28,604
They're supposed to play some role in the way
economic and political and cultural life goes on.
485
00:33:28,647 --> 00:33:30,683
Now, their consent is crucial.
486
00:33:30,727 --> 00:33:34,083
That's one group that has to be
deeply indoctrinated.
487
00:33:34,127 --> 00:33:37,085
Then there's maybe 80 per cent
of the population
488
00:33:37,127 --> 00:33:39,925
whose main function is to follow orders,
489
00:33:39,967 --> 00:33:41,446
and not to think, you know.
490
00:33:41,487 --> 00:33:43,637
Not to pay attention to anything,
491
00:33:43,687 --> 00:33:46,918
and they're the ones who usually pay the costs.
492
00:33:46,967 --> 00:33:49,276
LINVILLE: All right, Professor Chomsky, Noam,
493
00:33:50,767 --> 00:33:56,876
you outlined a model - filters propaganda
is sent through on its way to the public.
494
00:33:56,927 --> 00:33:58,918
Will you briefly outline those?
495
00:33:58,967 --> 00:34:02,243
CHOMSKY: It's basically an institutional
analysis of the major media,
496
00:34:02,287 --> 00:34:04,278
what we call a propaganda model.
497
00:34:04,327 --> 00:34:09,720
We're talking primarily about the national
media, those media that set a general agenda
498
00:34:09,767 --> 00:34:11,917
that others more or less adhere to,
499
00:34:11,967 --> 00:34:17,519
to the extent that they even pay much attention
to national or international affairs.
500
00:34:17,567 --> 00:34:20,718
Now, the elite media are the sort of
agenda-setting media.
501
00:34:20,767 --> 00:34:22,758
The New York Times, The Washington Post,
502
00:34:22,807 --> 00:34:25,275
the major television channels, and so on.
503
00:34:26,287 --> 00:34:28,278
They set the general framework.
504
00:34:29,087 --> 00:34:32,477
Local media more or less adapt
to their structure.
505
00:34:32,527 --> 00:34:34,324
(Phone rings)
506
00:34:35,127 --> 00:34:36,162
World news.
507
00:34:37,807 --> 00:34:40,685
DIRECTOR: It's a sound bite,
that says there's a beach head...
508
00:34:40,727 --> 00:34:42,718
I think 628 is a good one.
509
00:34:44,767 --> 00:34:46,962
This is the operative sound bite for us.
510
00:34:48,567 --> 00:34:50,159
Got a minute for all the times.
511
00:34:51,007 --> 00:34:52,406
I love this sound bite.
512
00:34:52,447 --> 00:34:55,245
CHOMSKY:
And they do this in all sorts of ways, by...
513
00:35:05,407 --> 00:35:07,921
FLOOR DIRECTOR:
Two and a half minutes to air.
514
00:35:09,767 --> 00:35:11,564
45 seconds.
515
00:35:21,127 --> 00:35:25,279
There is an unusual amount of attention today
on the five nations of Central America.
516
00:35:25,327 --> 00:35:27,841
NARRATOR: This is democracy's diary.
517
00:35:27,887 --> 00:35:31,004
Here, for our instruction,
are triumphs and disasters,
518
00:35:31,047 --> 00:35:33,959
the pattern of life's changing fabric.
519
00:35:34,007 --> 00:35:38,603
Here is great journalism,
a revelation of the past, a guide to the present,
520
00:35:38,647 --> 00:35:40,319
and a clue to the future.
521
00:35:48,727 --> 00:35:50,718
(Growls)
522
00:35:57,127 --> 00:36:01,678
The New York Times is certainly the most
important newspaper in the United States,
523
00:36:01,727 --> 00:36:05,242
and one could argue,
the most important newspaper in the world.
524
00:36:06,407 --> 00:36:12,004
The New York Times plays an enormous role
in shaping the perception of the current world
525
00:36:12,047 --> 00:36:15,596
on the part of
the politically active, educated classes.
526
00:36:15,647 --> 00:36:18,036
Also, The New York Times has a special role,
527
00:36:18,087 --> 00:36:21,636
and I believe its editors probably feel
that they bear a heavy burden
528
00:36:21,687 --> 00:36:25,965
in the sense that
The New York Times creates history.
529
00:36:26,007 --> 00:36:29,443
NARRATOR: What happened years ago may
have a bearing on what happens tomorrow.
530
00:36:29,487 --> 00:36:33,196
Millions of clippings
are preserved in the Times'library,
531
00:36:33,247 --> 00:36:35,238
all indexed for instant use.
532
00:36:35,287 --> 00:36:38,484
A priceless archive of events,
and the men who make them.
533
00:36:39,647 --> 00:36:42,844
CHOMSKY: That is, history is what appears in
The New York Times archives.
534
00:36:42,887 --> 00:36:46,357
The place where people will go to find out
what happened is The New York Times.
535
00:36:46,407 --> 00:36:50,958
Therefore it's extremely important,
if history is to be shaped in an appropriate way,
536
00:36:51,007 --> 00:36:56,081
that certain things appear, certain things do not,
certain questions be asked, others be ignored,
537
00:36:56,127 --> 00:36:59,358
and that issues be framed
in a particular fashion.
538
00:36:59,407 --> 00:37:03,446
Now, in whose interests
is history being so shaped?
539
00:37:03,487 --> 00:37:06,524
Well, I think that's not very difficult to answer.
540
00:37:06,567 --> 00:37:09,957
MEYER: The process by which
people make up their minds on this
541
00:37:10,007 --> 00:37:12,282
is a much more mysterious process
542
00:37:12,327 --> 00:37:16,115
than you would ever guess
from reading Manufacturing Consent.
543
00:37:16,167 --> 00:37:18,203
There is a saying about legislation,
544
00:37:18,247 --> 00:37:20,556
that legislation is like making sausage.
545
00:37:21,727 --> 00:37:26,437
The less you know about how it's done,
the better for your appetite.
546
00:37:26,487 --> 00:37:28,045
The same is true of this business.
547
00:37:28,087 --> 00:37:31,636
If you're in a conference
in which decisions are being made
548
00:37:31,687 --> 00:37:33,803
on what to put on page one, or what not,
549
00:37:33,847 --> 00:37:39,922
you would get, I think, the impression
that important decisions were being made
550
00:37:39,967 --> 00:37:42,037
in a flippant and frivolous way,
551
00:37:42,087 --> 00:37:46,046
but in fact, given the pressures of time
to try to get things out,
552
00:37:46,087 --> 00:37:48,078
you resort to a kind of a shorthand,
553
00:37:48,127 --> 00:37:51,915
and you have to fill that paper up every day.
554
00:37:52,767 --> 00:37:55,600
It's curious in a kind of a mirror image way that
555
00:37:55,647 --> 00:37:59,845
Professor Chomsky is in total accord
with Reed Irvine
556
00:37:59,887 --> 00:38:04,881
who at the right-wing end of the spectrum
says exactly what Chomsky does
557
00:38:04,927 --> 00:38:10,320
about the insinuating influence of the press,
of the big media
558
00:38:10,367 --> 00:38:15,964
as "agenda setters", to use
one of the great buzz words of the time,
559
00:38:16,007 --> 00:38:20,159
and, of course,
Reed Irvine sees this as a let-wing conspiracy,
560
00:38:20,207 --> 00:38:24,803
of foisting liberal ideas in both domestic
and foreign affairs on the American people.
561
00:38:24,847 --> 00:38:28,237
But in both cases,
I think that the premise really is an insult
562
00:38:28,287 --> 00:38:31,120
to the intelligence of the people
who consume news.
563
00:38:31,167 --> 00:38:37,436
Now, to eliminate confusion, all of this has
nothing to do with liberal or conservative bias.
564
00:38:37,487 --> 00:38:42,038
According to the propaganda model, both
liberal and conservative wings of the media,
565
00:38:42,087 --> 00:38:44,078
whatever those terms are supposed to mean,
566
00:38:44,127 --> 00:38:47,563
fall within the same framework of assumptions.
567
00:38:47,607 --> 00:38:53,557
In fact, if the system functions well, it ought
to have a liberal bias, or at least appear to,
568
00:38:53,607 --> 00:38:56,405
because if it appears to have a liberal bias,
569
00:38:56,447 --> 00:38:59,519
that will serve to bound thought
even more effectively.
570
00:38:59,567 --> 00:39:04,766
In other words, if the press is indeed adversarial
and liberal, and all these bad things,
571
00:39:04,807 --> 00:39:06,798
then how can I go beyond it?
572
00:39:06,847 --> 00:39:11,045
They're already so extreme in their opposition
to power that to go beyond it
573
00:39:11,087 --> 00:39:13,078
would be to take off from the planet,
574
00:39:13,127 --> 00:39:16,005
so therefore it must be that the presuppositions
575
00:39:16,047 --> 00:39:20,086
that are accepted in the liberal media
are sacrosanct.
576
00:39:20,127 --> 00:39:21,765
Can't go beyond them.
577
00:39:21,807 --> 00:39:25,436
And a well-functioning system
would in fact have a bias of that kind.
578
00:39:25,487 --> 00:39:30,800
The media would then serve to say, in effect:
Thus far and no further.
579
00:39:30,847 --> 00:39:33,805
We ask what would you expect of those media
580
00:39:33,847 --> 00:39:40,286
on just relatively uncontroversial,
guided-free market assumptions?
581
00:39:40,327 --> 00:39:43,478
And when you look at them,
you find a number of major factors
582
00:39:43,527 --> 00:39:46,087
entering into
determining what their products are.
583
00:39:46,127 --> 00:39:50,359
These are what we call the filters -
so one of them, for example, is ownership.
584
00:39:50,407 --> 00:39:52,682
Who owns them?
585
00:39:52,727 --> 00:39:56,083
CHOMSKY: The major agenda-setting media,
ater all, what are they?
586
00:39:56,127 --> 00:39:58,516
As institutions in the society, what are they?
587
00:39:58,567 --> 00:40:01,081
Well, in the first place
they are major corporations.
588
00:40:01,127 --> 00:40:03,197
In fact, huge corporations.
589
00:40:03,247 --> 00:40:07,798
Furthermore, they're integrated with, and
sometimes owned by, even larger corporations,
590
00:40:07,847 --> 00:40:11,920
conglomerates, so, for example,
by Westinghouse, GE and so on.
591
00:40:17,207 --> 00:40:22,884
STUDENT: What I wanted to know was
how specifically the elites control the media.
592
00:40:22,927 --> 00:40:25,999
That's like asking,
"How do the elites control General Motors"?
593
00:40:27,367 --> 00:40:29,358
Why isn't that a question?
594
00:40:29,407 --> 00:40:33,719
I mean, General Motors is an institution of the
elites. They don't have to control it. They own it.
595
00:40:33,767 --> 00:40:36,156
Except I guess, at a certain level I think...
596
00:40:38,727 --> 00:40:42,402
Like, I guess... I work with student press,
so I know, like, reporters and stuff...
597
00:40:42,447 --> 00:40:45,598
Elites don't control the student press,
but I'll tell you something -
598
00:40:45,647 --> 00:40:50,118
you try in the student press
to do anything that breaks out of conventions,
599
00:40:50,167 --> 00:40:53,921
and you're going to have the whole business
community around here down on your neck,
600
00:40:53,967 --> 00:40:56,925
and the university's going to get threatened,
and you know...
601
00:40:56,967 --> 00:40:59,686
Maybe nobody'll pay any attention to you.
That's possible.
602
00:40:59,727 --> 00:41:02,844
If you get to the point
where they don't stop paying attention to you,
603
00:41:02,887 --> 00:41:04,559
the pressures'll start coming.
604
00:41:04,607 --> 00:41:08,156
Because there are people with power,
there are people who own the country,
605
00:41:08,207 --> 00:41:10,767
and they're not going to
let the country get out of control.
606
00:41:10,807 --> 00:41:12,923
What do you think about that?
607
00:41:12,967 --> 00:41:20,647
This is the old cabal theory that somewhere
there's a room with a baize-covered desk,
608
00:41:20,687 --> 00:41:23,838
and there are a bunch of capitalists
sitting around pulling strings.
609
00:41:23,887 --> 00:41:27,197
These rooms don't exist.
I hate to tell Noam Chomsky this.
610
00:41:27,247 --> 00:41:30,842
- You don't share that view?
- It's the most absolute rubbish I've ever heard.
611
00:41:30,887 --> 00:41:32,639
It's the fashion in the universities.
612
00:41:32,687 --> 00:41:36,839
It's patent nonsense,
and I think it's nothing but a fashion.
613
00:41:36,887 --> 00:41:39,003
It's a way that...
614
00:41:39,727 --> 00:41:42,605
intellectuals have of... of feeling like a clergy.
615
00:41:42,647 --> 00:41:44,797
There has to be something wrong.
616
00:42:34,727 --> 00:42:36,718
CHOMSKY:
So, what we have in the first place
617
00:42:36,767 --> 00:42:40,396
is major corporations
which are parts of even bigger conglomerates.
618
00:42:40,447 --> 00:42:45,999
Now, like any other corporation, they...
they have a product which they sell to a market.
619
00:42:47,127 --> 00:42:50,676
The market is advertisers,
that is, other businesses.
620
00:42:50,727 --> 00:42:54,117
What keeps the media functioning
is not the audience.
621
00:42:54,167 --> 00:42:58,399
They make money from their advertisers, and
remember, we're talking about the elite media,
622
00:42:58,447 --> 00:43:04,283
so they're trying to sell a good product,
a product which raises advertising rates.
623
00:43:04,327 --> 00:43:06,636
And ask your friends in the advertising industry.
624
00:43:06,687 --> 00:43:09,520
That means
that they want to adjust their audience
625
00:43:09,567 --> 00:43:11,603
to the more elite and affluent audience.
626
00:43:11,647 --> 00:43:13,319
That raises advertising rates.
627
00:43:13,367 --> 00:43:17,326
So what you have is institutions, corporations -
big corporations -
628
00:43:17,367 --> 00:43:21,645
that are selling relatively privileged audiences
to other businesses.
629
00:43:21,687 --> 00:43:25,077
CHOMSKY: Well, what point of view
would you expect to come out of this?
630
00:43:25,687 --> 00:43:28,599
Without any further assumptions,
what you'd predict is
631
00:43:28,647 --> 00:43:31,957
that what comes out is a picture of the world,
a perception of the world,
632
00:43:32,007 --> 00:43:35,477
that satisfies the needs,
and the interests, and the perceptions
633
00:43:35,527 --> 00:43:38,997
of the sellers, the buyers, and the product.
634
00:43:41,567 --> 00:43:44,639
Now, there are many other factors
that press in the same direction.
635
00:43:44,687 --> 00:43:48,441
If people try to enter the system
who don't have that point of view,
636
00:43:48,487 --> 00:43:51,160
they're likely to be excluded
somewhere along the way.
637
00:43:51,207 --> 00:43:55,644
Ater all, no institution is going to
happily design a mechanism to self-destruct.
638
00:43:55,687 --> 00:44:00,158
That's not the way institutions function,
so they all work to exclude, or marginalise,
639
00:44:00,207 --> 00:44:03,756
or eliminate dissenting voices,
or alternative perspectives and so on
640
00:44:03,807 --> 00:44:05,365
because they're dysfunctional.
641
00:44:05,407 --> 00:44:07,762
They're dysfunctional to the institution itself.
642
00:44:07,807 --> 00:44:11,959
Do you think you've escaped
the ideological indoctrination
643
00:44:12,007 --> 00:44:14,362
of the media and society that you grew up in?
644
00:44:14,407 --> 00:44:16,637
Have I? Oten not.
645
00:44:16,687 --> 00:44:18,200
I mean, when I look back,
646
00:44:18,247 --> 00:44:22,957
and think of the things that I haven't done
that I should have done, it's...
647
00:44:23,007 --> 00:44:24,998
it's very...
648
00:44:25,807 --> 00:44:27,160
it's...
649
00:44:27,207 --> 00:44:28,845
not a pleasant experience.
650
00:44:28,887 --> 00:44:31,845
BARSAMIAN: So, what's the story
of young Noam in the school yard?
651
00:44:31,887 --> 00:44:33,036
Yeah, another...
652
00:44:33,087 --> 00:44:34,884
I mean, that was a personal thing for me.
653
00:44:34,927 --> 00:44:37,964
I don't know why it should interest anyone else,
but I do remember...
654
00:44:38,007 --> 00:44:41,283
- You drew certain conclusions.
- It had a big influence on me.
655
00:44:41,327 --> 00:44:44,000
I remember when I was about six, I guess,
656
00:44:44,047 --> 00:44:48,643
first grade, there was the standard fat kid
who everybody made fun of,
657
00:44:48,687 --> 00:44:53,124
and I remember in the school yard,
he was on a...
658
00:44:54,127 --> 00:44:57,836
you know, standing right outside
the school classroom,
659
00:44:57,887 --> 00:45:01,402
and a bunch of kids outside sort of taunting him,
and... you know, and so on,
660
00:45:01,447 --> 00:45:04,120
and one of the kids actually brought over
his older brother
661
00:45:04,167 --> 00:45:06,158
from third grade instead of first grade.
662
00:45:06,207 --> 00:45:07,526
Big kid.
663
00:45:07,567 --> 00:45:09,637
And he was going to beat him up or something,
664
00:45:09,687 --> 00:45:12,247
and I remember going up to stand next to him,
665
00:45:12,287 --> 00:45:15,279
feeling somebody ought to... help him,
666
00:45:15,327 --> 00:45:17,841
and I did for a while, and then I got scared,
667
00:45:17,887 --> 00:45:21,766
and I went away,
and I was very much ashamed of it aterwards,
668
00:45:21,807 --> 00:45:25,163
and sort of felt, you know...
"I'm not going to do that again."
669
00:45:27,167 --> 00:45:31,877
That's a feeling that's stuck with me -
you should stick with the underdog.
670
00:45:32,887 --> 00:45:35,799
And the shame remained.
I should have stayed there.
671
00:45:38,007 --> 00:45:42,080
You were already established, you were a
professor at MIT, you'd made a reputation,
672
00:45:42,127 --> 00:45:43,845
you had a terrific career ahead of you.
673
00:45:43,887 --> 00:45:47,436
You decided to become a political activist.
674
00:45:47,487 --> 00:45:51,844
Now, here is a classic case of somebody the
institution does not seem to have filtered out.
675
00:45:51,887 --> 00:45:54,117
I mean, you were a good boy up until then,
were you?
676
00:45:54,167 --> 00:45:56,283
Or you'd always been a slight rebel?
677
00:45:56,327 --> 00:45:59,000
CHOMSKY:
Pretty much. I had been pretty much outside.
678
00:45:59,047 --> 00:46:02,926
STEINBERG: You felt isolated and out of
sympathy with the currents of American life,
679
00:46:02,967 --> 00:46:04,195
but a lot of people do that.
680
00:46:04,247 --> 00:46:07,284
Suddenly, in 1964,
you decide, "I have to do something about this".
681
00:46:07,327 --> 00:46:08,601
What made you do that?
682
00:46:08,647 --> 00:46:12,003
CHOMSKY: That was a very conscious,
and a very uncomfortable, decision,
683
00:46:12,047 --> 00:46:14,481
because I knew
what the consequences would be.
684
00:46:14,527 --> 00:46:16,518
I was in a very favourable position.
685
00:46:16,567 --> 00:46:18,558
I had the kind of work I liked,
686
00:46:18,607 --> 00:46:20,723
we had a lively, exciting department,
687
00:46:20,767 --> 00:46:23,156
the field was going well, personal life was fine,
688
00:46:23,207 --> 00:46:25,482
I was living in a nice place, children growing up.
689
00:46:25,527 --> 00:46:28,087
Everything looked perfect,
and I knew I was giving it up,
690
00:46:28,127 --> 00:46:30,687
and at that time, remember,
it was not just giving talks.
691
00:46:30,727 --> 00:46:32,957
I became involved right away in resistance,
692
00:46:33,007 --> 00:46:36,522
and I expected to spend years in jail,
and came very close to it.
693
00:46:36,567 --> 00:46:39,400
In fact,
my wife went back to graduate school in part
694
00:46:39,447 --> 00:46:41,961
as we assumed
she would have to support the children.
695
00:46:42,007 --> 00:46:43,520
These were the expectations.
696
00:46:49,647 --> 00:46:52,684
And I recognised
that if I returned to these interests
697
00:46:52,727 --> 00:46:55,036
which were the dominant interests
of my own youth,
698
00:46:55,087 --> 00:46:57,282
life would become very uncomfortable.
699
00:46:57,327 --> 00:47:01,081
Because I know that in the United States
you don't get sent to psychiatric prison,
700
00:47:01,127 --> 00:47:03,482
and they don't send a death squad ater you
and so on,
701
00:47:03,527 --> 00:47:07,361
but there are definite penalties
for breaking the rules.
702
00:47:08,367 --> 00:47:10,005
So these were real decisions,
703
00:47:10,047 --> 00:47:15,838
and it simply seemed at that point
that it was just hopelessly immoral not to.
704
00:47:18,367 --> 00:47:21,040
I'm Noam Chomsky, I'm on the faculty at MIT,
705
00:47:21,087 --> 00:47:24,397
and I've been getting
more and more heavily involved
706
00:47:24,447 --> 00:47:26,802
in anti-war activities for the last few years.
707
00:47:38,967 --> 00:47:42,801
Beginning with writing articles,
and making speeches,
708
00:47:42,847 --> 00:47:45,042
speaking to congressmen
and that sort of thing,
709
00:47:45,087 --> 00:47:51,720
and gradually getting involved more and more
directly in resistance activities of various sorts.
710
00:47:51,767 --> 00:47:55,555
I've come to the feeling myself
that the most effective form of political action
711
00:47:55,607 --> 00:48:01,045
that is open to a responsible
and concerned citizen at the moment
712
00:48:01,087 --> 00:48:05,160
is action that really involves direct resistance,
713
00:48:05,207 --> 00:48:09,519
refusal to take part in
what I think are war crimes,
714
00:48:09,567 --> 00:48:13,685
to raise the domestic cost
of American aggression overseas
715
00:48:13,727 --> 00:48:19,359
through non-participation, and support
for those who are refusing to take part,
716
00:48:19,407 --> 00:48:22,126
in particular,
drat resistance throughout the country.
717
00:48:31,247 --> 00:48:36,116
I think that we can see quite clearly
some very, very serious defects and flaws
718
00:48:36,167 --> 00:48:39,000
in our society,
our level of culture, our institutions
719
00:48:39,047 --> 00:48:40,799
which are going to have to be corrected
720
00:48:40,847 --> 00:48:44,044
by operating outside of the framework
that is commonly accepted.
721
00:48:44,087 --> 00:48:47,796
I think we're going to have to
find new ways of political action.
722
00:48:56,167 --> 00:48:58,158
(Commotion)
723
00:48:58,207 --> 00:48:59,959
(Whistle blows)
724
00:49:13,007 --> 00:49:17,080
I rejoice in your disposition
to argue the Vietnam question,
725
00:49:17,127 --> 00:49:21,405
especially when I recognise
what an act of self-control this must involve.
726
00:49:21,447 --> 00:49:23,677
CHOMSKY: It really does.
- You're doing very well.
727
00:49:23,727 --> 00:49:26,958
- You're doing very well.
- I lose my temper. Maybe not tonight.
728
00:49:27,007 --> 00:49:28,998
Maybe not tonight...
729
00:49:29,047 --> 00:49:31,641
because if you would
I'd smash you in the goddamn face.
730
00:49:33,927 --> 00:49:36,236
That's a good reason for not losing your temper.
731
00:49:36,287 --> 00:49:42,726
You say, "The war is simply an obscenity,
a depraved act by weak and miserable men."
732
00:49:42,767 --> 00:49:44,997
Including all of us.
733
00:49:45,047 --> 00:49:47,607
Including myself. That's the next sentence.
734
00:49:47,647 --> 00:49:49,683
Oh, sure, sure, sure.
735
00:49:49,727 --> 00:49:52,719
Because you count everybody
in the company of the guilty.
736
00:49:52,767 --> 00:49:56,157
- I think that's true in this case.
- It's a theological observation.
737
00:49:56,207 --> 00:49:57,401
No, I don't think so.
738
00:49:57,447 --> 00:50:01,281
If everybody's guilty of everything,
then nobody's guilty of anything.
739
00:50:01,327 --> 00:50:02,646
No, I don't believe that.
740
00:50:02,687 --> 00:50:06,043
I think the point that I'm trying to make,
and I think ought to be made,
741
00:50:06,087 --> 00:50:08,442
is that the real...
742
00:50:08,487 --> 00:50:11,604
at least to me -
I say this elsewhere in the book -
743
00:50:11,647 --> 00:50:17,916
what seems to me a very, in a sense, terrifying
aspect of our society and other societies
744
00:50:17,967 --> 00:50:23,724
is the equanimity and the detachment
with which sane, reasonable, sensible people
745
00:50:23,767 --> 00:50:25,439
can observe such events.
746
00:50:25,487 --> 00:50:30,242
I think that's more terrifying than
the occasional Hitler or LeMay that crops up.
747
00:50:30,287 --> 00:50:33,597
These people would not be able
to operate were it not for the...
748
00:50:33,647 --> 00:50:35,126
this apathy and equanimity,
749
00:50:35,167 --> 00:50:37,283
and therefore I think that it's in some sense
750
00:50:37,327 --> 00:50:44,403
the sane, and reasonable, and tolerant people
who share a very serious burden of guilt
751
00:50:44,447 --> 00:50:47,678
that they very easily
throw on the shoulders of others
752
00:50:47,727 --> 00:50:50,366
who seem more extreme and more violent.
753
00:50:53,247 --> 00:50:58,924
12 million pounds of confetti dropped into
New York City's so-called Canyon of Heroes.
754
00:50:58,967 --> 00:51:03,324
Americans were officially welcoming
the troops home from the Persian Gulf war.
755
00:51:03,367 --> 00:51:05,483
MAN: It worked out really great for us.
756
00:51:05,527 --> 00:51:12,842
It just goes to show that we're a mighty nation,
and we'll be there no matter what comes along.
757
00:51:12,887 --> 00:51:17,165
It's the strongest country in the world,
and you got to be glad to live here.
758
00:51:17,207 --> 00:51:21,200
ASAIS: So, tell me what you feel
about media coverage of the war.
759
00:51:21,247 --> 00:51:26,082
It was good. It got to be a bit much ater a while,
but I guess it was good to know everything.
760
00:51:26,127 --> 00:51:28,595
In Vietnam you didn't know a lot
that was going on,
761
00:51:28,647 --> 00:51:32,003
but here you're pretty much
up to the moment on everything,
762
00:51:32,047 --> 00:51:34,561
so... I guess it was good to be informed.
763
00:51:36,247 --> 00:51:40,126
For the first time,
because of technology, we have the ability
764
00:51:40,167 --> 00:51:43,716
to be live from many locations
around the globe,
765
00:51:43,767 --> 00:51:47,726
and because of the format -
an all-news network -
766
00:51:47,767 --> 00:51:52,238
we can spend whatever time is necessary
to bring the viewer
767
00:51:52,287 --> 00:51:56,519
the complete context
of that day's portion of the story.
768
00:51:59,727 --> 00:52:06,678
And by context, I mean the institutional memory
that is critical to understand why and how,
769
00:52:06,727 --> 00:52:11,562
and that's those who are analysts,
and do commentary,
770
00:52:11,607 --> 00:52:13,962
and those who can explain.
771
00:52:15,127 --> 00:52:17,118
MAN: Slug that last piece...
772
00:52:19,167 --> 00:52:23,319
...lTN-lsrael Post War.
773
00:52:23,367 --> 00:52:26,962
TURNER: David Brinkley once said
that you step in front of the camera,
774
00:52:27,007 --> 00:52:29,567
and you get out of news business,
and into show business,
775
00:52:29,607 --> 00:52:34,635
but nonetheless
that should not in any way subtract or obscure
776
00:52:34,687 --> 00:52:37,565
the need for the basic standards
of good journalism.
777
00:52:37,607 --> 00:52:40,997
PRODUCER: Hang tight. Let me
give you a lead for Salinger right now, OK?
778
00:52:41,847 --> 00:52:46,159
President Bush
and Prime Minister Major have...
779
00:52:47,167 --> 00:52:50,921
...closed, or have almost rejected...
780
00:52:50,967 --> 00:52:55,199
the Soviet peace talk...
peace efforts in Saudi Arabia.
781
00:52:55,247 --> 00:52:57,761
The door is being let open.
782
00:52:57,807 --> 00:53:01,356
Rick Salinger is standing by live in Riyad.
783
00:53:01,407 --> 00:53:03,716
- All but closed.
- Yeah. All but closed.
784
00:53:03,767 --> 00:53:05,086
Right.
785
00:53:05,127 --> 00:53:10,440
TURNER: Accuracy, speed, a fair approach,
honesty and integrity within the reporter
786
00:53:10,487 --> 00:53:13,479
to try and bring the truth,
whatever the truth may be.
787
00:53:14,287 --> 00:53:16,164
Going to war is a serious business.
788
00:53:16,207 --> 00:53:21,235
In a totalitarian society, the dictator just says,
"We're going to war", and everybody marches.
789
00:53:21,287 --> 00:53:24,324
NARRATOR: And with this weapon
of human brotherhood in our hands
790
00:53:24,367 --> 00:53:29,566
we are seeing the war for men's minds
not as a battle of truth against lies,
791
00:53:29,607 --> 00:53:33,725
but as a lasting alliance pledged in faith
with all those millions driving forward
792
00:53:33,767 --> 00:53:38,363
to create the true new order-
the world order of the people first,
793
00:53:38,407 --> 00:53:40,443
the people before all.
794
00:53:40,487 --> 00:53:45,720
CHOMSKY: In a democratic society, the theory
is, if the political leadership is committed to war
795
00:53:45,767 --> 00:53:49,646
they present reasons, and they've got
a very heavy burden of proof to meet.
796
00:53:49,687 --> 00:53:53,202
Because a war is a very catastrophic affair,
as it's been proved to be.
797
00:53:53,247 --> 00:53:55,841
Now, the role of the media at that point is to...
798
00:53:55,887 --> 00:53:59,163
is to present the relevant background.
799
00:53:59,207 --> 00:54:02,199
For example,
the possibilities of peaceful settlement,
800
00:54:02,247 --> 00:54:04,556
such as what they may be,
have to be presented,
801
00:54:04,607 --> 00:54:11,922
and then to offer a forum... in fact encourage
a forum of debate over this very dread decision
802
00:54:11,967 --> 00:54:15,243
to go to war, and in this case
kill hundreds of thousands of people,
803
00:54:15,287 --> 00:54:17,278
and leave two countries wrecked, and so on.
804
00:54:17,327 --> 00:54:19,158
That never happened.
805
00:54:19,207 --> 00:54:20,686
There was never...
806
00:54:20,727 --> 00:54:22,206
Well, you know, when I say never,
807
00:54:22,247 --> 00:54:28,117
I mean 99.9 per cent of the discussion
excluded the option of a peaceful settlement.
808
00:54:28,167 --> 00:54:30,681
NARRATOR:
To Washington's Office of War Information
809
00:54:30,727 --> 00:54:34,606
falls one of the most vital and constructive tasks
of this war.
810
00:54:34,647 --> 00:54:36,638
This is a people's war,
811
00:54:36,687 --> 00:54:41,078
and to win it, the people ought to
know as much about it as they can.
812
00:54:41,127 --> 00:54:45,405
This office will do its best to tell the truth,
and nothing but the truth,
813
00:54:45,447 --> 00:54:47,119
both at home and abroad.
814
00:54:47,167 --> 00:54:50,239
NARRATOR: The first weapon
in this worldwide strategy of proof
815
00:54:50,287 --> 00:54:53,279
is the great machine of information
represented by the free press
816
00:54:53,327 --> 00:54:57,320
with its powers of moulding public thought,
and leading public action,
817
00:54:57,367 --> 00:55:00,484
with all its lifelines
for the exchange of new ideas
818
00:55:00,527 --> 00:55:03,439
between fighting nations
spread across the earth.
819
00:55:05,687 --> 00:55:09,202
CHOMSKY: Every time Bush would appear
and say, "There will be no negotiations",
820
00:55:09,247 --> 00:55:12,239
there would be a hundred editorials
the next day
821
00:55:12,287 --> 00:55:15,404
lauding him
for going the last mile for diplomacy.
822
00:55:15,447 --> 00:55:19,645
If he said, "You can't reward an aggressor",
instead of cracking up in ridicule
823
00:55:19,687 --> 00:55:23,600
the way people did in civilised sectors
of the world like the whole Third World,
824
00:55:23,647 --> 00:55:27,322
the media still...
"man of fantastic principle", you know.
825
00:55:27,367 --> 00:55:30,165
The invader of Panama, the only head of state
826
00:55:30,207 --> 00:55:33,324
who stands condemned
for aggression in the world,
827
00:55:33,367 --> 00:55:36,165
the guy who was head of the CIA
during the Timor aggression,
828
00:55:36,207 --> 00:55:39,324
he says, "Aggressors can't be rewarded",
the media just applaud it.
829
00:55:39,367 --> 00:55:44,361
VOICEOVER: The motion picture industry with
its worldwide organisation of newsreel crews,
830
00:55:44,407 --> 00:55:47,444
invaluable for bringing into vivid focus
831
00:55:47,487 --> 00:55:50,365
the background drama
and perspectives of the war.
832
00:55:50,967 --> 00:55:55,245
Mobilised too in this all-out struggle
for men's minds are the radio networks,
833
00:55:55,287 --> 00:55:59,565
with all their experience in the swift reporting
of great occasions and events.
834
00:56:01,367 --> 00:56:04,564
From every strategic centre
and frontline stronghold
835
00:56:04,607 --> 00:56:07,440
their reporters are sending back
the lessons of new tactics,
836
00:56:07,487 --> 00:56:09,478
new ways of war.
837
00:56:09,527 --> 00:56:13,839
CHOMSKY: The result was it's a media war.
There's tremendous fakery all along the line.
838
00:56:13,887 --> 00:56:16,401
The UN is finally living up to its mission.
839
00:56:16,927 --> 00:56:19,361
"A wondrous sea change",
The New York Times told us.
840
00:56:19,407 --> 00:56:21,602
The only wondrous sea change
was that for once
841
00:56:21,647 --> 00:56:25,560
the United States didn't veto a Security Council
Resolution against aggression.
842
00:56:27,247 --> 00:56:29,886
People don't want a war
unless you have to have one,
843
00:56:29,927 --> 00:56:31,997
and would've known
you don't have to have one.
844
00:56:32,047 --> 00:56:34,083
The media kept people from knowing that,
845
00:56:34,127 --> 00:56:37,483
and that means we went to war
very much in the manner of a totalitarian state,
846
00:56:37,527 --> 00:56:39,324
thanks to the media subservience.
847
00:56:39,367 --> 00:56:41,039
That's the big story.
848
00:56:41,887 --> 00:56:43,878
(Cheering)
849
00:56:47,447 --> 00:56:50,837
Now, remember I'm not talking about
a small radio station in Laramie.
850
00:56:50,887 --> 00:56:54,800
I'm talking about
the national agenda-setting media.
851
00:56:54,847 --> 00:56:57,315
If you run a radio news show in Laramie,
852
00:56:57,367 --> 00:57:01,565
chances are very strong that you pick up
what was in The Times that morning,
853
00:57:01,607 --> 00:57:03,086
and you decide that's the news.
854
00:57:03,127 --> 00:57:06,005
In fact, if you follow the AP wires,
you find it in the aternoon.
855
00:57:06,047 --> 00:57:09,596
They send across tomorrow's front page
of The New York Times.
856
00:57:09,647 --> 00:57:11,842
That's so that everybody knows
what the news is.
857
00:57:11,887 --> 00:57:16,244
The perceptions and perspectives
and so on are sort of transmitted down,
858
00:57:16,287 --> 00:57:20,883
not to the precise detail, but the general picture
is pretty much transmitted elsewhere.
859
00:57:22,927 --> 00:57:25,919
The foreign news comes here
to the Foreign News desk.
860
00:57:25,967 --> 00:57:27,958
The editor is Bob Hanley.
861
00:57:28,847 --> 00:57:32,726
Bob, I suppose you get far more foreign news
than you can possibly use in the paper.
862
00:57:32,767 --> 00:57:36,726
Yes, we do. We get a great deal more
than we can accommodate in a day.
863
00:57:36,767 --> 00:57:38,598
Your job is to weed it out, I suppose.
864
00:57:38,647 --> 00:57:41,559
This is the selection centre, as it were,
865
00:57:41,607 --> 00:57:44,167
and when I have selected it
866
00:57:44,207 --> 00:57:49,156
I pass it across the desk
to one or the other of the sub-editors.
867
00:57:49,207 --> 00:57:54,076
It comes back to me,
and on this chart I design the page.
868
00:57:54,127 --> 00:57:56,118
That is page one and page two.
869
00:57:56,167 --> 00:57:57,885
Fine, Bob. Thank you very much.
870
00:57:57,927 --> 00:57:59,918
(Bell rings)
871
00:58:02,927 --> 00:58:05,646
- Why do you want to make a film about Media?
WINTONICK: Well...
872
00:58:05,687 --> 00:58:07,325
Such a nice, quiet town.
873
00:58:07,367 --> 00:58:09,164
WINTONICK: It's a beautiful town.
874
00:58:09,207 --> 00:58:12,802
We're making a film about the mass media,
so we thought what a good place to come.
875
00:58:12,847 --> 00:58:14,405
Want to know where they got the name?
876
00:58:14,447 --> 00:58:16,836
WINTONICK: Maybe you could start
by introducing yourself.
877
00:58:16,887 --> 00:58:18,684
Yes, I'm Bodhon Senkow.
878
00:58:18,727 --> 00:58:22,515
I'm the main street manager and executive
director of the Media Business Authority,
879
00:58:22,567 --> 00:58:25,525
and we are in Media, Delaware County,
880
00:58:25,567 --> 00:58:27,876
in the southeastern part of Pennsylvania.
881
00:58:27,927 --> 00:58:31,044
Media is called "Everybody's hometown".
882
00:58:31,087 --> 00:58:35,160
The motto was developed
as a way to promote the community.
883
00:58:35,207 --> 00:58:37,641
We're a very high
promotion-conscious community.
884
00:58:39,127 --> 00:58:42,563
When you walk through Media,
you'll be treated very well,
885
00:58:42,607 --> 00:58:46,998
and you find that people have taken the idea
of being everybody's hometown to heart.
886
00:58:47,047 --> 00:58:49,607
WINTONICK:
The local paper, The Talk of the Town...
887
00:58:49,647 --> 00:58:51,160
The Town Talk.
888
00:58:51,767 --> 00:58:53,803
- Do you read that?
- Yes, I read The Town Talk.
889
00:58:53,847 --> 00:58:57,476
What do you think the difference is between
The Wall Street Journal and The Talk?
890
00:58:57,527 --> 00:59:00,087
Well, I mean, The Town Talk
is completely local news,
891
00:59:00,127 --> 00:59:02,800
and it's fun, it's nice to read, it's interesting.
892
00:59:02,847 --> 00:59:06,840
You read about your neighbours, see what's
going on in the district, and things like that.
893
00:59:06,887 --> 00:59:10,516
BERMAN: We're in business to make bucks,
just like the big daily newspapers,
894
00:59:10,567 --> 00:59:12,956
and like the big radio stations,
and we do quite well,
895
00:59:13,007 --> 00:59:15,362
and rightfully so, cos we work very hard at it.
896
00:59:15,407 --> 00:59:18,797
I just wanna show you a copy of the paper here,
the way it is this week.
897
00:59:18,847 --> 00:59:21,486
It's plastic-wrapped on all four sides.
898
00:59:21,527 --> 00:59:25,361
Weatherproof,
and hung on everybody's front door.
899
00:59:25,407 --> 00:59:30,322
And many times you'll find this paper runs
well over 100 pages a week.
900
00:59:30,367 --> 00:59:32,483
You have to remember there are five editions.
901
00:59:32,527 --> 00:59:35,087
This happens to be
the Central Delaware County edition,
902
00:59:35,127 --> 00:59:37,800
which is the edition
that covers Media, Pennsylvania.
903
00:59:37,847 --> 00:59:40,839
What you see here
is the advertising and composition department.
904
00:59:40,887 --> 00:59:42,878
- Say hello, guys, will you?
ALL: Hi.
905
00:59:43,887 --> 00:59:48,005
And what we're doing now is we're putting
red dots, green dots, and yellow dots
906
00:59:48,047 --> 00:59:51,562
up on the map wherever there is a store.
907
00:59:51,607 --> 00:59:54,485
The red dots are the stores
that don't advertise with us at all.
908
00:59:54,527 --> 00:59:57,325
The green dots are the ones
that advertise with us every week,
909
00:59:57,367 --> 01:00:00,882
and the yellow dots
are the ones that run sporadically.
910
01:00:00,927 --> 01:00:03,919
Now, we have computer print-outs
of every one of these stores,
911
01:00:03,967 --> 01:00:07,926
and what we do is we take the print-outs
of all the red dots which are the bad guys,
912
01:00:07,967 --> 01:00:12,279
and our idea is to turn these red dots into yellow
dots, and turn the yellow dots into green dots,
913
01:00:12,327 --> 01:00:15,444
and eventually make them all green dots,
so 100 per cent of the stores
914
01:00:15,487 --> 01:00:19,366
and 100 per cent of the merchants and service
people advertise in our paper every week.
915
01:00:19,407 --> 01:00:21,238
That way, we won't have any more red dots.
916
01:00:21,287 --> 01:00:23,676
I guess there'll always be a few,
but I have high hopes
917
01:00:23,727 --> 01:00:26,560
there'll be a lot more green ones
than red when we're finished.
918
01:00:26,607 --> 01:00:27,960
Hi, I'm Jim Morgan.
919
01:00:28,007 --> 01:00:31,044
I'm with the Corporate Relations Department
of The New York Times,
920
01:00:31,087 --> 01:00:34,636
and I'm here to take you on a tour
of The New York Times, so... let's begin.
921
01:00:37,927 --> 01:00:40,760
MORGAN:
So, they're just taking audio in here, yeah.
922
01:00:40,807 --> 01:00:42,798
They're taking audio in here.
923
01:00:42,847 --> 01:00:46,556
Audio. No cameras, no still.
We went over this quite thoroughly.
924
01:00:46,607 --> 01:00:48,996
They don't even take a still camera in here.
925
01:00:50,807 --> 01:00:53,799
We're in the composing room.
This is where the pages are composed.
926
01:00:53,847 --> 01:00:55,519
This is the typographical area.
927
01:01:02,687 --> 01:01:07,966
This might seem big, but it is average.
In fact, below average.
928
01:01:08,007 --> 01:01:13,206
Our 60 per cent might include on some days
maybe...
929
01:01:13,247 --> 01:01:17,240
20 pages of classified advertising all to itself,
930
01:01:17,287 --> 01:01:21,075
where the rest of the newspaper
is weighted much heavier news to advertising,
931
01:01:21,127 --> 01:01:24,756
but the paper in its entirety every day,
large or small,
932
01:01:24,807 --> 01:01:27,196
is 60 ads, 40 news.
933
01:01:29,007 --> 01:01:31,646
Well, that completes our tour
of The New York Times,
934
01:01:31,687 --> 01:01:34,804
and I hope you found it informative, and...
935
01:01:35,807 --> 01:01:40,483
...I hope that you read The New York Times
every day of your life from now on.
936
01:01:44,167 --> 01:01:48,399
CHOMSKY: There are other media too
whose basic social role is quite different.
937
01:01:48,447 --> 01:01:50,199
It's diversion.
938
01:01:50,247 --> 01:01:56,117
There's the real mass media, the kinds
that are aimed at the guys who... Joe Six-pack.
939
01:01:56,167 --> 01:02:00,604
That kind. The purpose of those media
is just to dull people's brains.
940
01:02:00,647 --> 01:02:04,720
This is an over-simplification,
but for the 80 per cent or whatever they are,
941
01:02:04,767 --> 01:02:07,156
the main thing for them is to divert them,
942
01:02:07,207 --> 01:02:12,565
to get them to watch National Football League,
and to worry about the... you know...
943
01:02:12,607 --> 01:02:17,522
mother with child with six heads,
or whatever you pick up in the... you know...
944
01:02:17,567 --> 01:02:21,321
in the thing that you pick
up on the supermarket stands, and so on.
945
01:02:21,367 --> 01:02:26,282
Or, you know, look at astrology, or get involved
in fundamentalist stuff, or something.
946
01:02:26,327 --> 01:02:31,321
Just get them away, you know.
Get them away from things that matter.
947
01:02:31,367 --> 01:02:35,645
And for that,
it's important to reduce their capacity to think.
948
01:02:35,687 --> 01:02:39,441
NARRATOR: The sports section is handled
in another special department.
949
01:02:39,487 --> 01:02:42,684
The sports reporter must be a specialist
in his knowledge of sports.
950
01:02:42,727 --> 01:02:47,960
He gets his story right at the sporting event,
and often sends it in to his paper play by play.
951
01:02:48,007 --> 01:02:49,645
CHOMSKY: Sports.
952
01:02:49,687 --> 01:02:53,999
That's another crucial example
of the indoctrination system in my view.
953
01:02:54,047 --> 01:02:58,518
For one thing, because it... you know,
it offers people something to pay attention to
954
01:02:58,567 --> 01:03:00,797
that's of no importance.
955
01:03:00,847 --> 01:03:03,839
- That keeps them from worrying about...
(Applause)
956
01:03:05,447 --> 01:03:08,484
...keeps them from worrying
about things that matter to their lives
957
01:03:08,527 --> 01:03:11,041
they might have some idea
about doing something about.
958
01:03:11,087 --> 01:03:18,437
And in fact, it's striking to see the intelligence
that's used by ordinary people in sports.
959
01:03:18,487 --> 01:03:21,638
You listen to radio stations where people call in.
960
01:03:21,687 --> 01:03:23,962
They have the most exotic information
961
01:03:24,007 --> 01:03:26,601
and understanding
about all kinds of arcane issues,
962
01:03:26,647 --> 01:03:28,638
and the press undoubtedly does a lot with this.
963
01:03:28,687 --> 01:03:30,757
I remember in high school - I was pretty old -
964
01:03:30,807 --> 01:03:33,162
I suddenly asked myself at one point,
965
01:03:33,207 --> 01:03:36,836
"Why do I care
if my high school team wins the football game?"
966
01:03:36,887 --> 01:03:40,323
I mean, I don't know anybody on the team,
you know.
967
01:03:40,367 --> 01:03:41,686
(Laughter)
968
01:03:41,727 --> 01:03:44,719
It had nothing to do with me.
I mean, why am I cheering for my team?
969
01:03:44,767 --> 01:03:46,405
It doesn't make any sense.
970
01:03:47,407 --> 01:03:49,398
But the point is, it does make sense.
971
01:03:49,447 --> 01:03:53,156
It's a way of building up irrational attitudes
of submission to authority,
972
01:03:54,167 --> 01:03:58,922
and, you know, group cohesion behind...
you know, leadership elements.
973
01:03:58,967 --> 01:04:01,640
In fact, it's training in irrational jingoism.
974
01:04:01,687 --> 01:04:05,157
That's also a feature of competitive sports.
I think...
975
01:04:05,207 --> 01:04:09,644
If you look closely at these things,
I think, typically, they do have functions,
976
01:04:09,687 --> 01:04:13,282
and that's why
energy is devoted to supporting them,
977
01:04:13,327 --> 01:04:16,683
and creating a basis for them,
and advertisers are willing to pay for them.
978
01:04:20,447 --> 01:04:22,278
WINTONICK: I'd like to ask you a question
979
01:04:22,327 --> 01:04:25,125
about the methodology
and study in the propaganda model,
980
01:04:25,167 --> 01:04:27,476
and how would one go about doing that?
981
01:04:27,527 --> 01:04:29,916
Well, there are a number of ways to proceed.
982
01:04:30,927 --> 01:04:35,921
One obvious way is to try to find
more or less paired examples.
983
01:04:36,927 --> 01:04:39,646
History doesn't offer true controlled
experiments,
984
01:04:39,687 --> 01:04:41,518
but it oten comes pretty close.
985
01:04:41,567 --> 01:04:46,800
So one can find atrocities or abuses of one sort
986
01:04:46,847 --> 01:04:51,159
that on the one hand are committed
by official enemies, and on the other hand
987
01:04:51,207 --> 01:04:55,962
are committed by friends and allies,
or by the favoured state itself.
988
01:04:56,007 --> 01:04:58,077
By the United States, in the US' case.
989
01:04:58,127 --> 01:05:01,244
The question is whether the media
accept the government framework,
990
01:05:01,287 --> 01:05:03,960
or whether they use the same agenda,
same set of questions,
991
01:05:04,007 --> 01:05:07,044
the same criteria for dealing with the two cases
992
01:05:07,087 --> 01:05:09,555
as any honest outside observer would do.
993
01:05:09,607 --> 01:05:11,677
ANNOUNCER:
If you think America's involvement
994
01:05:11,727 --> 01:05:14,639
in the war in Southeast Asia is over, think again.
995
01:05:14,687 --> 01:05:18,965
MAN: The Khmer Rouge are the
most genocidal people on the face of the earth.
996
01:05:19,007 --> 01:05:21,567
Peter Jennings
Reporting From The Killing Fields.
997
01:05:21,607 --> 01:05:23,359
Thursday.
998
01:05:23,407 --> 01:05:28,435
I mean, the great act of genocide
in the modern period is Pol Pot.
999
01:05:28,487 --> 01:05:32,036
1975 to... through 1978.
1000
01:05:32,087 --> 01:05:35,363
That atrocity...
I think it would be hard to find any example
1001
01:05:35,407 --> 01:05:40,845
of a comparable outrage and outpouring of fury,
and so on and so forth,
1002
01:05:40,887 --> 01:05:42,479
so that's one atrocity.
1003
01:05:42,527 --> 01:05:46,486
It just happens that in that case,
history did set up a controlled experiment.
1004
01:05:46,527 --> 01:05:48,916
ASAIS:
Ever heard of a place called East Timor?
1005
01:05:48,967 --> 01:05:50,958
- I can't say that I have.
- Where?
1006
01:05:51,007 --> 01:05:52,998
- East Timor.
- No.
1007
01:05:53,047 --> 01:05:56,403
Well, it happens that right at that time
there was another atrocity.
1008
01:05:56,447 --> 01:05:59,439
Very similar in character,
but differing in one respect -
1009
01:05:59,487 --> 01:06:02,160
we were responsible for it, not Pol Pot.
1010
01:06:02,207 --> 01:06:04,767
Hello. I'm Louise Penney,
and this is Radio Noon.
1011
01:06:04,807 --> 01:06:08,641
If you've been listening to the programme
fairly regularly over the last few months,
1012
01:06:08,687 --> 01:06:12,362
you'll know East Timor has come
into the conversation more than once,
1013
01:06:12,407 --> 01:06:17,435
particularly when we were talking about foreign
aid, and also the war, and a new world order.
1014
01:06:17,487 --> 01:06:21,002
People wondered why,
if the UN was serious about a new world order,
1015
01:06:21,047 --> 01:06:23,402
no-one was doing anything to help East Timor.
1016
01:06:23,447 --> 01:06:26,598
The area was invaded by Indonesia in 1975.
1017
01:06:26,647 --> 01:06:30,242
There are reports of atrocities
against the Timorese people,
1018
01:06:30,287 --> 01:06:33,006
and yet Canada and other nations
have consistently
1019
01:06:33,047 --> 01:06:36,244
voted against UN Resolutions
to end the occupation.
1020
01:06:36,287 --> 01:06:38,881
Today, we're going to take a closer look
at East Timor,
1021
01:06:38,927 --> 01:06:43,000
what's happened to it, and why the international
community is doing nothing to help.
1022
01:06:43,927 --> 01:06:46,725
One of the people who have been most active
is Elaine Bri�re,
1023
01:06:46,767 --> 01:06:48,962
a photojournalist from British Columbia.
1024
01:06:49,007 --> 01:06:51,475
She's the founder of
the East Timor Alert Network,
1025
01:06:51,527 --> 01:06:53,518
and she joins me in the studio now.
1026
01:06:53,567 --> 01:06:55,159
- Hello.
- Hi.
1027
01:06:55,207 --> 01:06:57,198
One tragedy compounding a tragedy
1028
01:06:57,247 --> 01:07:00,364
is that a lot of people
don't know much about East Timor.
1029
01:07:01,247 --> 01:07:04,319
- Where is it?
- East Timor is just north of Australia.
1030
01:07:04,367 --> 01:07:08,645
About 420 km, and it's right between
the Indian and Pacific oceans.
1031
01:07:08,687 --> 01:07:14,717
Just south of East Timor is a deep-water sea
lane perfect for US submarines to pass through.
1032
01:07:14,767 --> 01:07:16,883
There's also huge oil reserves there.
1033
01:07:20,367 --> 01:07:22,722
One of the unique things
about East Timor is that
1034
01:07:22,767 --> 01:07:27,477
it's truly one of the last surviving
ancient civilisations in that part of the world.
1035
01:07:29,607 --> 01:07:33,361
The Timorese spoke
30 different languages and dialects
1036
01:07:33,407 --> 01:07:35,841
amongst a group of 700,000 people.
1037
01:07:37,727 --> 01:07:42,437
Today less than five per cent of the world's
people live like the East Timorese.
1038
01:07:42,487 --> 01:07:47,641
Basically self-reliant, they live really outside
of the global economic system.
1039
01:07:51,847 --> 01:07:57,604
Small societies like the East Timorese are much
more democratic and much more egalitarian,
1040
01:07:57,647 --> 01:08:00,559
and there's much more sharing
of power and wealth.
1041
01:08:03,127 --> 01:08:07,086
Before the Indonesians invaded,
most people lived in small rural villages.
1042
01:08:13,047 --> 01:08:15,561
The old people in the village
were like the university.
1043
01:08:15,607 --> 01:08:19,077
They passed on tribal wisdom
from generation to generation.
1044
01:08:20,087 --> 01:08:25,002
Children grew up
in a safe, stimulating, nurturing environment.
1045
01:08:38,407 --> 01:08:43,037
A year ater I let East Timor, I was appalled
when I heard Indonesia had invaded.
1046
01:08:43,087 --> 01:08:47,365
It didn't want a small, independent country
setting an example for the region.
1047
01:08:49,847 --> 01:08:52,441
CHOMSKY:
East Timor was a Portuguese colony.
1048
01:08:52,487 --> 01:08:56,719
Indonesia had no claim to it,
and in fact stated that they had no claim to it.
1049
01:08:57,727 --> 01:09:02,039
During the period of colonisation,
there was a good deal of politicisation
1050
01:09:02,087 --> 01:09:04,078
that different groups developed.
1051
01:09:05,687 --> 01:09:08,724
A civil war broke out in August '75.
1052
01:09:12,807 --> 01:09:14,798
(Machine-gun fire)
1053
01:09:23,167 --> 01:09:28,480
It ended up in a victory for Fretilin,
which was one of the groupings,
1054
01:09:28,527 --> 01:09:34,875
described as populist Catholic in character,
with some typical letist rhetoric.
1055
01:09:34,927 --> 01:09:36,076
(Car horn beeps)
1056
01:09:36,127 --> 01:09:39,005
Indonesia at once started intervening.
1057
01:09:39,047 --> 01:09:42,596
SHACKLETON: What's the situation?
When did those ships come in?
1058
01:09:42,647 --> 01:09:44,956
RAMOS-HORTA:
They start arriving since Monday.
1059
01:09:45,007 --> 01:09:48,283
Six, seven boats together,
very close to our border.
1060
01:09:48,327 --> 01:09:52,240
They're not there just for fun.
They're preparing a massive operation.
1061
01:09:53,247 --> 01:09:57,525
SHACKLETON: Something happened here
last night that moved us very deeply.
1062
01:09:57,567 --> 01:10:00,035
It was so far outside our experience
as Australians
1063
01:10:00,087 --> 01:10:03,762
that we'll find it very difficult
to convey to you, but we'll try.
1064
01:10:05,047 --> 01:10:09,723
Sitting on woven mats under a thatched roof
in a hut with no walls
1065
01:10:09,767 --> 01:10:14,602
we were the target of a barrage of questioning
from men who know they may die tomorrow,
1066
01:10:14,647 --> 01:10:18,526
and cannot understand
why the rest of the world does not care.
1067
01:10:18,567 --> 01:10:20,046
That's all they want -
1068
01:10:20,087 --> 01:10:23,238
for the United Nations to care about
what is happening here.
1069
01:10:24,167 --> 01:10:26,840
The emotion here last night was so strong
1070
01:10:26,887 --> 01:10:30,926
that we, all three of us, felt we should
be able to reach out into the warm night air
1071
01:10:30,967 --> 01:10:32,480
and touch it.
1072
01:10:32,527 --> 01:10:36,520
Greg Shackleton, at an unnamed village
which we will remember forever
1073
01:10:36,567 --> 01:10:38,558
in Portuguese Timor.
1074
01:10:39,607 --> 01:10:41,598
(Gun cocked and fired)
1075
01:10:42,487 --> 01:10:44,478
(Continued gunfire)
1076
01:10:52,607 --> 01:10:55,883
Ford and Kissinger visited Jakarta,
I think it was December 5th.
1077
01:10:55,927 --> 01:11:00,717
We know that they had requested that
Indonesia delay the invasion until ater they let
1078
01:11:00,767 --> 01:11:02,644
because it would be too embarrassing.
1079
01:11:03,687 --> 01:11:07,999
And within hours, I think, ater they let,
the invasion took place on December 7th.
1080
01:11:08,047 --> 01:11:15,044
What happened on December 7th in 1975,
is just one of the great evil deeds of history.
1081
01:11:15,087 --> 01:11:18,966
Early in the morning
bombs begin dropping on Dili.
1082
01:11:19,007 --> 01:11:21,362
The number of troops that invaded Dili that day
1083
01:11:21,407 --> 01:11:24,558
almost outnumbered
the entire population of the town.
1084
01:11:24,607 --> 01:11:28,839
And for two or three weeks,
they just killed people.
1085
01:11:28,887 --> 01:11:30,878
(Speaks Portuguese)
1086
01:11:51,487 --> 01:11:56,277
This Council must consider Indonesian
aggression against East Timor
1087
01:11:56,327 --> 01:11:58,682
as the main issue of the discussion.
1088
01:11:58,727 --> 01:12:03,323
CHOMSKY: When the Indonesians invaded,
the UN reacted as it always does,
1089
01:12:03,367 --> 01:12:06,882
calling for sanctions and condemnation
and so on.
1090
01:12:06,927 --> 01:12:09,805
Various watered-down resolutions
were passed,
1091
01:12:09,847 --> 01:12:13,886
but the US were very clearly
not going to allow anything to work.
1092
01:12:24,167 --> 01:12:28,080
So the Timorese were fleeing into the jungles
by the thousands.
1093
01:12:28,127 --> 01:12:32,996
By late 1977, '78
Indonesia set up receiving centres
1094
01:12:33,047 --> 01:12:36,722
for those Timorese
who came out of the jungle waving white flags.
1095
01:12:36,767 --> 01:12:38,837
Those the Indonesians thought more educated,
1096
01:12:38,887 --> 01:12:44,917
or suspected of belonging to Fretilin or other
opposition parties were immediately killed.
1097
01:12:44,967 --> 01:12:47,845
They took women aside,
and flew them off to Dili in helicopters
1098
01:12:47,887 --> 01:12:49,559
for use by the Indonesian soldiers.
1099
01:12:49,607 --> 01:12:52,075
They killed children and babies.
1100
01:12:53,447 --> 01:12:57,918
But in those days their main strategy
and their main weapon was starvation.
1101
01:13:01,167 --> 01:13:05,240
CHOMSKY: By 1978,
it was approaching really genocidal levels.
1102
01:13:05,287 --> 01:13:09,724
The church and other sources
estimated about 200,000 people killed.
1103
01:13:09,767 --> 01:13:13,601
The US backed it all the way.
The US provided 90 per cent of the arms.
1104
01:13:13,647 --> 01:13:17,845
Right ater the invasion,
arms shipments were stepped up.
1105
01:13:17,887 --> 01:13:21,516
When the Indonesians
actually began to run out of arms in 1978,
1106
01:13:21,567 --> 01:13:25,162
the Carter administration moved in
and increased arms sales,
1107
01:13:25,567 --> 01:13:27,603
and other western countries did the same.
1108
01:13:27,647 --> 01:13:29,877
Canada, England... Holland...
1109
01:13:29,927 --> 01:13:32,122
Everybody who could make a buck
was in there,
1110
01:13:32,167 --> 01:13:34,681
trying to make sure
they could kill more Timorese.
1111
01:13:35,687 --> 01:13:38,565
There is no western concern
for issues of aggression,
1112
01:13:38,607 --> 01:13:40,598
atrocities, human rights abuses and so on
1113
01:13:40,647 --> 01:13:42,638
if there's a profit to be made from them.
1114
01:13:42,687 --> 01:13:46,077
Nothing could show it more clearly
than this case.
1115
01:13:48,447 --> 01:13:50,517
It wasn't that nobody had heard of East Timor.
1116
01:13:50,567 --> 01:13:52,558
Remember there was plenty of coverage
1117
01:13:52,607 --> 01:13:55,167
in The New York Times and elsewhere
before the invasion.
1118
01:13:56,167 --> 01:13:59,716
The reason was there was concern
over the break-up of the Portuguese empire
1119
01:13:59,767 --> 01:14:01,246
and what that would mean.
1120
01:14:01,287 --> 01:14:05,644
There was fear it would lead to independence,
or Russian influence, or whatever.
1121
01:14:05,687 --> 01:14:08,485
Ater the Indonesians invaded,
the coverage dropped.
1122
01:14:08,527 --> 01:14:11,246
There was some,
but it was strictly from the point of view
1123
01:14:11,287 --> 01:14:13,596
of the State Department
and Indonesian generals.
1124
01:14:13,647 --> 01:14:15,638
Never a Timorese refugee.
1125
01:14:19,127 --> 01:14:23,006
As the atrocities reached their maximum peak
in 1978,
1126
01:14:23,047 --> 01:14:25,038
when it really was becoming genocidal,
1127
01:14:25,087 --> 01:14:27,920
coverage dropped to zero
in the United States and Canada,
1128
01:14:27,967 --> 01:14:29,958
the two countries I've looked at closely.
1129
01:14:30,007 --> 01:14:31,520
Literally dropped to zero.
1130
01:14:33,367 --> 01:14:39,761
All this was going on at exactly the same time
as the great protest of outrage over Cambodia.
1131
01:14:39,807 --> 01:14:42,526
The level of atrocities was comparable.
1132
01:14:42,567 --> 01:14:46,446
In relative terms
it was probably considerably higher in Timor.
1133
01:14:48,687 --> 01:14:53,920
It turns out that right in Cambodia in the
preceding years, 1970 through 1975,
1134
01:14:53,967 --> 01:14:57,357
there was also a comparable atrocity
for which we were responsible.
1135
01:15:02,087 --> 01:15:04,647
The major US attack against Cambodia
1136
01:15:04,687 --> 01:15:07,440
started with the bombings of the early 1970s.
1137
01:15:07,487 --> 01:15:10,126
They reached a peak in 1973,
1138
01:15:10,167 --> 01:15:12,283
and they continued up till 1975.
1139
01:15:12,327 --> 01:15:15,000
They were directed against inner Cambodia.
1140
01:15:15,047 --> 01:15:18,562
Very little is known about them,
because the media wanted it to be secret.
1141
01:15:18,607 --> 01:15:21,963
They knew it was going on. They just
didn't want to know what was happening.
1142
01:15:24,047 --> 01:15:28,040
The CIA estimates about 600,000 killed
during that five-year period,
1143
01:15:28,087 --> 01:15:32,205
which is mostly either US bombing,
or a US-sponsored war.
1144
01:15:32,247 --> 01:15:35,717
So that's pretty significant killing.
1145
01:15:35,767 --> 01:15:38,486
Also, the conditions
in which it let Cambodia were such
1146
01:15:38,527 --> 01:15:43,123
that high US officials predicted that about
a million people would die in the atermath
1147
01:15:43,167 --> 01:15:47,240
just from hunger and disease
because of the wreckage of the country.
1148
01:15:48,647 --> 01:15:51,844
Pretty good evidence
from US government and scholarly sources
1149
01:15:51,887 --> 01:15:56,119
that the intense bombardment
was a significant force - maybe a critical force -
1150
01:15:56,167 --> 01:16:00,638
in building up peasant support for the Khmer
Rouge who were a pretty marginal element.
1151
01:16:00,687 --> 01:16:02,678
Well, that's just the wrong story.
1152
01:16:03,607 --> 01:16:05,404
Ater 1975,
1153
01:16:05,447 --> 01:16:08,007
atrocities continued,
and that became the right story -
1154
01:16:08,047 --> 01:16:10,242
now they're being carried out by the bad guys.
1155
01:16:11,247 --> 01:16:12,999
Well, it was bad enough.
1156
01:16:13,047 --> 01:16:16,960
In fact, current estimates are... well, they vary.
1157
01:16:17,007 --> 01:16:20,204
The CIA claim 50,000 to 100,000 people killed,
1158
01:16:20,247 --> 01:16:24,320
and maybe another million or so
who died one way or another.
1159
01:16:26,167 --> 01:16:29,876
Michael Vickery is the one person
who's given a really close, detailed analysis.
1160
01:16:29,927 --> 01:16:33,681
His figure is maybe
750,000 deaths above the normal.
1161
01:16:33,727 --> 01:16:38,517
Others like Ben Kiernan suggest higher figures,
but so far without a detailed analysis.
1162
01:16:38,567 --> 01:16:40,000
Anyway, it was terrible.
1163
01:16:40,047 --> 01:16:41,321
No doubt about it.
1164
01:16:41,367 --> 01:16:44,325
Although the atrocities - the real atrocities -
were bad enough,
1165
01:16:44,367 --> 01:16:47,677
they weren't quite good enough
for the purposes needed.
1166
01:16:47,727 --> 01:16:50,764
Within a few weeks
ater the Khmer Rouge takeover,
1167
01:16:50,807 --> 01:16:53,446
The New York Times
was already accusing them of genocide.
1168
01:16:54,527 --> 01:16:58,520
At that point, maybe a couple of hundred
or a few thousand people had been killed.
1169
01:16:58,567 --> 01:17:02,958
And from then on,
it was a drum beat, a chorus of genocide.
1170
01:17:09,767 --> 01:17:15,876
The big bestseller on Cambodia and Pol Pot
is called Murder of a Gentle Land.
1171
01:17:15,927 --> 01:17:20,921
Up until April 17th, 1975,
it was a gentle land of peaceful, smiling people,
1172
01:17:20,967 --> 01:17:23,879
and ater that some horrible holocaust
took place.
1173
01:17:25,287 --> 01:17:29,599
Very quickly,
a figure of two million killed was hit upon.
1174
01:17:30,447 --> 01:17:33,120
In fact,
what was claimed was that the Khmer Rouge
1175
01:17:33,167 --> 01:17:35,476
boast of having murdered two million people.
1176
01:17:36,647 --> 01:17:37,966
Facts are very dramatic.
1177
01:17:38,007 --> 01:17:41,636
In the case of
atrocities committed by the official enemy,
1178
01:17:41,687 --> 01:17:47,080
extraordinary show of outrage,
exaggeration, no evidence required.
1179
01:17:47,127 --> 01:17:50,119
Faked photographs are fine, anything goes.
1180
01:17:50,167 --> 01:17:52,158
Also a vast amount of lying.
1181
01:17:53,007 --> 01:17:56,682
I mean, an amount of lying
that would have made Stalin cringe.
1182
01:17:58,087 --> 01:18:00,476
It was fraudulent,
and we know that it was fraudulent
1183
01:18:00,527 --> 01:18:03,360
by looking at the response
to comparable atrocities
1184
01:18:03,407 --> 01:18:05,523
for which the United States was responsible.
1185
01:18:08,247 --> 01:18:12,684
Early '70s Cambodia, and Timor too -
very closely paired examples.
1186
01:18:13,567 --> 01:18:15,956
Well, the media response was quite dramatic.
1187
01:18:16,927 --> 01:18:18,918
(Typewriter ribbon being turned)
1188
01:18:22,447 --> 01:18:24,199
(Typing)
1189
01:18:25,207 --> 01:18:27,198
(Typewriter pings)
1190
01:18:29,487 --> 01:18:31,478
(Ribbon turns)
1191
01:18:36,287 --> 01:18:38,084
(Typing)
1192
01:18:52,767 --> 01:18:56,362
MEYER: Back in 1980,
I taught a course at Tuts University.
1193
01:18:56,407 --> 01:18:59,524
Well, Chomsky came around to this class,
1194
01:18:59,567 --> 01:19:04,721
and he made a very powerful case
that the press underplayed the fact
1195
01:19:04,767 --> 01:19:10,285
that the Indonesian government annexed
this former Portuguese colony in 1975,
1196
01:19:10,327 --> 01:19:14,479
and that if you compare it for example with
Cambodia where there was acreage of things,
1197
01:19:14,527 --> 01:19:18,202
this was a communist atrocity, whereas
the other was not a communist atrocity.
1198
01:19:18,247 --> 01:19:21,364
Well, I got quite interested in this,
and I went to talk to
1199
01:19:21,407 --> 01:19:23,716
the then deputy foreign editor of The Times,
1200
01:19:23,767 --> 01:19:26,839
and I said, "You know,
we've had very poor coverage on this".
1201
01:19:26,887 --> 01:19:30,675
He said, "You're right. There are a dozen
atrocities around the world we don't cover.
1202
01:19:30,727 --> 01:19:33,639
This is one for various reasons", so I took it up.
1203
01:19:33,687 --> 01:19:35,803
I was working as a reporter and writer for
1204
01:19:35,847 --> 01:19:39,123
a small alternative radio programme
in upstate New York,
1205
01:19:39,167 --> 01:19:44,195
and we received audio tapes
of interviews with Timorese leaders,
1206
01:19:44,247 --> 01:19:48,160
and we were quite surprised
that given the level of American involvement
1207
01:19:48,207 --> 01:19:51,517
that there was not more coverage,
indeed practically any coverage,
1208
01:19:51,567 --> 01:19:55,640
of the large-scale Indonesian killing
in the mainstream American media.
1209
01:19:55,687 --> 01:20:00,602
We formed a small group of people
to try to monitor the situation
1210
01:20:00,647 --> 01:20:03,605
and see what we could do over time
to alert public opinion
1211
01:20:03,647 --> 01:20:05,763
to what was actually happening in East Timor.
1212
01:20:07,087 --> 01:20:11,319
There were literally about half a dozen people
who simply dedicated themselves
1213
01:20:11,367 --> 01:20:15,326
with great commitment to getting this story
to break through.
1214
01:20:15,367 --> 01:20:17,756
And they reached a couple of people
in Congress.
1215
01:20:17,807 --> 01:20:22,801
They got to me, for example. I was able
to testify at the UN and write some things.
1216
01:20:22,847 --> 01:20:24,963
They kept at it, kept at it, kept at it.
1217
01:20:25,007 --> 01:20:29,364
Whatever is known about the subject
mainly... essentially comes from their work.
1218
01:20:29,407 --> 01:20:30,726
There's not much else.
1219
01:20:30,767 --> 01:20:35,522
I wrote first an editorial
called An Unjust War in East Timor.
1220
01:20:35,567 --> 01:20:38,081
It had a map,
and it said exactly what had happened.
1221
01:20:38,127 --> 01:20:41,961
We then ran a dozen other editorials on it.
1222
01:20:42,007 --> 01:20:44,567
They were read,
entered in the Congressional Record,
1223
01:20:44,607 --> 01:20:49,362
several Congressmen took up the cause, and
something was done in Congress as a result.
1224
01:20:49,407 --> 01:20:52,797
KOHEN: The fact the editorial page
of The New York Times on Christmas Eve
1225
01:20:52,847 --> 01:20:56,522
published that editorial
put our work on a very different level,
1226
01:20:56,567 --> 01:21:03,882
and it gave a great deal of legitimacy
to something that we were trying to...
1227
01:21:03,927 --> 01:21:07,886
advance for a long time,
and that was the idea and the reality
1228
01:21:07,927 --> 01:21:11,203
that a major tragedy
was unfolding in East Timor.
1229
01:21:11,247 --> 01:21:15,559
If one takes literally various...
1230
01:21:15,607 --> 01:21:18,201
theories that Professor Chomsky puts out,
1231
01:21:18,247 --> 01:21:22,638
one would feel that there is a tacit conspiracy
1232
01:21:22,687 --> 01:21:25,918
between the establishment press
and the government in Washington
1233
01:21:25,967 --> 01:21:28,925
to focus on certain things,
and ignore certain things.
1234
01:21:28,967 --> 01:21:34,519
So that if we broke the rules that we would
instantly get a reaction, a sharp reaction
1235
01:21:34,567 --> 01:21:37,035
from the overlords in Washington
1236
01:21:37,087 --> 01:21:40,204
who would say, "Hey, what are you doing
speaking up on East Timor?
1237
01:21:40,247 --> 01:21:41,760
We're trying to keep that quiet".
1238
01:21:41,807 --> 01:21:43,081
We didn't hear a thing.
1239
01:21:43,127 --> 01:21:45,243
What we did hear, and this was quite
interesting,
1240
01:21:45,287 --> 01:21:48,085
is that there was a guy named Arnold Kohen,
1241
01:21:48,127 --> 01:21:51,836
and he became a one-person lobby.
1242
01:21:51,887 --> 01:21:55,357
I appreciate the nice things
that Karl Meyer said about me in his interview,
1243
01:21:55,407 --> 01:21:59,116
but I object to the notion that a one-man lobby
was formed, or anything like that.
1244
01:21:59,167 --> 01:22:01,158
I think that if there weren't a large network
1245
01:22:01,207 --> 01:22:03,846
composed of
the American Catholic Bishops' Conference,
1246
01:22:03,887 --> 01:22:07,277
composed of other church groups,
human rights groups,
1247
01:22:07,327 --> 01:22:09,682
composed of simply concerned citizens,
1248
01:22:09,727 --> 01:22:12,525
and others, and a network of concern
within the news media,
1249
01:22:12,567 --> 01:22:15,877
I think it would have been impossible
to do anything at all at any time,
1250
01:22:15,927 --> 01:22:20,159
and it would have been impossible to sustain
things for as long as they've been sustained.
1251
01:22:20,207 --> 01:22:25,201
MEYER: Professor Chomsky and many people
who engage in this kind of press analysis
1252
01:22:25,247 --> 01:22:29,286
have one thing in common - most of them
have never worked for a newspaper,
1253
01:22:29,327 --> 01:22:32,763
many of them know very little
about how newspapers work.
1254
01:22:32,807 --> 01:22:36,516
When Chomsky came around, he had with him
1255
01:22:36,567 --> 01:22:40,116
a file of all the coverage
in The New York Times, The Washington Post,
1256
01:22:40,167 --> 01:22:42,078
and other papers of East Timor,
1257
01:22:42,127 --> 01:22:47,121
and he would go to the meticulous degree
that if, for example, The London Times
1258
01:22:47,167 --> 01:22:50,398
had a piece on East Timor,
and then it appeared in The New York Times,
1259
01:22:50,447 --> 01:22:51,846
that if a paragraph was cut out,
1260
01:22:51,887 --> 01:22:56,563
he'd compare, and he'd say,
"Look - this key paragraph right near the end
1261
01:22:56,607 --> 01:22:58,837
which is what tells the whole story
was let out
1262
01:22:58,887 --> 01:23:02,482
of The New York Times' version
of the London Times' thing."
1263
01:23:06,247 --> 01:23:09,876
CHOMSKY: There was a story in The London
Times which was pretty accurate.
1264
01:23:09,927 --> 01:23:13,556
The New York Times revised it radically.
They didn't just leave a paragraph out.
1265
01:23:13,607 --> 01:23:16,360
They revised it,
and gave it a totally different cast.
1266
01:23:30,367 --> 01:23:34,246
It was then picked up by Newsweek,
giving it The New York Times' cast.
1267
01:23:35,527 --> 01:23:37,518
It ended up being a whitewash,
1268
01:23:37,567 --> 01:23:39,922
whereas the original was an atrocity story.
1269
01:23:41,407 --> 01:23:44,160
So, I said to Chomsky at the time,
1270
01:23:44,207 --> 01:23:50,601
"Well, it may be that you're misinterpreting
ignorance, haste, deadline pressure, etcetera,
1271
01:23:50,647 --> 01:23:54,435
for some kind of determined effort
to suppress an element of the story."
1272
01:23:54,487 --> 01:23:57,877
He said, "Well, if it happened once,
or twice, or three times
1273
01:23:57,927 --> 01:24:01,078
I might agree with you,
but if it happens a dozen times,
1274
01:24:01,127 --> 01:24:03,595
Mr Meyer,
I think there's something else at work".
1275
01:24:03,647 --> 01:24:07,925
It's not a matter of happening one time,
two, five, a hundred. It happened all the time.
1276
01:24:07,967 --> 01:24:13,439
I said, "Professor Chomsky, having been
in this business, it happens a dozen times.
1277
01:24:13,487 --> 01:24:16,479
These are very imperfect institutions".
1278
01:24:16,527 --> 01:24:19,997
When they did give coverage,
it was from the point of view of...
1279
01:24:20,047 --> 01:24:22,083
it was a whitewash of the United States.
1280
01:24:22,127 --> 01:24:23,879
Now, you know, that's not an error.
1281
01:24:23,927 --> 01:24:26,157
That's systematic, consistent behaviour,
1282
01:24:26,207 --> 01:24:28,960
in this case without even any exception.
1283
01:24:29,007 --> 01:24:31,919
This is a much more subtle process...
1284
01:24:34,927 --> 01:24:36,679
...than you get...
1285
01:24:37,847 --> 01:24:40,884
...in the kind of sledgehammer rhetoric
1286
01:24:40,927 --> 01:24:47,275
of the people that make an A to B equation
between what the government does,
1287
01:24:47,327 --> 01:24:49,477
what people think, and what newspapers say.
1288
01:24:50,727 --> 01:24:52,718
That...
1289
01:24:52,767 --> 01:24:58,160
That sometimes what The Times does
can make an enormous difference.
1290
01:24:58,207 --> 01:25:02,041
At other times, it has no influence whatsoever.
1291
01:25:02,087 --> 01:25:03,805
So...
1292
01:25:03,847 --> 01:25:07,601
one of the greatest tragedies of our age
is still happening in East Timor.
1293
01:25:07,647 --> 01:25:10,400
The Indonesians have killed
up to a third of the population.
1294
01:25:10,447 --> 01:25:12,597
They're in concentration camps.
1295
01:25:12,647 --> 01:25:17,163
They conduct large-scale military campaigns
against the people who are resisting,
1296
01:25:17,207 --> 01:25:20,005
campaigns with names like Operation
Eradicate,
1297
01:25:20,047 --> 01:25:22,436
or Operation Clean Sweep.
1298
01:25:22,487 --> 01:25:26,685
Timorese women are subjected
to a forced birth control programme,
1299
01:25:26,727 --> 01:25:31,881
in addition to bringing in a constant stream
of Indonesian settlers to take over the land.
1300
01:25:33,727 --> 01:25:37,117
Whenever people are brave enough
to take to the streets in demonstrations
1301
01:25:37,167 --> 01:25:40,284
or show the least sign of resistance,
they just massacre them.
1302
01:25:41,287 --> 01:25:45,599
It's sort of like Indonesia, if we allow them
to continue to stay in East Timor -
1303
01:25:45,647 --> 01:25:49,003
the international community -
they will simply digest East Timor
1304
01:25:49,047 --> 01:25:53,245
and turn it into...
they're trying to turn it into cash crop.
1305
01:25:53,287 --> 01:25:58,236
I mean, this is way beyond just demonstrating
this subservience of the media to power.
1306
01:25:58,287 --> 01:26:02,599
I mean, they have real complicity in genocide
in this case.
1307
01:26:02,647 --> 01:26:07,675
The reason that the atrocities can go on
is because nobody knows about them.
1308
01:26:07,727 --> 01:26:11,720
If anyone knew about them,
there'd be protests and pressure to stop them.
1309
01:26:11,767 --> 01:26:16,204
So therefore, by suppressing the facts,
the media are making a major contribution
1310
01:26:16,247 --> 01:26:22,117
to some of... probably the worst act of genocide
since the Holocaust.
1311
01:26:22,167 --> 01:26:27,082
FRUM: You say that what the media do is to
ignore certain kinds of atrocities
1312
01:26:27,127 --> 01:26:29,561
that are committed by us and our friends,
1313
01:26:29,607 --> 01:26:34,635
and to play up enormously atrocities
that are committed by them and our enemies.
1314
01:26:34,687 --> 01:26:38,043
And you posit that
there's a test of integrity and moral honesty
1315
01:26:38,087 --> 01:26:41,762
which is to have
a kind of equality of treatment of corpses.
1316
01:26:41,807 --> 01:26:46,085
I mean, every dead person should be in
principle equal to every other dead person.
1317
01:26:46,127 --> 01:26:49,802
CHOMSKY: That's not what I say.
- I'm glad it's not, because it's not what you do.
1318
01:26:49,847 --> 01:26:53,362
Of course it's not what I do.
Nor would I say it. In fact, I say the opposite.
1319
01:26:53,407 --> 01:26:57,082
What I say is we should be
responsible for our own actions primarily.
1320
01:26:57,127 --> 01:27:00,403
Because your method is not only
to ignore the corpses created by them,
1321
01:27:00,447 --> 01:27:03,598
but also to ignore corpses
that are created by neither side,
1322
01:27:03,647 --> 01:27:05,922
that are irrelevant to your ideological agenda.
1323
01:27:05,967 --> 01:27:08,356
- That's totally untrue.
- Let me give you an example.
1324
01:27:08,407 --> 01:27:14,642
Um... one of your own causes that you take very
seriously is the cause of the Palestinians.
1325
01:27:14,687 --> 01:27:18,043
And a Palestinian corpse
weighs very heavily on your conscience,
1326
01:27:18,087 --> 01:27:20,078
and yet a Kurdish corpse does not.
1327
01:27:20,127 --> 01:27:24,678
That's not true at all. I've been involved
in Kurdish support groups for years.
1328
01:27:24,727 --> 01:27:26,922
That's... It's simply false.
1329
01:27:26,967 --> 01:27:28,286
Just ask the Kurdish...
1330
01:27:28,327 --> 01:27:30,124
Ask the people who are involved in...
1331
01:27:30,167 --> 01:27:33,443
You know, they come to me,
I sign their petitions, and so on and so forth.
1332
01:27:33,487 --> 01:27:37,036
If you look at the things we've written.
Let's take a look...
1333
01:27:37,087 --> 01:27:38,805
I'm not Amnesty International.
1334
01:27:38,847 --> 01:27:41,566
I can't do everything.
I'm a single human person.
1335
01:27:41,607 --> 01:27:47,477
But if you read... Take a look, say, at the book
that Edward Herman and I wrote on this topic.
1336
01:27:48,367 --> 01:27:51,757
In it we discuss three kinds of atrocities -
1337
01:27:51,807 --> 01:27:54,401
what we call benign bloodbaths,
1338
01:27:54,447 --> 01:27:56,119
which nobody cares about,
1339
01:27:56,167 --> 01:27:58,920
constructive bloodbaths,
which are the ones we like,
1340
01:27:58,967 --> 01:28:02,277
and nefarious bloodbaths,
which are the ones the bad guys do.
1341
01:28:02,327 --> 01:28:06,684
The principle that I think we ought to follow
is not the one that you stated.
1342
01:28:06,727 --> 01:28:09,002
You know, it's a very simple, ethical point.
1343
01:28:09,047 --> 01:28:13,404
You're responsible for
the predictable consequences of your actions.
1344
01:28:13,447 --> 01:28:17,520
You're not responsible for the predictable
consequences of somebody else's actions.
1345
01:28:17,567 --> 01:28:20,957
The most important thing for me and for you
1346
01:28:21,007 --> 01:28:23,840
is to think about
the consequences of your actions.
1347
01:28:23,887 --> 01:28:25,639
What can you affect?
1348
01:28:25,687 --> 01:28:29,760
These are the things to keep in mind.
These are not just academic exercises.
1349
01:28:29,807 --> 01:28:34,085
We're not analysing the media on Mars,
or in the 18th Century, or something like that.
1350
01:28:34,127 --> 01:28:39,724
We're dealing with real human beings who are
suffering, and dying, and being tortured,
1351
01:28:39,767 --> 01:28:44,158
and starving because of policies
that we are involved in.
1352
01:28:44,207 --> 01:28:49,042
We as citizens of democratic societies
are directly involved in and are responsible for,
1353
01:28:49,087 --> 01:28:54,445
and what the media are doing is ensuring
that we do not act on our responsibilities,
1354
01:28:54,487 --> 01:28:59,925
and that the interests of power are served,
not the needs of the suffering people,
1355
01:28:59,967 --> 01:29:03,084
and not even the needs of the American people
who would be horrified
1356
01:29:03,127 --> 01:29:06,597
if they realised
the blood that's dripping from their hands
1357
01:29:06,647 --> 01:29:12,244
because of the way they're allowing themselves
to be deluded and manipulated by the system.
1358
01:29:28,527 --> 01:29:30,404
What about the Third World?
1359
01:29:30,447 --> 01:29:34,156
Well, despite everything,
and it's pretty ugly and awful,
1360
01:29:34,207 --> 01:29:36,084
these struggles are not over.
1361
01:29:36,127 --> 01:29:40,996
The struggle for freedom and independence
never is completely over.
1362
01:29:46,927 --> 01:29:50,158
Their courage, in fact, is really remarkable.
1363
01:29:50,207 --> 01:29:51,276
Amazing.
1364
01:29:51,327 --> 01:29:55,684
I've personally had the privilege,
and it is a privilege, of witnessing it a few times,
1365
01:29:55,727 --> 01:29:58,605
in villages in Southeast Asia
and Central America,
1366
01:29:58,647 --> 01:30:01,115
and recently in the occupied West Bank,
1367
01:30:01,167 --> 01:30:03,158
and it is astonishing to see.
1368
01:30:06,367 --> 01:30:08,961
And it's always amazing -
at least to me it's amazing.
1369
01:30:09,007 --> 01:30:12,602
I can't understand it.
It's also very moving and inspiring.
1370
01:30:12,647 --> 01:30:14,444
In fact, it's kind of awe-inspiring.
1371
01:30:14,487 --> 01:30:17,240
Now, they rely very crucially
1372
01:30:17,287 --> 01:30:20,677
on a very slim margin for survival
1373
01:30:20,727 --> 01:30:25,403
that's provided by dissidence and turbulence
within the imperial societies,
1374
01:30:25,447 --> 01:30:29,725
and how large that margin is
is for us to determine.
1375
01:31:08,446 --> 01:31:10,084
In today's On The Spot assignment,
1376
01:31:10,126 --> 01:31:12,924
we're going to see
just what's behind the making of movies.
1377
01:31:13,566 --> 01:31:15,238
The director and the crew
1378
01:31:15,286 --> 01:31:16,958
are shooting a documentary film.
1379
01:31:17,006 --> 01:31:19,395
Let's take a closer look.
1380
01:31:19,446 --> 01:31:22,279
Bob, this word "documentary",
1381
01:31:22,326 --> 01:31:26,239
what would you say is the difference between
a documentary film and a feature movie?
1382
01:31:26,286 --> 01:31:28,277
Well, there are a good many differences.
1383
01:31:28,326 --> 01:31:32,478
One would be length. Generally speaking,
documentaries are shorter than feature films.
1384
01:31:32,526 --> 01:31:36,405
Also, documentaries have something to say
in the way of a message.
1385
01:31:36,446 --> 01:31:38,402
They are informational films.
1386
01:31:38,446 --> 01:31:43,315
Also, another term that's used interchangeably
with documentary is the word "actuality".
1387
01:31:43,366 --> 01:31:47,598
PRESENTER: Bob, is this the thing you hold up
in front of the camera before each scene?
1388
01:31:47,646 --> 01:31:49,159
BOB: This is a clapperboard, yes.
1389
01:31:49,206 --> 01:31:52,278
This identifies on the visual camera
1390
01:31:52,326 --> 01:31:54,715
the scene number and the take number.
1391
01:31:54,766 --> 01:31:57,883
And also, as you heard, on the soundtrack,
1392
01:31:57,926 --> 01:32:01,123
the editor back at the studio
puts the two pieces of film together,
1393
01:32:01,166 --> 01:32:03,361
matches where the lips of the clapper meet,
1394
01:32:03,406 --> 01:32:04,885
and there you are in synch.
1395
01:32:04,926 --> 01:32:07,599
MILLER:
Before the break, you were mentioning
1396
01:32:07,646 --> 01:32:12,003
the media putting forth the information
that the power elite want.
1397
01:32:12,046 --> 01:32:16,676
I'm not sure if I understand.
How does the power elite do this?
1398
01:32:16,726 --> 01:32:19,240
Why do we stand for it?
Why does it work so well?
1399
01:32:19,286 --> 01:32:22,483
Well, I think...
I mean, there are really two questions here.
1400
01:32:22,526 --> 01:32:26,235
One - is this picture of the media true?
And there, you have to look at the evidence.
1401
01:32:26,286 --> 01:32:29,198
I've given one example,
and that shouldn't convince anybody.
1402
01:32:29,246 --> 01:32:32,044
One has to look at a lot of evidence
to see whether this is true.
1403
01:32:32,086 --> 01:32:34,395
I think anyone who investigates it will find out
1404
01:32:34,446 --> 01:32:37,244
that the evidence to support it
is simply overwhelming.
1405
01:32:37,286 --> 01:32:41,325
It's probably one of the best supported
conclusions in the social sciences.
1406
01:32:41,366 --> 01:32:43,163
The other question is, how does it work?
1407
01:32:43,206 --> 01:32:47,518
- Noam Chomsky?
- I'm the... I'm the media guy.
1408
01:32:47,566 --> 01:32:50,717
What would you like?
I got you an International Herald Tribune.
1409
01:32:50,766 --> 01:32:54,759
Anything in a Western language which doesn't
include Dutch. What have you got?
1410
01:32:54,806 --> 01:32:57,718
- Financial Times.
- Financial Times, absolutely.
1411
01:32:57,766 --> 01:33:00,280
That's the only paper that tells the truth.
1412
01:33:00,326 --> 01:33:03,079
You get the one
where they've been debating back and forth?
1413
01:33:03,126 --> 01:33:05,321
NRC Handelsblad.
1414
01:33:05,366 --> 01:33:06,958
CHOMSKY: Handelsblad?
1415
01:33:16,606 --> 01:33:19,439
- Train to?
- Ammerswurth.
1416
01:33:20,766 --> 01:33:24,805
CHOMSKY: Well, this evening's programme
is scheduled as a debate,
1417
01:33:24,846 --> 01:33:26,723
which puzzled me all the way through.
1418
01:33:26,766 --> 01:33:28,358
There are some problems.
1419
01:33:28,406 --> 01:33:32,001
One problem is that
no proposition has been set forth.
1420
01:33:32,046 --> 01:33:35,436
As I understand "debate",
people advocate or oppose something.
1421
01:33:35,486 --> 01:33:37,522
Rather more sensibly,
1422
01:33:37,566 --> 01:33:39,875
a topic has been proposed for discussion.
1423
01:33:39,926 --> 01:33:43,282
Er... the topic is manufacture of consent.
1424
01:33:44,206 --> 01:33:46,879
BOLKESTEIN: It's unusual
for a member of the government
1425
01:33:46,926 --> 01:33:48,598
to debate with a professor in public.
1426
01:33:48,646 --> 01:33:50,557
It hasn't happened in Holland before.
1427
01:33:50,606 --> 01:33:53,325
I don't think it oten happens elsewhere.
1428
01:33:55,726 --> 01:33:57,318
(Bell)
1429
01:33:57,366 --> 01:33:59,357
Mr Bolkestein, the floor is yours.
1430
01:33:59,406 --> 01:34:02,239
BOLKESTEIN: Now, we all know
1431
01:34:02,286 --> 01:34:05,961
that a theory can never be established
merely by examples.
1432
01:34:06,006 --> 01:34:07,997
It can only be established
1433
01:34:08,046 --> 01:34:11,243
by showing some internal, inherent logic.
1434
01:34:11,286 --> 01:34:13,754
Professor Chomsky has not done so.
1435
01:34:13,806 --> 01:34:15,319
Professor Chomsky?
1436
01:34:15,366 --> 01:34:19,996
CHOMSKY: He's right to say you can't just pick
examples. You have to do them rationally.
1437
01:34:20,046 --> 01:34:22,514
That's why we compared examples.
1438
01:34:22,566 --> 01:34:28,038
The truth is that things are not as simple
as Professor Chomsky maintains.
1439
01:34:29,086 --> 01:34:31,646
Another of Professor Chomsky's case studies
1440
01:34:31,686 --> 01:34:35,725
concerns the treatment that
Cambodia has received in the Western press.
1441
01:34:35,766 --> 01:34:39,156
Here, he goes badly off the rails.
1442
01:34:39,206 --> 01:34:41,003
(Laughter)
1443
01:34:41,926 --> 01:34:43,644
We didn't discuss Cambodia.
1444
01:34:43,686 --> 01:34:46,280
We compared Cambodia with East Timor,
1445
01:34:46,326 --> 01:34:48,965
two very closely paired examples.
1446
01:34:49,006 --> 01:34:52,635
And we gave approximately
300 pages of detail covering this
1447
01:34:52,686 --> 01:34:54,597
in Political Economy of Human Rights,
1448
01:34:54,646 --> 01:34:59,083
including a reference to every article
we could discover about Cambodia.
1449
01:34:59,126 --> 01:35:03,085
BOLKESTEIN: Many Western intellectuals
do not like to face the facts
1450
01:35:03,126 --> 01:35:08,041
and balk at the conclusions
that any untutored person would draw.
1451
01:35:08,086 --> 01:35:11,078
Many people are very irritated
1452
01:35:11,126 --> 01:35:15,358
by the fact that we exposed
the extraordinary deceit over Cambodia
1453
01:35:15,406 --> 01:35:18,876
and paired it with the simultaneous suppression
1454
01:35:18,926 --> 01:35:22,441
of the US-supported,
ongoing atrocities in Timor.
1455
01:35:22,486 --> 01:35:23,965
People don't like that.
1456
01:35:24,006 --> 01:35:27,681
For one thing, we were challenging
the right to lie in defence of the state.
1457
01:35:27,726 --> 01:35:29,717
For another thing, we were exposing
1458
01:35:29,766 --> 01:35:34,317
the apologetics and support
for actual ongoing atrocities.
1459
01:35:34,366 --> 01:35:35,879
That doesn't make you popular.
1460
01:35:35,926 --> 01:35:36,995
(Bell)
1461
01:35:38,206 --> 01:35:41,676
BOLKESTEIN: Where did he learn
about the atrocities in East Timor
1462
01:35:41,726 --> 01:35:43,364
or in Central America,
1463
01:35:43,406 --> 01:35:47,524
if not in the same free press
which he so derides?
1464
01:35:47,566 --> 01:35:50,717
You can find out where I learned about them
by looking at my footnotes -
1465
01:35:50,766 --> 01:35:54,554
from Human Rights reports,
from church reports, from refugee studies,
1466
01:35:54,606 --> 01:35:56,836
and extensively, from the Australian press.
1467
01:35:56,886 --> 01:35:59,320
Nothing from the American press -
it was silenced.
1468
01:36:00,726 --> 01:36:04,435
Chairman, this is an attempt
at intellectual intimidation.
1469
01:36:04,486 --> 01:36:07,125
These are the ways of the bully.
1470
01:36:08,206 --> 01:36:11,960
Professor Chomsky uses
the oldest debating trick on record.
1471
01:36:12,006 --> 01:36:14,122
He erects a man of straw
1472
01:36:14,966 --> 01:36:17,764
and proceeds to hack away at him.
1473
01:36:17,806 --> 01:36:19,603
(Bell)
1474
01:36:19,646 --> 01:36:22,956
Professor Chomsky calls this
the "manufacture of consent".
1475
01:36:23,006 --> 01:36:26,203
I call it "the creation of consensus".
1476
01:36:26,246 --> 01:36:30,558
In Holland, we call it "Draagvlak",
which means "foundation".
1477
01:36:30,606 --> 01:36:33,404
Professor Chomsky thinks it is deceitful.
1478
01:36:33,446 --> 01:36:34,879
But it is not.
1479
01:36:34,926 --> 01:36:37,076
In a representative democracy,
1480
01:36:37,126 --> 01:36:41,165
it means winning people for one's point of view.
1481
01:36:41,206 --> 01:36:43,197
But I do not think
1482
01:36:43,246 --> 01:36:46,682
that Professor Chomsky believes
in representative democracy.
1483
01:36:46,726 --> 01:36:49,365
I think he believes in direct democracy.
1484
01:36:49,406 --> 01:36:51,636
With Rosa Luxemburg,
1485
01:36:51,686 --> 01:36:57,636
he longs for the creative, spontaneous,
self-correcting force of mass action.
1486
01:36:57,686 --> 01:37:01,076
That is the vision of the anarchist.
1487
01:37:01,126 --> 01:37:03,640
It is also a boy's dream.
1488
01:37:03,686 --> 01:37:05,278
(Ripple of laughter)
1489
01:37:05,326 --> 01:37:08,602
Those who believe in democracy and freedom
1490
01:37:08,646 --> 01:37:12,605
have a serious task ahead of them.
1491
01:37:12,646 --> 01:37:15,114
What they should be doing, in my view,
1492
01:37:15,166 --> 01:37:20,240
is dedicating their efforts to helping
the despised common people
1493
01:37:20,286 --> 01:37:22,402
to struggle for their rights
1494
01:37:22,446 --> 01:37:27,520
and to realise the democratic goals
that constantly surface throughout history.
1495
01:37:27,566 --> 01:37:30,842
They should be serving not power and privilege
1496
01:37:30,886 --> 01:37:32,524
but rather their victims.
1497
01:37:33,366 --> 01:37:35,482
Freedom and democracy are, by now,
1498
01:37:35,526 --> 01:37:38,040
not merely values to be treasured.
1499
01:37:38,086 --> 01:37:42,204
They are quite possibly
the prerequisite to survival.
1500
01:37:42,246 --> 01:37:44,885
It's a conspiracy theory, pure and simple.
1501
01:37:44,926 --> 01:37:46,917
It is not borne out by the facts.
1502
01:37:46,966 --> 01:37:51,881
Mr Chairman, I have to go to Amsterdam.
If you'll excuse me, I'm leaving.
1503
01:37:51,926 --> 01:37:53,405
(Laughter)
1504
01:37:57,006 --> 01:37:58,837
CHAIRMAN: One thing is sure.
1505
01:38:00,326 --> 01:38:03,636
Their consent has not been manufactured
tonight.
1506
01:38:06,166 --> 01:38:10,956
CHOMSKY: There is nothing more remote from
what I'm discussing than a conspiracy theory.
1507
01:38:13,086 --> 01:38:17,557
If I give an analysis
of, say, the economic system,
1508
01:38:17,606 --> 01:38:22,043
and I point out that General Motors tries
to maximise profit and market share,
1509
01:38:22,086 --> 01:38:24,042
that's not a conspiracy theory.
1510
01:38:24,086 --> 01:38:26,122
That's an institutional analysis.
1511
01:38:26,166 --> 01:38:28,396
That has nothing to do with conspiracies.
1512
01:38:28,446 --> 01:38:31,722
And that's precisely the sense
in which we're talking about the media.
1513
01:38:31,766 --> 01:38:34,917
The phrase "conspiracy theory"
is one that's constantly brought up.
1514
01:38:34,966 --> 01:38:39,244
And I think its effect, simply,
is to discourage institutional analysis.
1515
01:38:42,046 --> 01:38:45,834
WINTONICK: You think there's a connection
about what the government wants us to know
1516
01:38:45,886 --> 01:38:47,365
and what the media tell us?
1517
01:38:47,406 --> 01:38:49,078
It's not Communism,
1518
01:38:49,126 --> 01:38:51,117
but I think, to a certain point,
1519
01:38:51,166 --> 01:38:53,077
it is sensitised.
1520
01:38:53,126 --> 01:38:56,436
They don't always tell the truth,
the way it goes, huh?
1521
01:38:56,486 --> 01:38:57,680
You got that right.
1522
01:38:57,726 --> 01:39:01,765
Do you think the information you're getting
from this paper is biased in any way?
1523
01:39:01,806 --> 01:39:03,125
Oh, yeah.
1524
01:39:03,166 --> 01:39:06,795
I think, by and large, it's well done.
1525
01:39:06,846 --> 01:39:09,838
You get both sides of the stories.
1526
01:39:09,886 --> 01:39:14,402
You get the liberal side
and the conservative side, so to speak.
1527
01:39:14,446 --> 01:39:19,122
I don't think you get a very balanced picture
because they only have 20 seconds
1528
01:39:19,166 --> 01:39:22,715
for a news item, or whatever,
and they're going to pick out, a highlight.
1529
01:39:22,766 --> 01:39:26,964
Every network is going to cover the same
highlight. And that's all you're going to see.
1530
01:39:27,006 --> 01:39:29,520
You get what they want you to hear.
1531
01:39:30,926 --> 01:39:33,121
You think they're biased in some way, then?
1532
01:39:33,166 --> 01:39:34,155
Nah.
1533
01:39:34,926 --> 01:39:36,405
Here we go.
1534
01:39:36,446 --> 01:39:38,676
See you later.
1535
01:39:46,046 --> 01:39:49,118
Is it possible for the lights to get a little brighter
1536
01:39:49,166 --> 01:39:51,396
so I can see somebody out there?
1537
01:39:51,446 --> 01:39:54,119
STUDENT:
Yeah, for the last hour and 41 minutes,
1538
01:39:54,166 --> 01:39:58,079
you've been whining about how the elite
and how the government have been...
1539
01:39:58,126 --> 01:40:01,243
using thought control
to keep radicals like yourself
1540
01:40:01,286 --> 01:40:03,402
out of the public limelight.
1541
01:40:03,446 --> 01:40:04,959
Now, you're here.
1542
01:40:05,006 --> 01:40:07,281
I don't see any CIA men waiting to drag you off.
1543
01:40:07,326 --> 01:40:11,877
You were in the paper. That's where everyone
here heard you were coming from, in the paper.
1544
01:40:11,926 --> 01:40:14,679
I'm sure they're going to publish your comments
in the paper.
1545
01:40:14,726 --> 01:40:18,162
In a lot of countries, you would have been shot
for what you have done today.
1546
01:40:18,206 --> 01:40:19,798
So, what are you whining about?
1547
01:40:19,846 --> 01:40:23,043
We are allowing you to speak.
I don't see any thought control.
1548
01:40:23,086 --> 01:40:27,398
CHOMSKY: First of all, I haven't said one word
about my being kept out of the limelight.
1549
01:40:27,446 --> 01:40:29,721
The way it works here is quite different.
1550
01:40:29,766 --> 01:40:32,758
I don't think you heard what I was saying.
The way it works here is,
1551
01:40:32,806 --> 01:40:38,039
that there is a system of shaping and control,
which gives a certain perception of the world.
1552
01:40:38,086 --> 01:40:41,601
I gave one example. I'll give you sources
where you can find thousands more.
1553
01:40:41,646 --> 01:40:45,241
And it has nothing to do with me.
It has to do with marginalising the public
1554
01:40:45,286 --> 01:40:47,516
and ensuring that they don't get in the way
1555
01:40:47,566 --> 01:40:51,400
of elites who are supposed to run things
without interference.
1556
01:40:51,446 --> 01:40:54,677
KLEINHAUS:
In a review of The Chomsky Reader,
1557
01:40:54,726 --> 01:40:57,638
it was written that,
"As he's been forced to the margins,
1558
01:40:57,686 --> 01:40:59,517
he's become strident and rigid."
1559
01:40:59,566 --> 01:41:03,115
Do you feel this categorisation
of your later writings is accurate
1560
01:41:03,166 --> 01:41:06,681
and that you've been a victim
of this sort of process you've been describing?
1561
01:41:06,726 --> 01:41:08,603
Well, the business about being forced...
1562
01:41:08,646 --> 01:41:11,604
Other people will have to judge
about the stridency. I won't...
1563
01:41:11,646 --> 01:41:14,558
I don't believe it.
But that's for other people to judge.
1564
01:41:14,606 --> 01:41:17,325
But the matter of being forced
to the margins is one of fact.
1565
01:41:17,366 --> 01:41:20,005
The fact is the opposite of what is claimed.
1566
01:41:20,046 --> 01:41:24,244
The fact is, it's much easier to gain access
to even the major media now
1567
01:41:24,286 --> 01:41:25,844
than it was 20 years ago.
1568
01:41:25,886 --> 01:41:28,400
MO YERS:
You've dealt in such unpopular truths
1569
01:41:28,446 --> 01:41:31,563
and have been such a lonely figure
as a consequence of that.
1570
01:41:31,606 --> 01:41:35,042
Do you ever regret
either that you took the stand you took,
1571
01:41:35,086 --> 01:41:38,795
have written the things you have written,
or that we had listened to you earlier?
1572
01:41:39,606 --> 01:41:43,645
Er... I don't. I mean, there are particular things
which I would do differently.
1573
01:41:43,686 --> 01:41:45,802
Because you think about things differently.
1574
01:41:45,846 --> 01:41:49,680
- But, in general, I would say I do not regret it.
- Do you like being controversial?
1575
01:41:49,726 --> 01:41:51,637
No, it's a nuisance.
1576
01:41:51,686 --> 01:41:54,439
Because this medium pays little attention
to dissenters,
1577
01:41:54,486 --> 01:41:56,124
not just Noam Chomsky,
1578
01:41:56,166 --> 01:42:00,045
but most dissenters do not get
much of a hearing in this medium.
1579
01:42:00,086 --> 01:42:03,556
It's understandable. They wouldn't be
performing their societal function
1580
01:42:03,606 --> 01:42:06,439
if they allowed favoured truths to be challenged.
1581
01:42:09,326 --> 01:42:12,762
CHOMSKY: Now, notice that's not true
when I cross the border anywhere.
1582
01:42:12,806 --> 01:42:16,719
So I have easy access to the media
in just about every other country in the world.
1583
01:42:16,766 --> 01:42:20,281
That's for a number of reasons.
One is that I'm primarily talking about the US.
1584
01:42:20,326 --> 01:42:22,794
And it's much less threatening.
1585
01:42:23,926 --> 01:42:27,441
Your view there is that the militarisation
of the American economy
1586
01:42:27,486 --> 01:42:32,276
essentially has come about because there are
not other means of controlling the US people.
1587
01:42:32,326 --> 01:42:35,204
CHOMSKY: In a democratic society.
It may be paradoxical,
1588
01:42:35,246 --> 01:42:40,036
but the freer the society is,
the more it's necessary to resort to devices
1589
01:42:40,086 --> 01:42:41,485
like induced fear.
1590
01:42:47,326 --> 01:42:51,956
OK, I'll go along with that. Arguably, he is
the most important intellectual alive today.
1591
01:42:52,006 --> 01:42:56,682
And if my programme can give him
500,000 people listening
1592
01:42:56,726 --> 01:42:59,194
or three-quarters of a million people listening,
1593
01:42:59,246 --> 01:43:00,759
I'll be delighted.
1594
01:43:00,806 --> 01:43:02,922
OK, Professor, in your own time.
1595
01:43:04,726 --> 01:43:10,198
Wartime planners understood
that actual war aims should not be revealed.
1596
01:43:10,246 --> 01:43:15,366
CHOMSKY: A part of the reason why the media
in Canada and Belgium, etc are more open
1597
01:43:15,406 --> 01:43:18,204
is that it just doesn't matter that much
what people think.
1598
01:43:18,246 --> 01:43:22,524
It matters very much what the politically
articulate sectors of the population,
1599
01:43:22,566 --> 01:43:25,683
those narrow minorities,
think and do in the United States,
1600
01:43:25,726 --> 01:43:28,524
because of its overwhelming dominance
on the world scene.
1601
01:43:28,566 --> 01:43:31,080
But that's also a reason
for wanting to work here.
1602
01:43:31,126 --> 01:43:33,162
...what we might call the fith freedom -
1603
01:43:33,206 --> 01:43:35,595
the freedom to rob, exploit,
1604
01:43:35,646 --> 01:43:40,515
and dominate and to curb mischief
by any feasible means.
1605
01:43:42,686 --> 01:43:45,246
It's "conclude", not "include".
1606
01:43:45,286 --> 01:43:46,639
PRODUCER: From the top.
1607
01:43:48,966 --> 01:43:53,357
CHOMSKY: The United States is ideologically
narrower in general than other countries.
1608
01:43:53,406 --> 01:43:57,797
Furthermore, the structure of the American
media is such as to pretty much eliminate
1609
01:43:57,846 --> 01:43:59,996
critical discussion.
1610
01:44:00,046 --> 01:44:03,800
Our guests are as far apart
on the Contra question
1611
01:44:03,846 --> 01:44:05,802
as American intellectuals can be.
1612
01:44:05,846 --> 01:44:08,565
CHOMSKY: If we had the slightest concern
with democracy,
1613
01:44:08,606 --> 01:44:11,518
which we do not, in our foreign affairs,
and never have,
1614
01:44:11,566 --> 01:44:14,763
we would turn to countries
where we have influence like El Salvador.
1615
01:44:14,806 --> 01:44:18,845
Now, in El Salvador,
they don't call the Archbishop bad names.
1616
01:44:18,886 --> 01:44:20,444
What they do is murder him.
1617
01:44:20,486 --> 01:44:23,637
They do not censor the press.
1618
01:44:23,686 --> 01:44:27,679
They wipe the press out. They sent the army in
to blow up the church radio station.
1619
01:44:27,726 --> 01:44:31,560
The editor of the independent paper was found
in a ditch, mutilated, and cut to pieces.
1620
01:44:31,606 --> 01:44:34,074
- Don't...
- May I continue? I did not interrupt you.
1621
01:44:34,126 --> 01:44:36,640
Don't you want to put a time value
on anything you say
1622
01:44:36,686 --> 01:44:38,756
or do you want to lie systematically on TV?
1623
01:44:38,806 --> 01:44:41,274
- I'm talking about 1980.
- You are a systematic liar.
1624
01:44:41,326 --> 01:44:45,205
- Did these things happen or not?
- Not in the context which you suggested.
1625
01:44:45,246 --> 01:44:49,762
You are a phoney, mister, and it's time
that the people read you correctly.
1626
01:44:49,806 --> 01:44:52,445
It's clear why you want to divert me
from the discussion.
1627
01:44:52,486 --> 01:44:54,716
No, it's not. We're getting tired of rubbish.
1628
01:44:54,766 --> 01:44:57,803
- But let's continue with...
- Except we can't. We're out of time.
1629
01:44:57,846 --> 01:45:00,155
Let me thank you,
John Silver and Noam Chomsky.
1630
01:45:00,206 --> 01:45:01,639
OK.
1631
01:45:04,846 --> 01:45:06,564
STUDENT: Last time you were here,
1632
01:45:06,606 --> 01:45:09,074
you spoke about how, when you go overseas,
1633
01:45:09,126 --> 01:45:11,765
you are given access to the mass media.
1634
01:45:11,806 --> 01:45:14,001
But here, that doesn't seem to be the case.
1635
01:45:14,046 --> 01:45:17,083
Has that changed at all?
Have you ever been invited
1636
01:45:17,126 --> 01:45:19,765
to appear on Nightline or Brinkley?
1637
01:45:19,806 --> 01:45:21,717
CHOMSKY: Yes, I have a couple of times
1638
01:45:21,766 --> 01:45:23,597
been invited to speak on Nightline.
1639
01:45:23,646 --> 01:45:27,480
I couldn't do it.
I had another talk and something or other.
1640
01:45:27,526 --> 01:45:30,199
To tell you the honest truth,
I don't really care very much.
1641
01:45:30,246 --> 01:45:32,396
FAIR, the media monitoring group,
1642
01:45:32,446 --> 01:45:35,244
published a very interesting study of Nightline.
1643
01:45:35,286 --> 01:45:39,074
It shows that their conception of a spectrum
of opinion is ridiculously narrow,
1644
01:45:39,126 --> 01:45:41,037
at least by European or world standards.
1645
01:46:00,086 --> 01:46:02,077
Let me tell you a personal experience.
1646
01:46:02,126 --> 01:46:04,003
I happened to be in Madison, Wisconsin,
1647
01:46:04,046 --> 01:46:06,321
on a listener-supported radio station,
1648
01:46:06,366 --> 01:46:08,357
a community radio station, a very good one.
1649
01:46:08,406 --> 01:46:12,160
It was an interview with the news director.
I'd been on the programme dozens of times,
1650
01:46:12,206 --> 01:46:13,605
usually by telephone.
1651
01:46:13,646 --> 01:46:17,764
And he's very good, he gets all sorts of people.
He started the interview by playing for me
1652
01:46:17,806 --> 01:46:21,481
a tape of an interview that he had just had
1653
01:46:21,526 --> 01:46:27,044
and had broadcast with a guy who's...
some mucky-muck in Nightline.
1654
01:46:27,086 --> 01:46:30,874
I think his name is Jeff Greenfield
or some such name.
1655
01:46:30,926 --> 01:46:32,917
Does that name mean anything?
1656
01:46:32,966 --> 01:46:36,197
I'm Jeff Greenfield from Nightline in New York.
1657
01:46:36,246 --> 01:46:39,522
We've got just a selection of guests
to analyse things.
1658
01:46:39,566 --> 01:46:42,524
Why is Noam Chomsky never on Nightline?
1659
01:46:42,566 --> 01:46:44,443
GREENFIELD: I couldn't begin to tell you.
1660
01:46:44,486 --> 01:46:47,046
HANSEN: He's one of the world's
leading intellectuals.
1661
01:46:47,086 --> 01:46:48,599
GREENFIELD: I have no idea.
1662
01:46:48,646 --> 01:46:50,523
I mean, I can make some guesses.
1663
01:46:50,566 --> 01:46:53,126
He may be
one of the leading intellectuals who...
1664
01:46:54,686 --> 01:46:56,199
...can't talk on television.
1665
01:46:56,246 --> 01:46:59,044
You know,
that's a standard that's very important. To us.
1666
01:46:59,086 --> 01:47:01,077
If you've got a 22-minute show,
1667
01:47:01,126 --> 01:47:03,401
and a guy takes five minutes to warm up...
1668
01:47:03,446 --> 01:47:05,596
Now, I don't know
whether Chomsky does or not.
1669
01:47:05,646 --> 01:47:07,125
...he's out.
1670
01:47:07,166 --> 01:47:11,000
One of the reasons
why Nightline has the usual suspects is,
1671
01:47:11,046 --> 01:47:13,082
one thing you have to do
when you book a show
1672
01:47:13,126 --> 01:47:16,323
is know that the person can make the point
within the framework of TV.
1673
01:47:16,366 --> 01:47:18,675
If people don't like that,
they should understand
1674
01:47:18,726 --> 01:47:21,843
it is as sensible to book somebody
who takes eight minutes to answer
1675
01:47:21,886 --> 01:47:24,275
as it is to book somebody
who doesn't speak English.
1676
01:47:24,326 --> 01:47:27,238
In the normal given flow,
that's another culture-bound thing.
1677
01:47:27,286 --> 01:47:29,880
We've got to have English speakers
and concision.
1678
01:47:29,926 --> 01:47:32,998
So Greenfield or whatever his name is
hit the nail on the head.
1679
01:47:33,046 --> 01:47:35,037
The US media are alone
1680
01:47:35,086 --> 01:47:38,635
in that you must meet the condition of concision.
1681
01:47:38,686 --> 01:47:41,359
You've got to say things
between two commercials
1682
01:47:41,406 --> 01:47:43,681
or in 600 words.
1683
01:47:43,726 --> 01:47:45,444
And that's a very important fact.
1684
01:47:45,486 --> 01:47:47,920
Because the beauty of concision,
1685
01:47:47,966 --> 01:47:50,924
you know, saying a couple of sentences
between two commercials...
1686
01:47:50,966 --> 01:47:54,515
The beauty of that is
that you can only repeat conventional thoughts.
1687
01:47:54,566 --> 01:47:56,875
GREENFIELD: I was reading Chomsky
20 years ago.
1688
01:47:56,926 --> 01:48:00,839
Didn't he co-author a book called Engineering
Consent or Manufacturing Consent?
1689
01:48:00,886 --> 01:48:03,844
I mean, some of that stuff, to me,
looks like it's from Neptune.
1690
01:48:03,886 --> 01:48:08,801
This is the first time the Neptune system
has been seen clearly by human eyes.
1691
01:48:08,846 --> 01:48:11,599
These pictures,
taken only hours ago by Voyager-2,
1692
01:48:11,646 --> 01:48:13,284
are its latest contribution.
1693
01:48:13,326 --> 01:48:17,797
GREENFIELD: You know, he's perfectly entitled
to say I'm seeing it through a prism, too.
1694
01:48:17,846 --> 01:48:22,920
But my view of his notions about the limits
of debate in this country is absolutely wacko.
1695
01:48:23,686 --> 01:48:27,315
Suppose I get up on Nightline, say.
And I'm given whatever it is, two minutes.
1696
01:48:27,366 --> 01:48:31,359
And I say Gaddafi is a terrorist,
Khomeini is a murderer, you know, etc, etc.
1697
01:48:31,406 --> 01:48:35,638
The Russians, you know, invaded Afghanistan.
All this sort of stuff.
1698
01:48:35,686 --> 01:48:38,200
I don't need any evidence. Everybody just nods.
1699
01:48:38,246 --> 01:48:42,876
On the other hand, suppose you say something
that just isn't regurgitating conventional pieties.
1700
01:48:42,926 --> 01:48:48,159
Suppose you say something that's the least bit
unexpected or controversial. You say:
1701
01:48:48,206 --> 01:48:51,039
The biggest international terror operations
that are known
1702
01:48:51,086 --> 01:48:52,997
are the ones that are run out of Washington.
1703
01:48:53,046 --> 01:48:54,365
Or suppose you say:
1704
01:48:54,406 --> 01:48:57,796
What happened in the 1980s is,
the US government was driven underground.
1705
01:48:57,846 --> 01:49:01,680
Suppose I say the United States is invading
South Vietnam, as it was?
1706
01:49:01,726 --> 01:49:06,038
The best political leaders
are the ones who are lazy and corrupt.
1707
01:49:06,086 --> 01:49:09,761
If the Nuremberg laws were applied,
1708
01:49:09,806 --> 01:49:14,038
then every post-War American President
would have been hanged.
1709
01:49:14,086 --> 01:49:18,204
The Bible is probably the most genocidal book
in our total canon.
1710
01:49:18,246 --> 01:49:21,204
Education is a system of imposed ignorance.
1711
01:49:21,246 --> 01:49:25,637
There's no more morality in world affairs
than there was in the time of Genghis Khan.
1712
01:49:25,686 --> 01:49:29,838
There are just different... You know, there are
just different factors to be concerned with.
1713
01:49:29,886 --> 01:49:31,285
Noam Chomsky, thank you.
1714
01:49:31,326 --> 01:49:35,763
Well, you know, people will quite reasonably
expect to know what you mean.
1715
01:49:35,806 --> 01:49:38,684
"Why did you say that?
I've never heard that before.
1716
01:49:38,726 --> 01:49:42,241
If you said that, you'd better have a reason,
better have some evidence.
1717
01:49:42,286 --> 01:49:46,325
In fact, you'd better have a lot of evidence
because that's a pretty startling comment".
1718
01:49:46,366 --> 01:49:49,199
You can't give evidence
if you're stuck with concision.
1719
01:49:49,246 --> 01:49:52,875
That's the genius of this structural constraint.
1720
01:49:52,926 --> 01:49:57,238
And in my view, if people like, say, Nightline,
MacNeil, Lehrer and so on were smarter,
1721
01:49:57,286 --> 01:49:59,004
if they were better propagandists,
1722
01:49:59,046 --> 01:50:02,243
they would let dissidents on,
let them on more, in fact.
1723
01:50:02,286 --> 01:50:05,358
The reason is that they would sound like
they were from Neptune.
1724
01:50:05,406 --> 01:50:08,239
PRESENTER: Then our conversation
on the Middle East crisis
1725
01:50:08,286 --> 01:50:11,483
with the activist, writer and professor,
Noam Chomsky.
1726
01:50:11,526 --> 01:50:14,962
Again, there has been an offer on the table
which we rejected,
1727
01:50:15,006 --> 01:50:16,758
an Iraqi offer of last April...
1728
01:50:16,806 --> 01:50:18,205
MACNEIL: OK, I have to...
1729
01:50:18,246 --> 01:50:21,522
...to eliminate their chemical
and other unconventional arsenals
1730
01:50:21,566 --> 01:50:23,921
if Israel were to simultaneously do the same.
1731
01:50:23,966 --> 01:50:26,764
- We have to end it there.
- That should be pursued as well.
1732
01:50:26,806 --> 01:50:32,517
Sorry to interrupt. I have to end it. That's the
end of our time. Professor Chomsky, thanks.
1733
01:50:32,566 --> 01:50:37,401
AT&T has supported
the MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour since 1983
1734
01:50:37,446 --> 01:50:40,518
because quality information
and quality communication
1735
01:50:40,566 --> 01:50:42,557
is our idea of a good connection.
1736
01:50:42,606 --> 01:50:45,404
AT&T - the right choice.
1737
01:50:45,446 --> 01:50:48,199
- Thank you.
- Could you just sit there for half a second?
1738
01:50:48,246 --> 01:50:52,000
It's just for a two-shot, that's all.
Then we can do anything else with that. OK.
1739
01:50:52,046 --> 01:50:55,083
Yeah, what about the mic? Is that a problem?
1740
01:50:55,126 --> 01:50:57,082
OK, right.
1741
01:50:57,126 --> 01:51:00,914
The idea of this one is it's just a shot
where I'm seen talking to you.
1742
01:51:00,966 --> 01:51:05,721
I'll ask you, though, not to speak to me or move
your lips, so I can be seen to ask a question.
1743
01:51:05,766 --> 01:51:09,645
The reason for the shot is simply this.
OK, just don't talk to me and I'll keep going.
1744
01:51:09,686 --> 01:51:13,804
The reason for the shot - I'll explain it
because I find that's the easiest way to do it -
1745
01:51:13,846 --> 01:51:16,201
is I need a shot where you're sitting and seeing
1746
01:51:16,246 --> 01:51:18,362
and listening while I'm asking you a question.
1747
01:51:18,406 --> 01:51:22,160
We can use the shot to introduce you, explain
who you are, where you fit into my piece.
1748
01:51:22,206 --> 01:51:26,245
But if you don't speak to me, I can also use...
Got it? OK, thanks for your time.
1749
01:51:26,286 --> 01:51:29,881
If there is a narrower range of opinion
in the United States
1750
01:51:29,926 --> 01:51:34,044
and it is harder to express
a variety of different opinions,
1751
01:51:34,086 --> 01:51:35,804
why do you live in the US?
1752
01:51:35,846 --> 01:51:38,519
Well, first of all, it's my country,
1753
01:51:38,566 --> 01:51:41,034
and secondly, it's in many ways -
as I said before -
1754
01:51:41,086 --> 01:51:42,804
it's the freest country in the world.
1755
01:51:42,846 --> 01:51:46,885
I think there's more possibilities for change here
than in any other country I know.
1756
01:51:46,926 --> 01:51:48,837
But again, comparatively speaking,
1757
01:51:48,886 --> 01:51:51,958
it's the country
where the state is probably most restrictive.
1758
01:51:52,006 --> 01:51:55,601
Isn't that what you should look at comparatively
rather than in absolute terms?
1759
01:51:55,646 --> 01:51:57,318
You don't give that impression.
1760
01:51:57,366 --> 01:52:00,244
Maybe I don't give the impression.
I say it oten enough.
1761
01:52:00,286 --> 01:52:02,242
What I've said over and over again,
1762
01:52:02,286 --> 01:52:05,005
I've said it tonight, I've written it a million times,
1763
01:52:05,046 --> 01:52:07,321
is that the United States is a very free society.
1764
01:52:07,366 --> 01:52:09,118
It's also a very rich society.
1765
01:52:09,166 --> 01:52:12,920
Of course, the United States is a scandal
from the point of view of its wealth.
1766
01:52:12,966 --> 01:52:16,117
Given the natural advantages
that the United States has,
1767
01:52:16,166 --> 01:52:20,079
in terms of resources
and lack of enemies and so on,
1768
01:52:20,126 --> 01:52:23,641
the United States should have a level
of health and welfare and so on
1769
01:52:23,686 --> 01:52:27,474
that's, you know, on an order of magnitude
beyond anybody else in the world.
1770
01:52:27,526 --> 01:52:32,998
We don't. The United States is last among
20 industrialised societies in infant mortality.
1771
01:52:33,046 --> 01:52:35,765
That's a scandal of American capitalism.
1772
01:52:35,806 --> 01:52:37,922
And it ends up being a very free society
1773
01:52:37,966 --> 01:52:40,799
which does a lot of rotten things
in the world, OK?
1774
01:52:40,846 --> 01:52:42,564
There's no contradiction there.
1775
01:52:42,606 --> 01:52:46,724
Greece was a free society
by the standards of Athens, you know.
1776
01:52:46,766 --> 01:52:49,758
It was also a vicious society
as regards its imperial behaviour.
1777
01:52:49,806 --> 01:52:53,116
There's virtually no correlation - maybe none -
1778
01:52:53,166 --> 01:52:57,125
between the internal freedom of a society
and its external behaviour.
1779
01:52:57,166 --> 01:53:00,203
You start your line of discussion
1780
01:53:00,246 --> 01:53:02,680
at a moment that is historically useful for you.
1781
01:53:02,726 --> 01:53:06,241
- But you picked the beginning.
- The grand fact of the post-war world
1782
01:53:06,286 --> 01:53:09,278
is that the Communist imperialists,
1783
01:53:09,326 --> 01:53:12,796
by the use of terrorism,
by the use of deprivation of freedom,
1784
01:53:12,846 --> 01:53:15,838
have contributed to the continuing bloodshed.
1785
01:53:15,886 --> 01:53:18,275
The sad thing about it is,
not only the bloodshed,
1786
01:53:18,326 --> 01:53:22,638
but the fact that they seem to dispossess you
of the power of rational observation.
1787
01:53:22,686 --> 01:53:24,642
I think that's about five per cent true.
1788
01:53:24,686 --> 01:53:27,200
Or maybe ten per cent true. It certainly is true...
1789
01:53:27,246 --> 01:53:29,999
- Why do you give that?
- May I complete a sentence?
1790
01:53:30,046 --> 01:53:34,358
It's perfectly true that there were areas
of the world, in particular, Eastern Europe,
1791
01:53:34,406 --> 01:53:36,715
where Stalinist imperialism...
1792
01:53:37,966 --> 01:53:41,515
very brutally took control
and still maintains control.
1793
01:53:41,566 --> 01:53:45,479
But there are also very vast areas of the world
where we were doing the same thing.
1794
01:53:45,526 --> 01:53:48,120
And there's quite an interplay in the Cold War.
1795
01:53:48,166 --> 01:53:51,636
What you just described is, I believe,
a mythology about the Cold War.
1796
01:53:51,686 --> 01:53:55,964
It may have been tenable ten years ago but
it's inconsistent with contemporary scholarship.
1797
01:53:56,006 --> 01:53:57,405
Ask a Czech.
1798
01:53:57,446 --> 01:53:59,437
Ask a Guatemalan, ask a Dominican.
1799
01:54:00,366 --> 01:54:05,486
Ask the president of the Dominican Republic,
ask a person from South Vietnam, ask a Thai.
1800
01:54:05,526 --> 01:54:09,519
Obviously, if you can't distinguish between
the nature of our venture in Guatemala
1801
01:54:09,566 --> 01:54:12,717
and the nature of the Soviet Union's in Prague,
we have difficulties.
1802
01:54:12,766 --> 01:54:13,994
(Doorbell sound)
1803
01:54:16,566 --> 01:54:21,162
Er... now, what about making the media
more responsive and democratic?
1804
01:54:21,206 --> 01:54:23,401
Well, there are very narrow limits for that.
1805
01:54:23,446 --> 01:54:27,075
It's kind of like asking, "How do we make
corporations more democratic?"
1806
01:54:27,126 --> 01:54:29,162
Well, the only way to do that is get rid of them.
1807
01:54:29,206 --> 01:54:31,879
I mean, if you have concentrated power...
1808
01:54:31,926 --> 01:54:34,486
I don't want to say you can do nothing.
1809
01:54:34,526 --> 01:54:38,280
Like the church can show up
at the stockholders' meeting
1810
01:54:38,326 --> 01:54:41,443
and start screaming
about not investing in South Africa.
1811
01:54:41,486 --> 01:54:45,115
And sometimes that has marginal effects.
I don't want to say it has no effect.
1812
01:54:45,166 --> 01:54:47,805
But you can't really affect the structure of power.
1813
01:54:47,846 --> 01:54:50,485
Because to do that would be a social revolution.
1814
01:54:50,526 --> 01:54:53,245
Unless you're ready for a social revolution,
1815
01:54:53,286 --> 01:54:55,322
that is, power is going to be somewhere else,
1816
01:54:55,366 --> 01:54:59,564
the media are going to have their present
structure and represent their present interests.
1817
01:54:59,606 --> 01:55:02,040
That's not to say
that one shouldn't try to do things.
1818
01:55:02,086 --> 01:55:04,919
It makes sense
to try to push the limits of a system.
1819
01:55:04,966 --> 01:55:09,039
It only takes one or two people
that think they have integrity as journalists
1820
01:55:09,086 --> 01:55:10,599
to give you some good press.
1821
01:55:10,646 --> 01:55:13,763
That's important. That goes back
to something that came up before.
1822
01:55:13,806 --> 01:55:18,118
There are contradictions.
You know, things are complex.
1823
01:55:18,166 --> 01:55:22,079
It's not monolithic. I mean, the mass media
themselves are complicated institutions
1824
01:55:22,126 --> 01:55:23,764
with internal contradictions.
1825
01:55:23,806 --> 01:55:27,481
So, on the one hand, there's the commitment
to indoctrination and control.
1826
01:55:27,526 --> 01:55:31,041
But on the other hand,
there's the sense of professional integrity.
1827
01:55:31,086 --> 01:55:33,600
REPORTER: She works alone,
as her own boss,
1828
01:55:33,646 --> 01:55:36,763
writing newspaper columns
and producing radio commentaries
1829
01:55:36,806 --> 01:55:39,400
for a hodgepodge of small clients
across the country.
1830
01:55:40,166 --> 01:55:42,760
This so-called leather-lunged Texan
1831
01:55:42,806 --> 01:55:46,082
has been firing questions at our chief executive
for almost 40 years.
1832
01:55:46,126 --> 01:55:48,515
Many a young man in this country
is disillusioned
1833
01:55:48,566 --> 01:55:50,158
by his government these days.
1834
01:55:50,206 --> 01:55:54,757
Well, this is a question which you very properly
bring to the attention of the nation.
1835
01:55:54,806 --> 01:55:57,240
It's not that we haven't held press conferences.
1836
01:55:57,286 --> 01:55:59,720
I was just waiting for Sarah to come back.
1837
01:55:59,766 --> 01:56:02,439
Mr President, that's very nice of you
and I appreciate it.
1838
01:56:02,486 --> 01:56:06,320
Sir, I want to call your attention to a real
problem we've got in this country today.
1839
01:56:06,366 --> 01:56:10,917
REPORTER: The unique, terrifying McClendon
questions reflect her desire to get information.
1840
01:56:10,966 --> 01:56:13,799
MCCLENDON:
I want to ask your new man what he feels...
1841
01:56:13,846 --> 01:56:15,837
- Here.
(Laughter)
1842
01:56:17,086 --> 01:56:19,520
REPORTER:
With enough know-how and persistence,
1843
01:56:19,566 --> 01:56:21,557
she usually gets her man.
1844
01:56:21,606 --> 01:56:24,837
MCCLENDON: What would you do
if you were in a situation
1845
01:56:24,886 --> 01:56:27,400
where you were trying to be an honest reporter
1846
01:56:27,446 --> 01:56:31,439
and you were worried sick about your country
and you saw how sick it was,
1847
01:56:31,486 --> 01:56:36,002
and you were facing this weak White House
and a weak Congress,
1848
01:56:36,046 --> 01:56:38,196
as a reporter, what would you do?
1849
01:56:38,246 --> 01:56:41,124
CHOMSKY: I think there are a lot of reporters
who do a good job.
1850
01:56:41,166 --> 01:56:44,044
I have a lot of friends in the press
who I think do a terrific job.
1851
01:56:44,086 --> 01:56:46,680
I know they are. They want to...
1852
01:56:46,726 --> 01:56:50,275
Well, first of all,
you have to understand what the system is.
1853
01:56:50,326 --> 01:56:54,035
And smart reporters do understand what it is.
1854
01:56:54,086 --> 01:56:56,998
You have to understand
what the pressures and commitments are,
1855
01:56:57,046 --> 01:56:59,719
what the barriers are
and what the openings are.
1856
01:56:59,766 --> 01:57:01,961
Right ater the Iran-Contra hearings,
1857
01:57:02,006 --> 01:57:06,602
a lot of good reporters understood, "Things are
going to be more open for a couple of months".
1858
01:57:06,646 --> 01:57:10,116
So they rammed through stories
they couldn't even talk about before.
1859
01:57:10,166 --> 01:57:12,555
- And ater Watergate.
- The same ater Watergate.
1860
01:57:12,606 --> 01:57:14,562
Then it closes up again.
1861
01:57:14,606 --> 01:57:17,837
Most people, I imagine,
simply internalise the values.
1862
01:57:17,886 --> 01:57:20,764
That's the easiest way
and the most successful way.
1863
01:57:20,806 --> 01:57:24,594
You just internalise the values and then
you regard yourself, in a way correctly,
1864
01:57:24,646 --> 01:57:26,159
as acting perfectly freely.
1865
01:57:26,206 --> 01:57:28,436
All right, let's get to the White House now
1866
01:57:28,486 --> 01:57:31,637
where I think veteran correspondent
Frank Sesno can tell us
1867
01:57:31,686 --> 01:57:33,802
a little bit about self-censorship.
1868
01:57:33,846 --> 01:57:37,236
That internal guidance system's
always going on, isn't it?
1869
01:57:37,286 --> 01:57:40,676
- Is there any formal censorship there?
- There's no self-censorship.
1870
01:57:40,726 --> 01:57:42,921
If somebody tells me something, I'll pass it on,
1871
01:57:42,966 --> 01:57:45,560
unless there's a particular,
compelling reason not to.
1872
01:57:45,606 --> 01:57:48,245
I can't deny that I'd like to have access
to the Oval Office
1873
01:57:48,286 --> 01:57:50,800
and all the same maps
the President's looking at.
1874
01:57:50,846 --> 01:57:54,202
But that's not possible, it's not realistic,
and probably not desirable.
1875
01:58:01,006 --> 01:58:02,997
Hello. How are you?
1876
01:58:03,046 --> 01:58:04,684
Go and sit down there, please.
1877
01:58:05,686 --> 01:58:07,642
Welcome to Holland.
1878
01:58:07,686 --> 01:58:10,200
I'll introduce you first with a few lines.
1879
01:58:10,246 --> 01:58:13,716
Professor Chomsky, Noam Chomsky.
1880
01:58:21,606 --> 01:58:24,439
Chomsky has been called
the Einstein of modern linguistics.
1881
01:58:24,486 --> 01:58:28,559
The New York Times has said he's arguably
the most important intellectual alive today.
1882
01:58:28,606 --> 01:58:31,040
But his presence here has sparked a protest.
1883
01:58:31,086 --> 01:58:33,475
This book has poisoned the world.
1884
01:58:33,526 --> 01:58:34,925
All lies are in there.
1885
01:58:34,966 --> 01:58:38,197
As the Vietnamese people,
we come here to burn the book.
1886
01:58:41,366 --> 01:58:45,757
He said that in Vietnam
there is no violation of human rights
1887
01:58:45,806 --> 01:58:48,320
and no crime in Cambodia - it's wrong.
1888
01:58:48,366 --> 01:58:50,675
Chomsky using his profession,
1889
01:58:50,726 --> 01:58:53,035
he using that to poison the world.
1890
01:58:53,086 --> 01:58:55,316
And we come here to protest that.
1891
01:58:55,366 --> 01:58:58,563
I don't mind the denunciations, frankly.
I mind the lies.
1892
01:58:58,606 --> 01:59:02,042
Intellectuals are very good at lying.
They're professionals at it.
1893
01:59:02,086 --> 01:59:04,042
Vilification is a wonderful technique.
1894
01:59:04,086 --> 01:59:05,565
There's no way of responding.
1895
01:59:05,606 --> 01:59:09,884
If somebody calls you an anti-Semite,
what can you say? "I'm not an anti-Semite"?
1896
01:59:09,926 --> 01:59:12,599
If somebody says,
"You're a racist, you're a Nazi",
1897
01:59:12,646 --> 01:59:14,204
you always lose.
1898
01:59:14,246 --> 01:59:16,601
I mean, the person who throws the mud
always wins,
1899
01:59:16,646 --> 01:59:18,762
because there's no way of responding.
1900
01:59:18,806 --> 01:59:21,115
Professor Chomsky seems to believe
1901
01:59:21,166 --> 01:59:26,798
that the people he criticises fall
into one of two classes - liars or dupes.
1902
01:59:28,206 --> 01:59:32,040
Consider what happens when I discuss
the case of Robert Faurisson.
1903
01:59:32,086 --> 01:59:34,646
Let me recall the facts.
1904
01:59:34,686 --> 01:59:38,645
- Let's not go into details.
- The details happen to be important.
1905
01:59:38,686 --> 01:59:40,802
Yes, but I have only one question for you.
1906
01:59:40,846 --> 01:59:43,280
- Do the facts matter or don't they?
- Of course.
1907
01:59:43,326 --> 01:59:45,886
Well, let me tell you what the facts are.
1908
01:59:45,926 --> 01:59:46,995
(Heckling)
1909
01:59:47,046 --> 01:59:51,756
Faurisson says that the massacre of the Jews
in the Holocaust is a historic lie.
1910
01:59:51,806 --> 01:59:54,525
WOMAN: Can we have the next question?
SPEAKER: No.
1911
01:59:54,566 --> 01:59:57,285
No, this is an important one.
It has a lot to do with the topic.
1912
01:59:57,326 --> 01:59:58,645
WOMAN: Get off!
1913
01:59:58,686 --> 02:00:00,995
REYNOLDS:
Your views are very controversial.
1914
02:00:01,046 --> 02:00:04,004
Perhaps one of the things
that has been most controversial
1915
02:00:04,046 --> 02:00:08,244
and you've been most strongly criticised for
was your defence of a French intellectual
1916
02:00:08,286 --> 02:00:10,322
who was suspended from his university post
1917
02:00:10,366 --> 02:00:13,483
for contending that there were
no Nazi death camps in World War II.
1918
02:00:15,246 --> 02:00:17,840
FAURISSON: My name is Robert Faurisson.
1919
02:00:17,886 --> 02:00:21,845
I am 60.
I am a university professor in Lyons, France.
1920
02:00:21,886 --> 02:00:26,437
Behind me,
you may see the courthouse of Paris,
1921
02:00:26,486 --> 02:00:28,317
Le Palais de Justice.
1922
02:00:29,246 --> 02:00:30,759
In this place,
1923
02:00:30,806 --> 02:00:35,800
I was convicted many times
at the beginning of the '80s.
1924
02:00:36,726 --> 02:00:42,005
I was charged by nine associations,
1925
02:00:42,046 --> 02:00:44,116
mostly Jewish associations,
1926
02:00:44,166 --> 02:00:45,679
for...
1927
02:00:48,166 --> 02:00:50,157
...inciting hatred,
1928
02:00:50,206 --> 02:00:51,958
racial hatred,
1929
02:00:52,006 --> 02:00:53,997
for racial defamation,
1930
02:00:54,046 --> 02:00:58,722
for damage by falsifying history.
1931
02:00:58,766 --> 02:01:03,317
Professor Chomsky and a number
of other intellectuals signed a petition
1932
02:01:03,366 --> 02:01:08,440
in which Faurisson is called
"a respected professor of literature
1933
02:01:08,486 --> 02:01:12,684
who merely tried to make his findings public".
1934
02:01:13,566 --> 02:01:22,520
Perhaps we can start with just the story of
Robert Faurisson and your involvement.
1935
02:01:22,566 --> 02:01:26,844
More than 500 people signed...
1936
02:01:28,286 --> 02:01:30,038
Maybe 600.
1937
02:01:30,766 --> 02:01:34,395
Mostly... universitaires.
1938
02:01:34,446 --> 02:01:35,674
Scholars.
1939
02:01:35,726 --> 02:01:39,275
And what happened to the other 499 of them?
1940
02:01:39,326 --> 02:01:41,965
How come we only hear
about Chomsky's signature?
1941
02:01:42,006 --> 02:01:46,761
Well, I think it's because Chomsky has,
in himself, a kind of political power.
1942
02:01:50,166 --> 02:01:51,804
CHOMSKY: I signed a petition
1943
02:01:51,846 --> 02:01:54,724
calling on the tribunal to defend his civil rights.
1944
02:01:54,766 --> 02:01:58,964
At that point, the French press,
which has no conception of freedom of speech,
1945
02:01:59,006 --> 02:02:02,635
concluded that
since I had called for his civil rights,
1946
02:02:02,686 --> 02:02:04,517
I was therefore defending his thesis.
1947
02:02:04,566 --> 02:02:06,761
Faurisson then published a book
1948
02:02:06,806 --> 02:02:11,641
in which he tried to prove
that the Nazi gas chambers never existed.
1949
02:02:11,686 --> 02:02:16,237
What we deny is that there was
1950
02:02:16,286 --> 02:02:18,846
an extermination programme
1951
02:02:18,886 --> 02:02:21,320
and an extermination, actually.
1952
02:02:21,366 --> 02:02:24,722
Especially in gas chambers or gas vans.
1953
02:02:24,766 --> 02:02:29,396
BOLKESTEIN: The book contains a preface
written by Professor Chomsky
1954
02:02:29,446 --> 02:02:31,562
in which he calls Faurisson
1955
02:02:31,606 --> 02:02:35,121
"a relatively apolitical sort of liberal".
1956
02:02:36,526 --> 02:02:40,883
A Communist is a man, a Jew is a man,
a Nazi is a man.
1957
02:02:40,926 --> 02:02:42,325
I am a man.
1958
02:02:42,366 --> 02:02:44,163
Are you a Nazi?
1959
02:02:44,206 --> 02:02:46,117
I am not a Nazi.
1960
02:02:46,166 --> 02:02:48,634
How would you describe yourself politically?
1961
02:02:50,326 --> 02:02:51,554
Nothing.
1962
02:02:51,606 --> 02:02:55,519
- The preface that you wrote...
- No, that's not the preface that I wrote.
1963
02:02:55,566 --> 02:02:59,002
Because I never wrote a preface
and you know that I never wrote a preface.
1964
02:03:00,046 --> 02:03:03,197
He's referring to a statement of mine
on civil liberties
1965
02:03:03,246 --> 02:03:07,080
which was added to a book
in which Faurisson...
1966
02:03:07,126 --> 02:03:08,525
(Heckling)
- Excuse me.
1967
02:03:08,566 --> 02:03:11,638
You're a linguist
and the language you use has meaning!
1968
02:03:11,686 --> 02:03:15,076
And when you describe Faurisson
as an "apolitical liberal",
1969
02:03:15,126 --> 02:03:20,803
or as someone whose views can be dignified
by the words "findings" or "conclusions",
1970
02:03:20,846 --> 02:03:24,122
that is a judgment
and that is a favourable judgment of his views.
1971
02:03:24,166 --> 02:03:25,360
On the contrary.
1972
02:03:25,406 --> 02:03:29,081
- May I continue with the facts?
- You can continue with the facts for hours.
1973
02:03:29,126 --> 02:03:31,765
But there are a few facts that... Yeah, OK.
1974
02:03:31,806 --> 02:03:33,524
Let's get to the so-called preface.
1975
02:03:33,566 --> 02:03:37,400
I was then asked
by the person who organised the petition
1976
02:03:37,446 --> 02:03:39,960
to write a statement on freedom of speech.
1977
02:03:40,006 --> 02:03:42,884
Just banal comments about freedom of speech,
1978
02:03:42,926 --> 02:03:47,556
pointing out the difference between defending
a person's right to express his views
1979
02:03:47,606 --> 02:03:49,483
and defending the views expressed.
1980
02:03:49,526 --> 02:03:52,484
So I did that. I wrote a rather banal statement
1981
02:03:52,526 --> 02:03:55,438
called "Some Elementary Remarks
on Freedom of Expression".
1982
02:03:55,486 --> 02:03:57,716
And I told them, "Do what you like with it".
1983
02:03:57,766 --> 02:04:00,485
So Pierre produced a book
1984
02:04:00,526 --> 02:04:05,042
in which all the arguments of Faurisson
were to be put in front of the court.
1985
02:04:05,086 --> 02:04:08,158
And we thought it wise
1986
02:04:08,206 --> 02:04:11,198
to use the text of Noam Chomsky
1987
02:04:11,246 --> 02:04:14,204
as a kind of warning, a forward,
1988
02:04:14,246 --> 02:04:17,716
to say that it was
a matter of freedom of expression,
1989
02:04:17,766 --> 02:04:19,996
freedom of thought, freedom of research.
1990
02:04:20,046 --> 02:04:23,482
Why did you try at the last moment
to get it back from the book?
1991
02:04:23,526 --> 02:04:25,198
That's the one thing I'm sorry about.
1992
02:04:25,246 --> 02:04:27,714
- But that's the real important thing.
- No, it's not.
1993
02:04:27,766 --> 02:04:29,404
You mean that I tried to retract it?
1994
02:04:29,446 --> 02:04:33,041
- With that, you said it was wrong of you to do it.
- No. Take a look at what I did.
1995
02:04:33,086 --> 02:04:36,999
I wrote a letter, which was then published,
in which I said,
1996
02:04:37,046 --> 02:04:38,638
"Look, things have reached a point
1997
02:04:38,686 --> 02:04:41,200
where the French intellectual community
1998
02:04:41,246 --> 02:04:44,238
simply is incapable of understanding the issues.
1999
02:04:44,286 --> 02:04:47,596
At this point,
it's just going to confuse matters even more
2000
02:04:47,646 --> 02:04:52,925
if my comments on freedom of speech are
attached to a book which I didn't know existed.
2001
02:04:52,966 --> 02:04:55,605
So, just to clarify things,
you'd better separate them".
2002
02:04:55,646 --> 02:04:58,080
Now, in retrospect, I shouldn't have done that.
2003
02:04:58,126 --> 02:05:01,516
I should have just said, "Fine. Let it appear,
because it ought to appear".
2004
02:05:01,566 --> 02:05:04,160
But apart from that,
2005
02:05:04,206 --> 02:05:06,595
I regard this as not only trivial,
2006
02:05:06,646 --> 02:05:10,355
but as compared with other positions I've taken
on freedom of speech, invisible.
2007
02:05:10,406 --> 02:05:14,194
I do not think the state ought to have the right
to determine historical truth
2008
02:05:14,246 --> 02:05:16,157
and to punish people who deviate from it.
2009
02:05:16,206 --> 02:05:19,118
I'm not willing to give the state that right,
even if they...
2010
02:05:19,166 --> 02:05:22,124
- Are you denying the gas chambers existed?
- Of course not.
2011
02:05:22,166 --> 02:05:24,475
I'm saying, if you believe in freedom of speech,
2012
02:05:24,526 --> 02:05:27,165
you believe in freedom of speech
for views you don't like.
2013
02:05:27,206 --> 02:05:31,438
Goebbels was in favour of freedom of speech
for views he liked, right? So was Stalin.
2014
02:05:31,486 --> 02:05:33,363
If you're in favour of freedom of speech,
2015
02:05:33,406 --> 02:05:37,365
that means you're in favour of freedom
of speech precisely for views you despise.
2016
02:05:37,406 --> 02:05:39,840
Otherwise you're not in favour
of freedom of speech.
2017
02:05:39,886 --> 02:05:43,959
There's two positions you can have on freedom
of speech. You can decide which you want.
2018
02:05:44,006 --> 02:05:47,840
With regard to my defence
of the utterly offensive,
2019
02:05:47,886 --> 02:05:50,605
the people who express utterly offensive views,
2020
02:05:50,646 --> 02:05:53,319
I haven't the slightest doubt
that every commissar says,
2021
02:05:53,366 --> 02:05:55,243
"You're defending that person's views".
2022
02:05:55,286 --> 02:05:57,720
No, I'm not.
I'm defending his right to express them.
2023
02:05:57,766 --> 02:05:59,324
The difference is crucial.
2024
02:05:59,366 --> 02:06:03,962
And the difference has been understood
outside of fascist circles since the 18th century.
2025
02:06:04,006 --> 02:06:08,124
Is there anything like objectivity,
scientific objectivity, reality?
2026
02:06:08,166 --> 02:06:11,841
- As a scientist, where do you stand on this?
- I'm not saying I defend the views.
2027
02:06:11,886 --> 02:06:15,196
If somebody publishes a scientific article
which I disagree with,
2028
02:06:15,246 --> 02:06:18,477
I do not say
the state ought to put him in jail, right?
2029
02:06:18,526 --> 02:06:21,324
- But you don't have to support him...
- I don't support him.
2030
02:06:21,366 --> 02:06:25,200
...and say, "I support him just for the sake
of anybody saying what they want".
2031
02:06:25,246 --> 02:06:27,237
Suppose this guy is taken to court
2032
02:06:27,286 --> 02:06:29,561
and charged with falsification?
2033
02:06:29,606 --> 02:06:32,120
- Then I'll defend him.
- But he wasn't taken to court.
2034
02:06:32,166 --> 02:06:35,203
- Oh, you're wrong.
- But when did you write the support?
2035
02:06:35,246 --> 02:06:36,998
CHOMSKY: When he was brought to court.
2036
02:06:37,046 --> 02:06:39,082
And, in fact, the only support that I gave him
2037
02:06:39,126 --> 02:06:42,243
was to say he has a right
of freedom of speech, period.
2038
02:06:42,286 --> 02:06:45,881
OLMERT: There is no doubt in my mind
that the example I gave about the story,
2039
02:06:45,926 --> 02:06:48,918
that the Holocaust did not exist,
is very, very typical.
2040
02:06:48,966 --> 02:06:51,241
I'll give you another example of this.
2041
02:06:51,286 --> 02:06:55,040
How much of the American press believes
that Faurisson has anything to say?
2042
02:06:55,086 --> 02:06:56,838
How much of the press in France...
2043
02:06:56,886 --> 02:07:00,481
What percentage would you say?
Is it higher than zero?
2044
02:07:00,526 --> 02:07:05,122
Is it higher than zero? Have you ever seen
anything in any newspaper or any journal
2045
02:07:05,166 --> 02:07:07,634
saying that this man
is anything other than a lunatic?
2046
02:07:07,686 --> 02:07:09,119
I'll try to answer.
2047
02:07:09,166 --> 02:07:11,964
- I just follow the case...
- That's a simple question.
2048
02:07:12,006 --> 02:07:14,122
I follow the case five or six years ago.
2049
02:07:14,166 --> 02:07:18,318
I happened to see
that Noam Chomsky was in for strong criticism
2050
02:07:18,366 --> 02:07:20,163
even from some of his supporters
2051
02:07:20,206 --> 02:07:25,564
for doing something which could be interpreted
only in terms of a campaign against Israel.
2052
02:07:25,606 --> 02:07:28,916
Going back years, I am absolutely certain
2053
02:07:28,966 --> 02:07:31,321
that I've taken far more extreme positions
2054
02:07:31,366 --> 02:07:34,597
on people who deny the Holocaust
than you have.
2055
02:07:34,646 --> 02:07:38,764
For example, you go back to my earliest articles
and you will find that I say that
2056
02:07:38,806 --> 02:07:42,242
even to enter into the arena of debate
2057
02:07:42,286 --> 02:07:45,881
on the question
of whether the Nazis carried out such atrocities
2058
02:07:45,926 --> 02:07:47,484
is already to lose one's humanity.
2059
02:07:47,526 --> 02:07:51,155
So I don't even think you ought to discuss
the issue, if you want my opinion.
2060
02:07:51,206 --> 02:07:53,515
But if anybody wants to refute Faurisson,
2061
02:07:53,566 --> 02:07:55,636
there's certainly no difficulty in doing so.
2062
02:08:10,526 --> 02:08:13,040
I'm not interested in...
2063
02:08:14,326 --> 02:08:16,078
...freedom of speech and all that.
2064
02:08:16,126 --> 02:08:18,959
I have to win. And that's the question.
2065
02:08:19,006 --> 02:08:20,917
And I shall win.
2066
02:08:20,966 --> 02:08:22,115
Cut.
2067
02:08:25,646 --> 02:08:27,637
(Train's hooter)
2068
02:08:46,686 --> 02:08:48,916
I'm just an ordinary mum
2069
02:08:48,966 --> 02:08:51,321
who just thinks in terms of...
2070
02:08:51,366 --> 02:08:54,358
I don't want to some day
be holding my grandchildren
2071
02:08:54,406 --> 02:08:56,442
and watching something horrible happen
2072
02:08:56,486 --> 02:08:58,363
and feel like I didn't do anything.
2073
02:08:58,406 --> 02:09:02,035
And I mean, it's obvious what you're doing.
2074
02:09:02,086 --> 02:09:04,759
My question is, on a practical level,
2075
02:09:04,806 --> 02:09:09,118
where do you see the most practical place
to put your energy?
2076
02:09:09,166 --> 02:09:12,681
Tonight, I feel I'm overwhelmed.
I feel like it's too big, it's too much,
2077
02:09:12,726 --> 02:09:14,876
to even make a dent in.
2078
02:09:16,126 --> 02:09:20,005
CHOMSKY: The way things change is because
lots of people are working all the time.
2079
02:09:20,046 --> 02:09:24,483
You know, they're working in their communities,
in their workplace or wherever they are.
2080
02:09:24,526 --> 02:09:28,405
And they're building up the basis
for popular movements
2081
02:09:28,446 --> 02:09:29,959
which are going to make changes.
2082
02:09:30,006 --> 02:09:32,964
That's the way
everything has ever happened in history.
2083
02:09:33,006 --> 02:09:34,917
Whether it was the end of slavery,
2084
02:09:34,966 --> 02:09:38,402
whether it was the democratic revolutions,
2085
02:09:38,446 --> 02:09:42,041
or anything you want, you name it,
that's the way it worked.
2086
02:09:42,086 --> 02:09:45,158
You get a very false picture of this
from the history books.
2087
02:09:45,206 --> 02:09:47,800
In the history books, there's a couple of leaders.
2088
02:09:47,846 --> 02:09:50,155
You know, George Washington,
2089
02:09:50,206 --> 02:09:52,037
or Martin Luther King or whatever.
2090
02:09:52,086 --> 02:09:54,554
And I don't want to say
those people are unimportant.
2091
02:09:54,606 --> 02:09:58,076
Martin Luther King was important,
but he was not the Civil Rights Movement.
2092
02:09:58,126 --> 02:10:01,402
Martin Luther King can appear
in the history books
2093
02:10:01,446 --> 02:10:04,483
cos lots of people
whose names you will never know
2094
02:10:04,526 --> 02:10:07,882
and whose names are all forgotten
and who may have been killed and so on,
2095
02:10:07,926 --> 02:10:09,917
were working down in the South.
2096
02:10:11,286 --> 02:10:15,484
When you have active... activists,
2097
02:10:15,526 --> 02:10:19,917
and people concerned and people devoting
themselves and dedicating themselves
2098
02:10:19,966 --> 02:10:21,843
to social change or issues or whatever,
2099
02:10:21,886 --> 02:10:24,764
then people like me can appear.
2100
02:10:24,806 --> 02:10:28,685
We can appear to be prominent. But that's only
cos somebody else is doing the work.
2101
02:10:28,726 --> 02:10:32,685
My work,
whether it's giving hundreds of talks a year
2102
02:10:32,726 --> 02:10:36,241
or spending 20 hours a week
writing letters or writing books,
2103
02:10:36,286 --> 02:10:40,564
is not directed to intellectuals and politicians.
2104
02:10:40,606 --> 02:10:43,962
It's directed to what are called
"ordinary people".
2105
02:10:44,006 --> 02:10:48,602
What I expect from them is, in fact,
exactly what they are.
2106
02:10:48,646 --> 02:10:51,683
That they should try to understand the world
2107
02:10:51,726 --> 02:10:54,160
and act in accordance
with their decent impulses.
2108
02:10:54,206 --> 02:10:56,959
And that they should try to improve the world.
2109
02:10:57,006 --> 02:10:59,804
Many are willing to do that.
But they have to understand.
2110
02:10:59,846 --> 02:11:01,723
As far as I can see, in these things,
2111
02:11:01,766 --> 02:11:06,920
I feel that I'm simply helping people develop
courses of intellectual self-defence.
2112
02:11:06,966 --> 02:11:08,957
What did you mean by that?
2113
02:11:09,006 --> 02:11:11,395
What would such a course be?
2114
02:11:11,446 --> 02:11:14,279
I don't mean go to school,
because you'll not get it there.
2115
02:11:15,766 --> 02:11:20,635
It means you have to develop
an independent mind and work on it.
2116
02:11:20,686 --> 02:11:22,438
That's extremely hard to do alone.
2117
02:11:23,366 --> 02:11:26,438
The beauty of our system is
it isolates everybody.
2118
02:11:26,486 --> 02:11:29,364
Each person is sitting alone in front of the tube.
2119
02:11:29,406 --> 02:11:33,445
It's very hard to have ideas or thoughts
under those circumstances.
2120
02:11:33,486 --> 02:11:35,477
You can't fight the world alone.
2121
02:11:35,526 --> 02:11:37,915
Some people can, but it's pretty rare.
2122
02:11:37,966 --> 02:11:39,957
The way to do it is through organisation.
2123
02:11:40,006 --> 02:11:42,474
So courses of intellectual self-defence
2124
02:11:42,526 --> 02:11:47,998
will have to be in the context
of political and other organisation.
2125
02:11:50,086 --> 02:11:54,364
And it makes sense, I think,
to look at what the institutions are trying to do
2126
02:11:54,406 --> 02:11:56,044
and to take that almost as a key.
2127
02:11:56,086 --> 02:11:58,759
What they're trying to do
is what we're trying to combat.
2128
02:11:58,806 --> 02:12:03,004
If they're trying to keep people
isolated and separate, and so on,
2129
02:12:03,046 --> 02:12:05,640
then we'll try and do the opposite,
bring them together.
2130
02:12:05,686 --> 02:12:10,885
So, in your local community,
you want to have sources of alternative action,
2131
02:12:10,926 --> 02:12:14,316
people with parallel concerns,
maybe differently focused,
2132
02:12:14,366 --> 02:12:17,164
but, at the core, sort of similar values
2133
02:12:17,206 --> 02:12:21,882
and a similar interest in helping people defend
themselves against external power
2134
02:12:21,926 --> 02:12:23,723
and taking control of their lives
2135
02:12:23,766 --> 02:12:26,075
and reaching out your hand
to people who need it.
2136
02:12:26,126 --> 02:12:28,003
That's a common array of concerns.
2137
02:12:28,046 --> 02:12:30,002
You can learn about your own values
2138
02:12:30,046 --> 02:12:33,675
and you can figure out how to defend yourself
in conjunction with others.
2139
02:12:33,726 --> 02:12:38,925
Erm... are there one or two publications
that I, as an average person, a biologist,
2140
02:12:38,966 --> 02:12:43,039
can read to bypass this filter of our press?
2141
02:12:43,086 --> 02:12:46,761
Now, if you ask, "What media can I turn to
to get the right answers?"
2142
02:12:46,806 --> 02:12:48,922
First of all, I wouldn't tell you that,
2143
02:12:48,966 --> 02:12:50,843
because I don't think there's an answer.
2144
02:12:50,886 --> 02:12:53,923
The right answers are what you decide
are the right answers.
2145
02:12:53,966 --> 02:12:56,196
Maybe everything I'm telling you is wrong.
2146
02:12:56,246 --> 02:12:58,635
It could perfectly well be. I'm not God.
2147
02:12:58,686 --> 02:13:02,679
But that's something for you to figure out.
I can tell you what I think happens to be right.
2148
02:13:02,726 --> 02:13:05,604
But there isn't any reason
why you should pay any attention to it.
2149
02:13:05,926 --> 02:13:10,556
What impact do you feel alternative media is
currently having or could potentially have?
2150
02:13:10,606 --> 02:13:13,518
I'm actually a little more interested
in its potential.
2151
02:13:13,566 --> 02:13:15,284
And just to define my terms,
2152
02:13:15,326 --> 02:13:20,002
by alternative media, I'm referring to media
that are or could be citizen-controlled
2153
02:13:20,046 --> 02:13:22,241
as opposed to state or corporate-controlled.
2154
02:13:22,286 --> 02:13:24,754
That's what's kept people together.
2155
02:13:24,806 --> 02:13:27,843
To the extent that people are able
to do something constructive,
2156
02:13:27,886 --> 02:13:30,320
it's because they have some way of interacting.
2157
02:13:30,366 --> 02:13:32,834
I've always felt it would be a very positive thing
2158
02:13:32,886 --> 02:13:34,797
and it should be pushed as far as it can go.
2159
02:13:34,846 --> 02:13:37,041
I think it's going to have a very hard time.
2160
02:13:37,086 --> 02:13:42,001
There's just such a concentration
of resources and power that...
2161
02:13:43,246 --> 02:13:45,521
...alternative media,
2162
02:13:45,566 --> 02:13:49,718
while extremely important,
are going to have quite a battle.
2163
02:13:49,766 --> 02:13:53,042
It's true there are things
which are small successes.
2164
02:13:53,086 --> 02:13:57,125
But it's because people have just been willing
to put in an incredible effort.
2165
02:13:57,166 --> 02:13:59,043
Like, say, take Z Magazine.
2166
02:13:59,086 --> 02:14:01,964
I mean, that's a national magazine
2167
02:14:02,006 --> 02:14:04,440
which literally has a staff of two
2168
02:14:04,486 --> 02:14:06,397
and no resources.
2169
02:14:07,246 --> 02:14:10,795
Tell us a little about Z Magazine,
what it is and what makes it different.
2170
02:14:10,846 --> 02:14:12,404
Go ahead.
2171
02:14:12,446 --> 02:14:14,880
Go ahead? Thank you.
2172
02:14:14,926 --> 02:14:19,636
ALBERT: We just wanted to do a magazine
that would address all the sides of political life.
2173
02:14:19,686 --> 02:14:22,359
Economics, race, gender,
2174
02:14:22,406 --> 02:14:24,681
authority, political relations.
2175
02:14:24,726 --> 02:14:27,194
And we wanted to do it in a way
that would incorporate
2176
02:14:27,246 --> 02:14:30,602
attention to how to not only understand
what's going on,
2177
02:14:30,646 --> 02:14:32,876
but how to make things better, what to aim for,
2178
02:14:32,926 --> 02:14:37,522
and to provide, at the same time,
humour, culture.
2179
02:14:37,566 --> 02:14:42,276
A kind of magazine that people could relate to
and get a lot out of and participate in.
2180
02:14:42,326 --> 02:14:46,444
What we wanted to do, which we didn't think
was provided by the existing magazines,
2181
02:14:46,486 --> 02:14:49,876
was to give it a real activist slant.
2182
02:14:49,926 --> 02:14:55,364
So that it could be very useful
to the variety of movements in the country.
2183
02:14:55,406 --> 02:14:59,160
We just felt there wasn't a magazine
that reflected that, that inspired people,
2184
02:14:59,206 --> 02:15:02,960
and that gave people a strategy
and perhaps even a vision
2185
02:15:03,006 --> 02:15:04,962
of how things could be better.
2186
02:15:11,966 --> 02:15:14,605
CHOMSKY: South End Press
has sort of made it.
2187
02:15:14,646 --> 02:15:17,365
That is, they're surviving.
2188
02:15:17,406 --> 02:15:19,715
It's a small collective, again with no resources.
2189
02:15:19,766 --> 02:15:21,836
They've put out a lot of good books.
2190
02:15:21,886 --> 02:15:26,038
But for a South End book to get reviewed
is almost impossible.
2191
02:15:26,086 --> 02:15:28,725
Editorially and business-wise,
2192
02:15:28,766 --> 02:15:35,444
we make decisions based on a politics
that no corporate publisher can really advocate
2193
02:15:35,486 --> 02:15:38,364
because of their ties to corporate America.
2194
02:15:38,406 --> 02:15:43,878
We can solicit manuscripts based on
what we feel is the relevance for the movement.
2195
02:15:43,926 --> 02:15:46,042
And we can make our business decisions
2196
02:15:46,086 --> 02:15:49,556
based on whether we feel
people can afford our books,
2197
02:15:49,606 --> 02:15:53,394
whether we feel that
a book might not make that much money
2198
02:15:53,446 --> 02:15:55,004
but it needs to be out there,
2199
02:15:55,046 --> 02:15:57,435
and maybe there is 1,000 people
who would buy it.
2200
02:15:57,486 --> 02:16:01,798
And those are criteria
that we feel are very precious
2201
02:16:01,846 --> 02:16:03,916
in this day of corporate mergers.
2202
02:16:03,966 --> 02:16:10,519
And likewise, our structure about sharing work
and continuing our training process
2203
02:16:10,566 --> 02:16:12,443
as long as we're at the press.
2204
02:16:12,486 --> 02:16:15,284
There are losses there in terms of productivity,
2205
02:16:15,326 --> 02:16:17,237
but in terms of empowerment,
2206
02:16:17,286 --> 02:16:20,437
all of us are then able to say...
2207
02:16:21,206 --> 02:16:23,595
"My perspective is different from yours".
2208
02:16:23,646 --> 02:16:28,276
Then all of our intelligence gets used
in making those decisions,
2209
02:16:28,326 --> 02:16:31,557
and not just whoever happens
to have done it the longest,
2210
02:16:31,606 --> 02:16:35,201
whoever happens to have graduated
from the best schools
2211
02:16:35,246 --> 02:16:37,282
in order to be the best editor,
2212
02:16:37,326 --> 02:16:41,478
making all the decisions
and only using his or her intelligence.
2213
02:16:41,526 --> 02:16:44,199
Citizen-supported radio in the United States
2214
02:16:44,246 --> 02:16:47,682
has undergone a remarkable growth
in the last decade.
2215
02:16:47,726 --> 02:16:52,004
It's perhaps the fastest-growing
alternative media.
2216
02:16:52,046 --> 02:16:54,321
There are many reasons for this.
2217
02:16:54,366 --> 02:16:57,722
First and foremost
is that it's enormously economical.
2218
02:16:57,766 --> 02:17:02,999
It reaches communities that have not been
served by community radio before.
2219
02:17:03,966 --> 02:17:06,400
In Boulder,
we see with someone like Noam Chomsky,
2220
02:17:06,446 --> 02:17:09,756
who's been there, I believe,
three times in the last six years,
2221
02:17:09,806 --> 02:17:11,762
he has a tremendous audience.
2222
02:17:11,806 --> 02:17:14,161
And KGNU is partly responsible for that.
2223
02:17:14,206 --> 02:17:16,879
Because we play his tapes on a regular basis.
2224
02:17:16,926 --> 02:17:19,360
We play his lectures and his interviews.
2225
02:17:19,406 --> 02:17:22,921
So, when he does come to Boulder
and people hear what he has to say,
2226
02:17:22,966 --> 02:17:27,881
they're able to tune in, it's not something exotic
or esoteric he's talking about.
2227
02:17:27,926 --> 02:17:31,965
It's material that they're very familiar with.
He's noted this, incidentally.
2228
02:17:32,006 --> 02:17:34,998
CHOMSKY: If there's a listener-supported
radio station,
2229
02:17:35,046 --> 02:17:38,561
it means that people can get daily, every day,
2230
02:17:38,606 --> 02:17:40,995
a different way of looking at the world.
2231
02:17:41,046 --> 02:17:44,356
Not just what the corporate media
want you to see,
2232
02:17:44,406 --> 02:17:47,045
but a different picture,
a different understanding.
2233
02:17:47,086 --> 02:17:49,839
Not only can you hear it,
but you can participate in it.
2234
02:17:49,886 --> 02:17:51,604
You can add your own thoughts.
2235
02:17:51,646 --> 02:17:53,637
You can learn something, and so on.
2236
02:17:53,686 --> 02:17:57,679
Well, that's the way people become human.
2237
02:17:57,726 --> 02:18:03,483
That's the way you become human participants
in a social and political system.
2238
02:18:04,286 --> 02:18:06,925
Hello, I'm Ed Robinson
and this is non-corporate news.
2239
02:18:06,966 --> 02:18:10,356
What is non-corporate news
and why is it necessary?
2240
02:18:10,406 --> 02:18:13,637
I didn't want to just show another film
at a library or something.
2241
02:18:13,686 --> 02:18:17,395
I wanted to make my own statement.
I thought it'd be more fun to do.
2242
02:18:17,446 --> 02:18:19,676
Perhaps I'd get others involved in a project.
2243
02:18:19,726 --> 02:18:24,197
Besides showing a film,
we could make a film or a video.
2244
02:18:24,246 --> 02:18:30,242
The local cable station's hooked up to three
communities - Lynn, Swampscott and Salem.
2245
02:18:30,286 --> 02:18:32,083
So that's 30,000 people,
2246
02:18:32,126 --> 02:18:34,196
or 30,000 homes.
2247
02:18:34,246 --> 02:18:36,237
I'm not sure. But I'm sure...
2248
02:18:36,286 --> 02:18:40,677
a lot of people see it and it'll be the kind
of people who don't go out to see a film.
2249
02:18:40,726 --> 02:18:45,277
It'll go right into their houses.
So, if they're flipping through their channels,
2250
02:18:45,326 --> 02:18:48,921
they might be able to get
a completely new idea of the world.
2251
02:18:55,486 --> 02:18:58,523
CHOMSKY: So there's kind of networks
of co-operation developing.
2252
02:18:58,566 --> 02:19:00,557
I mean, like here, for example.
2253
02:19:00,606 --> 02:19:04,121
There's a collection of stuff
from a friend of mine in Los Angeles
2254
02:19:04,166 --> 02:19:08,682
who does careful monitoring
of the whole press in Los Angeles
2255
02:19:08,726 --> 02:19:10,921
and a lot of the British press, which he reads.
2256
02:19:10,966 --> 02:19:12,877
And he does selections.
2257
02:19:12,926 --> 02:19:17,522
So I don't have to read the movie reviews
and the local gossip and all this kind of stuff.
2258
02:19:17,566 --> 02:19:20,205
But I get the occasional nugget
that sneaks through
2259
02:19:20,246 --> 02:19:26,435
and that you find if you're carefully, intelligently
and critically reviewing a wide range of press.
2260
02:19:26,486 --> 02:19:29,796
There are a fair number of people who do this
and we exchange information.
2261
02:19:29,846 --> 02:19:31,564
We wrote this two-volume work.
2262
02:19:31,606 --> 02:19:34,279
We saw one another for a couple of weeks
2263
02:19:34,326 --> 02:19:36,078
when we were getting started.
2264
02:19:36,126 --> 02:19:40,005
But then we wrote two volumes,
essentially without seeing one another.
2265
02:19:40,046 --> 02:19:43,959
Just by phone, by mail,
2266
02:19:44,006 --> 02:19:46,201
and exchanging manuscripts.
2267
02:19:46,246 --> 02:19:50,603
But this takes a lot of communication by mail.
2268
02:19:50,646 --> 02:19:54,082
My Chomsky file is a couple of feet thick.
2269
02:19:54,126 --> 02:19:57,004
The end result is that
you do have access to resources
2270
02:19:57,046 --> 02:20:01,995
in a way which I doubt that
any national intelligence agency can duplicate,
2271
02:20:02,046 --> 02:20:03,365
let alone scholarship.
2272
02:20:03,406 --> 02:20:07,763
So there are ways of compensating
for the absence of resources.
2273
02:20:07,806 --> 02:20:09,444
People can do things.
2274
02:20:09,486 --> 02:20:13,240
For example,
I found out about the arms flow to Iran
2275
02:20:13,286 --> 02:20:15,277
by reading transcripts of the BBC
2276
02:20:15,326 --> 02:20:20,639
and by reading an interview somewhere
with an Israeli ambassador in one city
2277
02:20:20,686 --> 02:20:23,200
and reading something else in the Israeli press.
2278
02:20:23,246 --> 02:20:24,964
OK, the information is there.
2279
02:20:25,006 --> 02:20:27,042
But it's there to a fanatic.
2280
02:20:27,086 --> 02:20:31,637
You know, somebody who wants to spend
a substantial part of their time and energy
2281
02:20:31,686 --> 02:20:36,043
exploring it and comparing today's lies
with yesterday's leaks, and so on.
2282
02:20:36,086 --> 02:20:37,644
That's a research job.
2283
02:20:37,686 --> 02:20:42,441
And it just simply doesn't make any sense
to ask the general population
2284
02:20:42,486 --> 02:20:45,762
to dedicate themselves to this task
on every issue.
2285
02:20:46,806 --> 02:20:48,603
I'm not given to false modesty.
2286
02:20:48,646 --> 02:20:52,036
There are things that I can do.
I know that I can do them reasonably well,
2287
02:20:52,086 --> 02:20:53,804
including...
2288
02:20:55,406 --> 02:20:57,397
...analysis and, you know...
2289
02:20:59,086 --> 02:21:00,405
...study, research.
2290
02:21:00,446 --> 02:21:04,598
I know how to do that. I think I've a reasonable
understanding of the way the world works,
2291
02:21:04,646 --> 02:21:06,557
as much as anyone can.
2292
02:21:06,606 --> 02:21:08,722
And that turns out to be a very useful resource
2293
02:21:08,766 --> 02:21:12,554
for people who are doing active organising...
2294
02:21:14,486 --> 02:21:17,159
...trying to engage themselves
2295
02:21:17,206 --> 02:21:19,879
in a way which will make it
a little bit of a better world.
2296
02:21:19,926 --> 02:21:22,963
And if you can help in those things,
or participate in them,
2297
02:21:23,006 --> 02:21:24,997
well, that's rewarding.
2298
02:21:25,046 --> 02:21:27,765
I wonder if you can envision a time
2299
02:21:27,806 --> 02:21:33,199
when people like myself,
and again, the na�ve people of this world
2300
02:21:33,246 --> 02:21:35,806
can again take pride in the United States?
2301
02:21:35,846 --> 02:21:39,361
And is that even a healthy wish now?
2302
02:21:39,406 --> 02:21:43,194
Because it's maybe this hunger
for pride in our country
2303
02:21:43,246 --> 02:21:45,362
that makes us more easily manipulated
2304
02:21:45,406 --> 02:21:47,124
by the powers that you talk about.
2305
02:21:47,166 --> 02:21:51,478
Er... I think you first of all have to ask
what you mean by your country.
2306
02:21:51,526 --> 02:21:54,723
Now, if you mean by "the country"
the government,
2307
02:21:54,766 --> 02:21:58,475
I don't think you can be proud of it
and I don't think you could ever be proud of it.
2308
02:21:58,526 --> 02:22:00,676
(Applause)
- Or be proud of any government.
2309
02:22:00,726 --> 02:22:02,284
It's not our government.
2310
02:22:02,326 --> 02:22:04,556
And you shouldn't be.
2311
02:22:04,606 --> 02:22:06,437
States are violent institutions.
2312
02:22:06,486 --> 02:22:10,195
The government of any country, including ours,
2313
02:22:10,246 --> 02:22:13,238
represents a domestic power structure
and it's usually violent.
2314
02:22:13,286 --> 02:22:17,598
States are violent to the extent
that they're powerful. That's roughly accurate.
2315
02:22:17,646 --> 02:22:20,558
You look at American history,
it's nothing to write home about.
2316
02:22:20,606 --> 02:22:25,316
Why are we here? We're here because some
ten million native Americans were wiped out.
2317
02:22:25,366 --> 02:22:26,924
That's not very pretty.
2318
02:22:27,726 --> 02:22:31,560
Until the 1960s,
it was still cowboys and Indians.
2319
02:22:31,606 --> 02:22:34,757
In the 1970s, for the first time, really,
2320
02:22:34,806 --> 02:22:38,685
it became possible, even for scholarship,
to try to deal with the facts as they were.
2321
02:22:38,726 --> 02:22:43,083
For example, to deal with the fact that
the Native American population was far higher
2322
02:22:43,126 --> 02:22:44,605
than had been claimed.
2323
02:22:44,646 --> 02:22:47,877
Millions higher, maybe as many as ten million
higher than was claimed.
2324
02:22:47,926 --> 02:22:49,882
That they had an advanced civilisation,
2325
02:22:49,926 --> 02:22:53,282
and that there was something akin to genocide
that took place.
2326
02:22:53,326 --> 02:22:56,682
Now, we went through 200 years of our history
without facing that fact.
2327
02:22:56,726 --> 02:22:58,682
One of the effects of the 1960s
2328
02:22:58,726 --> 02:23:03,083
is it's possible to at least begin
to come to think about the facts.
2329
02:23:03,126 --> 02:23:05,003
Well, that's an advance.
2330
02:23:05,046 --> 02:23:07,879
INTERVIEWER: Do you think
that this activism 20 years ago
2331
02:23:07,926 --> 02:23:10,918
has made a difference
in how our society operates now?
2332
02:23:10,966 --> 02:23:15,357
CHOMSKY: It has not changed the institutions
in the way they function.
2333
02:23:16,566 --> 02:23:19,603
But it has led
to very significant cultural changes.
2334
02:23:19,646 --> 02:23:21,762
Remember, these movements of the '60s
2335
02:23:21,806 --> 02:23:25,321
expanded in the '70s
and expanded further in the '80s.
2336
02:23:25,366 --> 02:23:28,756
They reached into other parts of the society
and different issues.
2337
02:23:28,806 --> 02:23:34,915
A lot of things that seemed outrageous
in the '60s are taken for granted today.
2338
02:23:34,966 --> 02:23:38,038
So, for example, take the feminist movement,
2339
02:23:38,086 --> 02:23:40,805
which barely began to exist in the '60s.
2340
02:23:40,846 --> 02:23:43,519
Now it's part of general consciousness
and awareness.
2341
02:23:43,566 --> 02:23:47,525
The ecological movements began in the '70s.
2342
02:23:47,566 --> 02:23:52,356
The Third World solidarity movements
were very limited in the '60s.
2343
02:23:52,406 --> 02:23:53,839
It was really Vietnam.
2344
02:23:53,886 --> 02:23:57,720
And in the '60s also,
it was a student movement, as you say.
2345
02:23:57,766 --> 02:24:01,520
Now it's not. Now it's mainstream America.
2346
02:24:03,726 --> 02:24:06,638
MO YERS: If there is more dissidence now
than you can remember,
2347
02:24:06,686 --> 02:24:10,964
why do you go on to write
that the people feel isolated?
2348
02:24:11,006 --> 02:24:14,794
Because I think
much of the general population recognises
2349
02:24:14,846 --> 02:24:21,081
that the organised institutions do not reflect
their concerns and interests and needs.
2350
02:24:21,126 --> 02:24:24,755
They do not feel that they participate
meaningfully in the political system.
2351
02:24:24,806 --> 02:24:29,322
They do not feel that the media are telling them
the truth or even reflect their concerns.
2352
02:24:30,446 --> 02:24:34,837
They go outside
of the organised institutions to act.
2353
02:24:34,886 --> 02:24:39,118
We see more of our elected leaders and know
less of what they do. This medium does that.
2354
02:24:39,166 --> 02:24:40,724
It's very striking.
2355
02:24:40,766 --> 02:24:43,803
The Presidential elections are
almost removed from the point
2356
02:24:43,846 --> 02:24:47,122
where the public takes them seriously
as involving a matter of choice.
2357
02:24:47,166 --> 02:24:49,919
What do you think about what goes on
in the White House?
2358
02:24:49,966 --> 02:24:51,638
It's kept too private, I think.
2359
02:24:51,686 --> 02:24:53,995
Yeah, they should come out
and talk to the people.
2360
02:24:54,046 --> 02:24:56,162
- Yeah.
- Who should talk to the people?
2361
02:24:56,206 --> 02:24:58,003
George Bush!
2362
02:24:58,046 --> 02:25:01,356
Well, it means that
the political system increasingly...
2363
02:25:01,406 --> 02:25:04,364
increasingly functions without public input.
2364
02:25:04,406 --> 02:25:06,715
It means, to an increasing extent,
2365
02:25:06,766 --> 02:25:10,202
not only do people not ratify decisions
presented to them,
2366
02:25:10,246 --> 02:25:12,601
but they don't take the trouble of ratifying them.
2367
02:25:12,646 --> 02:25:17,674
They assume that the decisions are going on
independently of what they do in the poll booth.
2368
02:25:17,726 --> 02:25:19,557
MO YERS: Ratification would be what?
2369
02:25:19,606 --> 02:25:24,202
CHOMSKY: Ratification would mean there are
two positions presented to me, the voter.
2370
02:25:24,246 --> 02:25:27,443
I go into the polling booth
and I push one or another button,
2371
02:25:27,486 --> 02:25:29,681
depending on which of those positions I want.
2372
02:25:29,726 --> 02:25:31,762
That's a very limited form of democracy.
2373
02:25:31,806 --> 02:25:36,561
Really meaningful democracy would mean that
I play a role in forming those decisions,
2374
02:25:36,606 --> 02:25:38,756
in creating those positions.
2375
02:25:38,806 --> 02:25:41,445
That would be real democracy.
We're very far from that.
2376
02:25:41,486 --> 02:25:44,398
We're even departing from a point
where there is ratification.
2377
02:25:44,446 --> 02:25:46,801
When you have stage-managed elections,
2378
02:25:46,846 --> 02:25:51,283
with the public relations industry determining
what words come out of people's mouth,
2379
02:25:51,326 --> 02:25:56,241
candidates deciding what to say on the basis of
tests that determine what the effect will be
2380
02:25:56,286 --> 02:25:58,038
across the population,
2381
02:25:58,086 --> 02:26:01,874
somehow people don't see how profoundly
contemptuous that is of democracy.
2382
02:26:06,006 --> 02:26:07,485
(Fanfare)
2383
02:26:07,526 --> 02:26:11,644
The solemn moment is near.
But first, the swearing-in of Dan Quayle.
2384
02:26:16,726 --> 02:26:19,524
Please move to your seats.
2385
02:26:19,566 --> 02:26:21,682
For the first time in this century,
2386
02:26:21,726 --> 02:26:25,799
for the first time in perhaps all history,
2387
02:26:25,846 --> 02:26:30,044
Man does not have to invent a system
by which to live.
2388
02:26:30,086 --> 02:26:35,160
We don't have to talk late into the night
about which form of government is better.
2389
02:26:35,206 --> 02:26:38,004
We don't have to wrest justice...
2390
02:26:38,886 --> 02:26:40,524
...from the kings.
2391
02:26:40,566 --> 02:26:43,922
We only have to summon it
from within ourselves.
2392
02:26:43,966 --> 02:26:48,244
This is a time when the future seems a door
you can walk right through
2393
02:26:48,286 --> 02:26:50,356
into a room called Tomorrow.
2394
02:26:50,406 --> 02:26:54,240
Great nations of the world
are moving toward democracy
2395
02:26:54,286 --> 02:26:56,117
through the door to freedom.
2396
02:26:56,166 --> 02:27:01,115
The people of the world agitate
for free expression and free thought
2397
02:27:01,166 --> 02:27:05,523
through the door to the moral
and intellectual satisfactions
2398
02:27:05,566 --> 02:27:08,205
that only liberty allows.
2399
02:27:09,446 --> 02:27:14,679
We know how to secure a more just
and prosperous life for men on Earth.
2400
02:27:14,726 --> 02:27:16,637
Through free markets,
2401
02:27:16,686 --> 02:27:19,154
free speech, free elections,
2402
02:27:19,206 --> 02:27:23,996
and the exercise of free will
unhampered by the state.
2403
02:27:24,926 --> 02:27:26,962
I've spoken of 1,000 points of light,
2404
02:27:27,006 --> 02:27:30,123
of all the community organisations
2405
02:27:30,166 --> 02:27:33,715
that are spread like stars throughout the nation
doing good.
2406
02:27:34,646 --> 02:27:38,275
To the world, too,
we offer new engagement
2407
02:27:38,326 --> 02:27:40,317
and a renewed vow.
2408
02:27:41,366 --> 02:27:44,961
- We will stay strong to protect the peace.
(Whir of helicopter)
2409
02:27:46,366 --> 02:27:48,084
The offered hand...
2410
02:27:49,246 --> 02:27:51,123
...is a reluctant fist.
2411
02:27:52,126 --> 02:27:55,277
America is never wholly herself
2412
02:27:55,326 --> 02:28:00,081
unless she is engaged in high moral principle.
2413
02:28:00,126 --> 02:28:03,038
We, as a people, have such a purpose today.
2414
02:28:04,086 --> 02:28:05,758
It is...
2415
02:28:05,806 --> 02:28:08,274
to make kinder the face of the nation
2416
02:28:08,326 --> 02:28:11,124
and gentler the face of the world.
2417
02:28:15,646 --> 02:28:17,841
Referring back to your earlier comment
2418
02:28:17,886 --> 02:28:21,003
about escaping from
or doing away with capitalism,
2419
02:28:21,046 --> 02:28:25,039
I was wondering what scheme,
workable scheme, you would put in its place.
2420
02:28:25,086 --> 02:28:26,963
Me?
2421
02:28:27,006 --> 02:28:29,315
- Well, what I would...
(Laughter)
2422
02:28:29,366 --> 02:28:33,678
What would you suggest to others who might be
in a position to set it up and get it going?
2423
02:28:33,726 --> 02:28:39,323
Well, I mean, I think that what used to be called,
centuries ago, wage slavery is intolerable.
2424
02:28:39,366 --> 02:28:43,279
I don't think people ought to be forced
to rent themselves in order to survive.
2425
02:28:43,326 --> 02:28:49,037
I think that the economic institutions
ought to be run democratically
2426
02:28:49,086 --> 02:28:52,965
by their participants, by the communities
in which they exist, and so on,
2427
02:28:53,006 --> 02:28:56,715
and I think basically
through various kinds of free association.
2428
02:28:59,726 --> 02:29:03,560
Historically, have there been
any sustained examples
2429
02:29:03,606 --> 02:29:05,881
on any substantial scale
2430
02:29:05,926 --> 02:29:10,204
of societies which approximated
to the anarchist ideal?
2431
02:29:11,086 --> 02:29:13,805
There are small societies,
2432
02:29:13,846 --> 02:29:15,438
small in number,
2433
02:29:15,486 --> 02:29:18,717
that have, I think, done so quite well.
2434
02:29:18,766 --> 02:29:23,203
And there are a few examples
of large-scale libertarian revolutions
2435
02:29:23,246 --> 02:29:25,760
which were largely anarchist in their structure.
2436
02:29:25,806 --> 02:29:29,640
As to the first, small societies,
extending over a long period,
2437
02:29:29,686 --> 02:29:33,838
I myself think the most dramatic example
was perhaps the Israeli Kibbutzim,
2438
02:29:33,886 --> 02:29:37,003
which, for a long period -
it may or may not be true today -
2439
02:29:37,046 --> 02:29:39,480
really were constructed on anarchist principles.
2440
02:29:39,526 --> 02:29:41,835
That is, of direct worker control,
2441
02:29:41,886 --> 02:29:46,004
integration of agriculture, industry, service,
personal life,
2442
02:29:46,046 --> 02:29:50,244
on an egalitarian basis with direct and
quite active participation in self-management,
2443
02:29:50,286 --> 02:29:53,517
and were, I should think,
extraordinarily successful.
2444
02:29:53,566 --> 02:29:57,559
A good example
of a really large-scale anarchist revolution,
2445
02:29:57,606 --> 02:30:00,882
or largely anarchist revolution,
the best example to my knowledge,
2446
02:30:00,926 --> 02:30:03,394
is the Spanish Revolution in 1936.
2447
02:30:03,446 --> 02:30:06,563
In fact, you can't tell
what would have happened.
2448
02:30:06,606 --> 02:30:09,279
That anarchist revolution
was simply destroyed by force.
2449
02:30:09,326 --> 02:30:13,160
But during the period in which it was alive,
I think it was an inspiring testimony
2450
02:30:13,206 --> 02:30:16,596
to the ability of poor working people
2451
02:30:16,646 --> 02:30:21,959
to organise and manage their affairs extremely
successfully, without coercion or control.
2452
02:30:22,006 --> 02:30:26,079
How far does the success of libertarian
socialism or anarchism as a way of life
2453
02:30:26,126 --> 02:30:28,845
really depend on a fundamental change
2454
02:30:28,886 --> 02:30:34,199
in the nature of man,
both in his motivation, his altruism,
2455
02:30:34,246 --> 02:30:36,965
and also in his knowledge and sophistication?
2456
02:30:37,006 --> 02:30:38,678
I think it not only depends on it
2457
02:30:38,726 --> 02:30:43,322
but, in fact, the whole purpose of libertarian
socialism is that it will contribute to it.
2458
02:30:43,366 --> 02:30:47,484
It will contribute to a spiritual transformation.
2459
02:30:47,526 --> 02:30:50,563
Precisely that kind of great transformation
2460
02:30:50,606 --> 02:30:53,678
in the way humans conceive of themselves
2461
02:30:53,726 --> 02:30:57,605
and their ability to act, to decide,
2462
02:30:57,646 --> 02:30:59,318
to create, to produce, to enquire.
2463
02:30:59,366 --> 02:31:02,244
Precisely that spiritual transformation that...
2464
02:31:02,286 --> 02:31:05,164
social thinkers from the Let-Marxist tradition,
2465
02:31:05,206 --> 02:31:09,916
from Luxemburg, say, on over through
anarcho-syndicalists, have emphasised.
2466
02:31:09,966 --> 02:31:13,800
So, on the one hand,
it requires that spiritual transformation.
2467
02:31:13,846 --> 02:31:18,681
But also, its purpose is to create institutions
which will contribute to that transformation.
2468
02:31:23,486 --> 02:31:27,479
INTERVIEWER: You've written that,
in looking at contributions of gited thinkers,
2469
02:31:27,526 --> 02:31:30,643
one must make sure
to understand their contributions,
2470
02:31:30,686 --> 02:31:33,120
but also to eliminate the errors in them.
2471
02:31:34,326 --> 02:31:38,365
And, of your ideas, what would you guess
would be discarded
2472
02:31:38,406 --> 02:31:40,044
and what would be assimilated
2473
02:31:40,086 --> 02:31:41,644
by future thinkers?
2474
02:31:41,686 --> 02:31:45,156
Well, I would assume
virtually everything would be discarded.
2475
02:31:45,206 --> 02:31:46,844
For example...
2476
02:31:46,886 --> 02:31:49,036
Here, we have to distinguish.
2477
02:31:49,086 --> 02:31:51,554
The work that I do in my professional area...
2478
02:31:51,606 --> 02:31:55,565
If I still believed what I believed ten years ago,
I'd assume the field is dead.
2479
02:31:55,606 --> 02:31:58,916
So I assume,
next time you read a student's paper,
2480
02:31:58,966 --> 02:32:03,244
you're going to see something that has to be
changed and you continue to make progress.
2481
02:32:03,286 --> 02:32:05,720
In dealing with social and political issues,
2482
02:32:05,766 --> 02:32:10,157
in my view, what is at all understood
is pretty straightforward.
2483
02:32:10,206 --> 02:32:14,438
There may be deep and complicated things.
But, if so, they're not understood.
2484
02:32:16,486 --> 02:32:21,685
The basic... To the extent that we understand
society at all, it's pretty straightforward.
2485
02:32:21,726 --> 02:32:25,958
And I don't think those simple understandings
are likely to undergo much change.
2486
02:32:26,006 --> 02:32:27,997
The point is that you have to work.
2487
02:32:28,046 --> 02:32:31,800
That's why
the propaganda system is so successful.
2488
02:32:31,846 --> 02:32:35,805
Very few people are going to have
the time or the energy or the commitment
2489
02:32:35,846 --> 02:32:39,043
to carry out the constant battle that's required
2490
02:32:39,086 --> 02:32:41,759
to get outside of, you know...
2491
02:32:41,806 --> 02:32:43,398
MacNeil/Lehrer
2492
02:32:43,446 --> 02:32:46,040
or Dan Rather, somebody like that.
2493
02:32:46,086 --> 02:32:49,874
The easy thing to do... You come home
from work, you're tired, have had a busy day.
2494
02:32:49,926 --> 02:32:53,202
You're not going to spend the evening
carrying out a research project.
2495
02:32:53,246 --> 02:32:55,714
So you turn on the tube
and say it's probably right.
2496
02:32:55,766 --> 02:32:59,076
You look at the headlines in the paper
and then you watch the sports.
2497
02:32:59,126 --> 02:33:03,438
And that's basically the way
the system of indoctrination works.
2498
02:33:03,486 --> 02:33:06,876
Sure, the other stuff is there,
but you're going to have to work to find it.
2499
02:33:08,366 --> 02:33:10,561
Modern industrial civilisation
2500
02:33:10,606 --> 02:33:15,396
has developed within a certain system
of convenient myths.
2501
02:33:15,446 --> 02:33:19,200
The driving force
of modern industrial civilisation
2502
02:33:19,246 --> 02:33:21,840
has been individual material gain,
2503
02:33:21,886 --> 02:33:25,481
which is accepted as legitimate,
even praiseworthy,
2504
02:33:25,526 --> 02:33:32,204
on the grounds that private vices yield
public benefits in the classic formulation.
2505
02:33:32,246 --> 02:33:35,875
Now, it's long been understood very well
2506
02:33:35,926 --> 02:33:38,804
that a society that is based on this principle
2507
02:33:38,846 --> 02:33:41,155
will destroy itself in time.
2508
02:33:41,206 --> 02:33:43,117
It can only persist
2509
02:33:43,166 --> 02:33:46,397
with whatever suffering and injustice it entails,
2510
02:33:46,446 --> 02:33:49,006
as long as it's possible to pretend
2511
02:33:49,046 --> 02:33:53,756
that the destructive forces that humans create
are limited,
2512
02:33:53,806 --> 02:33:58,960
that the world is an infinite resource
and that the world is an infinite garbage can.
2513
02:34:00,286 --> 02:34:02,277
At this stage of history,
2514
02:34:02,326 --> 02:34:05,636
either one of two things is possible.
2515
02:34:05,686 --> 02:34:10,362
Either the general population
will take control of its own destiny
2516
02:34:10,406 --> 02:34:14,365
and will concern itself with community interests,
2517
02:34:14,406 --> 02:34:19,764
guided by values of solidarity and sympathy
and concern for others.
2518
02:34:19,806 --> 02:34:24,675
Or, alternatively, there will be no destiny
for anyone to control.
2519
02:34:24,726 --> 02:34:28,844
As long as some specialised class is
in a position of authority,
2520
02:34:28,886 --> 02:34:33,164
it is going to set policy
in the special interests that it serves.
2521
02:34:33,206 --> 02:34:37,199
But the conditions of survival, let alone justice,
2522
02:34:37,246 --> 02:34:42,081
require rational social planning
in the interests of the community as a whole.
2523
02:34:42,126 --> 02:34:44,401
By now, that means the global community.
2524
02:34:45,806 --> 02:34:49,765
The question is whether privileged elites
should dominate mass communication
2525
02:34:49,806 --> 02:34:53,515
and should use this power
as they tell us they must -
2526
02:34:53,566 --> 02:34:56,000
namely, to impose necessary illusions,
2527
02:34:56,046 --> 02:34:58,685
to manipulate and deceive the "stupid majority",
2528
02:34:58,726 --> 02:35:01,081
and remove them from the public arena.
2529
02:35:01,126 --> 02:35:02,639
The question, in brief,
2530
02:35:02,686 --> 02:35:06,474
is whether democracy and freedom
are values to be preserved
2531
02:35:06,526 --> 02:35:08,118
or threats to be avoided.
2532
02:35:08,166 --> 02:35:11,920
In this possibly terminal phase
of human existence,
2533
02:35:11,966 --> 02:35:15,402
democracy and freedom
are more than values to be treasured.
2534
02:35:15,446 --> 02:35:17,755
They may well be essential to survival.
2535
02:35:17,806 --> 02:35:19,205
Thank you.
2536
02:35:19,246 --> 02:35:20,440
(Applause)
2537
02:35:22,886 --> 02:35:26,162
METCALF:
He's up there thinking for himself.
2538
02:35:26,206 --> 02:35:32,236
And he's deciphering this tremendously
overweighted body of information,
2539
02:35:32,286 --> 02:35:35,358
which he puts into an order
2540
02:35:35,406 --> 02:35:37,795
and gives you the feeling
2541
02:35:37,846 --> 02:35:41,043
that you can do the same thing,
that the whole thing is decipherable.
2542
02:35:41,086 --> 02:35:43,884
And he also gives you the sense
that there is a source,
2543
02:35:43,926 --> 02:35:45,917
there is a centre to the...
2544
02:35:47,406 --> 02:35:49,044
...to a dissenting population,
2545
02:35:49,086 --> 02:35:51,202
although we feel that there's no centre.
2546
02:35:52,846 --> 02:35:56,805
And I think that is what reactivated in me...
2547
02:35:58,806 --> 02:36:02,242
...a desire to get back...
2548
02:36:02,286 --> 02:36:07,918
get reacquainted with the political scene
ater 30 years of alienation from it.
2549
02:36:09,686 --> 02:36:12,405
You do hundreds of interviews and lectures.
2550
02:36:12,446 --> 02:36:15,643
And you're dealing with massacres
in East Timor
2551
02:36:15,686 --> 02:36:18,484
and invasions of Panama, etc.
2552
02:36:18,526 --> 02:36:20,437
Pretty horrific stuff- death squads.
2553
02:36:20,486 --> 02:36:23,558
What keeps you going?
Don't you get burned out on this material?
2554
02:36:27,126 --> 02:36:31,085
It's mainly a matter of whether you can look
yourself in the mirror, I think.
2555
02:36:32,326 --> 02:36:34,362
GUARD: Got to go,
2556
02:36:34,406 --> 02:36:38,524
- get these people into town.
- Maybe you could say, "All aboard", for us?
2557
02:36:41,206 --> 02:36:42,525
All aboard!
2558
02:36:46,326 --> 02:36:47,361
Bye-bye!
2559
02:36:47,406 --> 02:36:49,158
Bye!
2560
02:37:15,766 --> 02:37:17,165
(Beep)
2561
02:37:17,206 --> 02:37:18,924
No, couldn't see it!
2562
02:37:18,966 --> 02:37:21,434
Just hit the microphone.
2563
02:37:21,486 --> 02:37:24,125
Thank you. Goodbye, Canada.
Goodbye, Canada.
2564
02:37:24,166 --> 02:37:25,155
Bye!
2565
02:37:28,926 --> 02:37:31,486
I think I've gone past the hour
that you agreed to.
2566
02:37:31,526 --> 02:37:34,165
In your introduction,
you said that he's from Harvard.
2567
02:37:34,206 --> 02:37:35,719
Oh, I heard that.
2568
02:37:35,766 --> 02:37:38,326
Oh, yes, that is true. We'll bleep it.
2569
02:37:38,366 --> 02:37:41,802
Sorry about making you answer that
in such a short time!
2570
02:37:41,846 --> 02:37:43,962
It worked. Did we hit it in two minutes?
2571
02:37:44,006 --> 02:37:48,716
Well, we did pretty well, actually.
That means less sports and that's fine with me.
2572
02:37:51,086 --> 02:37:55,398
The people don't know what's going on.
If the people knew what you say here today,
2573
02:37:55,446 --> 02:37:56,925
they'd happily change.
2574
02:37:56,966 --> 02:37:58,160
Thank you.
2575
02:37:59,246 --> 02:38:02,636
On that optimistic note, Professor Chomsky,
thank you very much indeed.
2576
02:38:03,406 --> 02:38:05,795
So, how did it go?
2577
02:38:05,846 --> 02:38:09,156
I thought it was sort of technical-sounding.
2578
02:38:09,206 --> 02:38:10,400
But...
2579
02:38:11,326 --> 02:38:13,556
There wasn't much of a rhythm.
2580
02:38:13,606 --> 02:38:17,042
- Did you ever think of running for President?
(Laughter)
2581
02:38:17,086 --> 02:38:20,556
If I ran for President, the first thing I'd do
is tell people not to vote for me.
2582
02:38:25,846 --> 02:38:27,882
This guy's got to go home, he really does.
2583
02:38:27,926 --> 02:38:31,714
And people still believe
the politics of the world changes.
2584
02:38:31,766 --> 02:38:33,597
- Why don't you let him go home?
- Thanks.
242415
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