[IMC-US] personal reprtback for indy folks abouttheNationalCOnference on Med

[deva]

On May 25, 2005, at 10:12 AM, Kat Aaron wrote:

> Argh, I can get so worked up about this.  Sorry, I didn't really mean
> to rant, and I don't think that deva is coming from a super different
> place than I am.  It's just important to me that if possible we keep
> the conversations from the NCMR going about the
> justice/democracy/reform issues, and think broadly about the openness
> of IMC.  I hope that the conversation doesn't get subsumed under a
> corporate-media-is-bullshit blanket.  Let's take that as a given and
> work from there.

Both conversations need to happen. It is not a given that corporate 
media is bullshit. Many many people, including radicals, still give it 
more than it deserves. So many people still consume it daily, which 
feeds it.

Corporate media is arguably the single most destructive force in this 
country.

All too often when making such statements, I hear replies like, hey, we 
also have a long way to go, and so on.

Corporate media is doing immeasurable harm in the world. Indymedia is a 
value. Of course it has problems, could be better, and so on, but 
fundamentally, they are nothing alike. There is no need to be 
apologetic.




On May 25, 2005, at 10:12 AM, Kat Aaron wrote:

> If media activists
> and media makers inside and outside IMC are going to push for reform,
> or for a total takeback of the airwaves (my personal preference!), the
> question to me is then what?

the task is simply to insure that nobody else grabs all the resources. 
Diversity naturally follows and I consider it a question somewhat born 
out of the dominant white culture's urge to know and control and shape 
everything.



>   This new media, whether
> it be IMC or something else, is only going to be as good as the
> community ties behind it.  If we're making a new media, I don't want
> to make a more left or more radical version of what we took down.  I
> don't want a new media that's horizontally organized but still
> under-represents people of color, women, immigrants, queers, etc.

people of color, immigrants, women, queers etc are currently actively 
excluded. If new media is truly horizontal, then it will take care of 
itself. It is taking care of itself wherever it has some room to grow 
as on the internet. People of color do not need white folks helping 
them, they just need white folks to stop erecting and actively 
maintaining barriers which force power discrepancies.

I like the quote from Malcolm X... "Beware the newspapers, for they 
will have you hating the oppressed, and loving the people doing the 
oppressing" He understood that what we are calling the corporate media 
is actively engaged in oppression, actively engaged in controlling and 
shaping peoples minds.


>   What sort of a media will replace the
> corporate media, and who will be making it?


This question supposes that there is some similarity. That something 
that is happening now needs to be replaced. It does not. Corporate 
media is a highly sophisticated propaganda apparatus. Providing tools 
for people to communicate with each other is something so entirely 
different from corporate media that you cannot talk about one replacing 
the other.

You do not try to improve or reform something fundamentally inhumane. 
You do not talk about improving or reforming a concentration camp. You 
do not need to talk about replacing it because it serves only an evil 
purpose. You just shut it down. That there is much talk about media 
reform, shows that its nature is not yet understood...

I believe that a clear understanding and critique of corporate media is 
helpful, if not necessary for the discussion you want to keep going...

thanks for responding
regards,
deva


> I
> know I'm not alone in that, even just based off the discussions in
> this thread.