Posted by rippon
on November 4, 2009, 10:31 pm
Firstly, everything in this query of mine depends on the correctness of my understanding of the ML criticism of lefties who regularly publish in mainstream media, e.g. George Monbiot (GM).
If anyone chooses to respond, they might need first to correct that.
My understanding of the criticism is this:
GM (and others, e.g. Naomi Klein, Mark Thomas) publishes articles which, by mainstream standards, posit very radically left-wing arguments in The Guardian.
This plays into the hands of The (corporate, conservative) Guardian because, using such smidgens of left-wing analysis, they can argue, ‘Look, we are not a supine, establishment- and corporate-friendly body of homogeneous journalists; we are diverse, dissenting and combative.’ (But, of course, the opposite is the case.) Therefore, GM is effectively providing cover for this deception.
And this successful deception encourages complacency within news-consumers because, consequently, they feel that they do not need to go beyond ‘left-wing’ papers (e.g. Guardian, Independent) to be able to read left-wing analyses. Therefore, disastrously (for the causes of justice, poverty, peace, species-survival, etc.), they are not exposed to full-bodied left analyses to be found elsewhere, e.g. ZNet, Counterpunch.
Assuming that is a correct understanding, then is the following a fair analogy?
Charities are often criticised by the Left for analogous reasons. For example, the Live Aid campaign will contribute nothing overall to alleviating poverty in Africa. Indeed, it plays into the hands of the UK government (UKG) because it (UKG) can give massive support to that campaign, using it as cover for the claim that it does indeed care about ‘eliminating that scourge from the continent’ (as Blair put it, I think). This, then, conveniently obviates the need for our government to implement policies which really +could+ alleviate poverty there – policies that would outlaw: arms deals, asset theft by corporations, mercenaries, unjust terms of trade; that would impose low-prices on pharmaceutical corporations; etc etc. Thus, overall, a campaign like Live Aid exacerbates rather than alleviates the problems that it claims to want to solve. Live Aid conveniently (to the UKG) helps to distract people from real solutions because it gives the impression that real solutions are already being pursued.
Thus, it seems that criticism of charities by the Left – for being embedded in popular culture and the culture of ‘the government fully supports these fine efforts’ – is analogous to criticism of left-wing journalists for being embedded in mainstream corporate newspapers.