The Information Industry 8

All media exist to invest our lives with artificial perceptions and

arbitrary values.

Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man,

1965

Media manipulation in the U.S. today is more efficient than it was in

Nazi Germany, because here we have the pretense that we are getting

all the information we want. That misconception prevents people

from even looking for the truth.

Mark Crispin Miller, The Project on Media Ownership

The Voice of Authority

There is a large and very active community of academics who study the
history, structure and function of the media, in all its guises. In contrast,
the focus of this book is quite narrow, and can be summarized in a single
question: how does the mass media – specifically the broadcast and print
media outlets concerned with the dissemination of news – use the

language subordination model presented in Chapter 5?^1
Media representatives claim authority in matters of language, and use
that manufactured authority as a tool to coerce agreement on a wide range
of public issues. This is a conscious, focused goal, as openly
acknowledged in The Art of Editing: “The copy editor plays a major role
in protecting the language against abuse” (from the chapter “Protecting the
Language” in Baskette et al. 1986, cited in Cotter 1999: 175).
The same is true of all dominant institutions, but the media have one
advantage over the others. Educational institutions begin the formal
process of inculcating individuals into an SLI, but at a certain age
everyone moves beyond school and educational influence loses some or all
of its intensity. Some – but not all – employers require adherence to an
SLI. A skilled forklift driver is not likely to be scolded about the variety of