Pakistanis wake up.
Pakistans Media Terrorists
By Ghani Jafar
June 28, 2011 "The Nation" -- We had in our previous column in TheNation (Pakistan at war - the external flank, June 14) taken a look at the broad contours of the unilateral, undeclared war that has been waged on Pakistan since the reported death of Osama bin Laden on May 2. It had also been pointed out that the offensive on this country is multidimensional, and the previous write-up had taken a look at its external flank.
Now, the obvious dimension of the internal war in Pakistan is the daily death toll, on both sides, of the countrys security forces personnel together with innocent children, women and men; and the faceless terrorists, who are conveniently clubbed together as belonging to the notorious Al-Qaeda network, not to forget the so-called Taliban of course. However, the real battle is for the soul of the nation.
The Americans - apt as they are at coining ever new phraseologies to insinuate their desired connotations to concepts, ideas, the mindsets of humanity at large in the global village that they have crafted out of the debris of the bipolar world three decades ago - have attempted to give a half clever twist to what was once known as propaganda pure and simple. They now call it strategic communication, a discipline accorded legitimacy through its admittance as an academic subject to be employed for the achievement of what President George Bush famously described the predominance of American values in the world subsequent to 9/11. To that end, the US has allocated $50 million this year to buy and utilise as many media channels, print and electronic, journalists, academics, the flourishing breed of civil society armchair warriors, human rights activists, et al, as can dance to Uncle Sams tune in Pakistan.
Starting with the Raymond Davis (if that was his real name) incident of late January this year - when CIA was caught with its pants down in a busy Lahore locality - this tribe has apparently been told that it is payback time; and paying back they are day and night to haunt the nation and make it lose hope in the states viability.
The onslaught has become so pervasive that, barring some honorable exceptions, the electronic media space of Pakistan is becoming their Masters Voice. A la CNN and Fox News, they have employed half-literate, attractive young females to keep male viewers glued to the screens.
http://nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Opinions/Columns/28-Jun-2011/Pakistans-media-terrorists
Pakistans Media Terrorists
By Ghani Jafar
June 28, 2011 "The Nation" -- We had in our previous column in TheNation (Pakistan at war - the external flank, June 14) taken a look at the broad contours of the unilateral, undeclared war that has been waged on Pakistan since the reported death of Osama bin Laden on May 2. It had also been pointed out that the offensive on this country is multidimensional, and the previous write-up had taken a look at its external flank.
Now, the obvious dimension of the internal war in Pakistan is the daily death toll, on both sides, of the countrys security forces personnel together with innocent children, women and men; and the faceless terrorists, who are conveniently clubbed together as belonging to the notorious Al-Qaeda network, not to forget the so-called Taliban of course. However, the real battle is for the soul of the nation.
The Americans - apt as they are at coining ever new phraseologies to insinuate their desired connotations to concepts, ideas, the mindsets of humanity at large in the global village that they have crafted out of the debris of the bipolar world three decades ago - have attempted to give a half clever twist to what was once known as propaganda pure and simple. They now call it strategic communication, a discipline accorded legitimacy through its admittance as an academic subject to be employed for the achievement of what President George Bush famously described the predominance of American values in the world subsequent to 9/11. To that end, the US has allocated $50 million this year to buy and utilise as many media channels, print and electronic, journalists, academics, the flourishing breed of civil society armchair warriors, human rights activists, et al, as can dance to Uncle Sams tune in Pakistan.
Starting with the Raymond Davis (if that was his real name) incident of late January this year - when CIA was caught with its pants down in a busy Lahore locality - this tribe has apparently been told that it is payback time; and paying back they are day and night to haunt the nation and make it lose hope in the states viability.
The onslaught has become so pervasive that, barring some honorable exceptions, the electronic media space of Pakistan is becoming their Masters Voice. A la CNN and Fox News, they have employed half-literate, attractive young females to keep male viewers glued to the screens.
http://nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Opinions/Columns/28-Jun-2011/Pakistans-media-terrorists
