Posted on 21-7-2003

WMD - Weapons of Media Destruction
by Alan Marston

In his 1964 book 'Understanding Media' Marshall McLuhan defines media as 'the extensions of man'. His survey of media includes technologies such as speech, writing and roads through horse harnesses, wheels and sails to modern forms such as advertising, typewriters and telephones. Thus defined, man alone, without these extensions, without 'media', is unthinkable. Yet we consider media and technology as being separate from man, separate from the human condition. Bad assumption.

A moments reflection on our own relationship to media delivers the inescapable conclusion that we fear it, and with good reason. The deepest aspect of the human condition is self-definition, based to a greater or lesser extent on socialisation. How a human defines self is how they be, ie. human is being, being is what is conceived as the self. The large part of self is for the large part of humanity defined by the social environment in which they swim and the medium of that social environment is media. Only the enlightened few define self relatively independently of what others do and say about them. Especially when young but also for many in later life, fitting in with the prevailing political, moral, dress, economic,... codes is a matter of the utmost importance while not fitting in an utter catastrophe to the point of self-threatening, in short, life-threatening - unless one can escape to another social setting.

The 20th and now 21st Century city offers a great range of social niches within driving distance and an even greater range within internet distance and thus makes it easier than it has ever been to find a group with which to feel comfortably self-assured. Alienation would thus be a thing of the past? I'm afraid not, such is the dialectic of this dualistic universe the modern mass media has done away with what was the localised and escapable social opprobrium of a town or even a country and turned alienation into an overnight global damnation by media kangaroo court. From unknown to global demon in minutes. 15 minutes of fame in hometown has become, since Andy Warhol in the 70's promulgated it as everyone's birthright, 15 days of universal infamy - which even Atlas would have trouble bearing. Fear of the media is The Fear of moderns.

Fear has always been the most effective tool in modifying behaviour, its use goes back to the evolution of the first nerve cell. Parents, businessmen, politicians, teachers,... actually every single social organism that ever lived has employed fear against others and against its self for the purpose of behaviour management in the interests of what is perceived as self advancement. Needless to say, a useful thing taken too far becomes destructive. I contend the use of fear is being over-exploited, its taking humanity down a dangerous dead-end and the mass media is rapidly becoming the fear weapon of choice, replacing the hydrogen bomb.

Media are assumed to be our products--helping us as our tools--doing our bidding. However it is easy to turn the assumption around and ask: To what extent are we the products and tools of our media? Clearly media and technology change us. Can we think of media as replicating patterns--similar to organic viruses--that attack us, change us, and use us to replicate themselves? Media as a threat? I could be accused of being a neo-luddite advocating technology and modern media as a threat to humanity. However my adoption of the philosophy `don't attack the media become the media' acts I hope as evidence to the contrary. Far from being a luddite, PlaNet has lead the field in innovation since its inception and never more so in developing alternative media (www.pl.net, PlaNet TV, P St).

I'm not attacking the media for being media, just as I don't attack the scientist for discovering nuclear energy. It's the philosophy, the self-definition that I talk about, because without constant questioning of assumptions things go badly wrong before the assumption is overturned. In the case of WMD the luxury of learning from experience is a luxury the human `race' can not afford to run. Our various `improvements' not only mark a diminution of the function improved upon... but the unleashing of great power standing on wrong assumptions works to dissolve some of the fundamental authority of the human, ie.its self. We are experiencing the gradual but steady erosion of the human's being.

I contend that media and technology is alive, because it defines self and thus contributes greatly to being. We're not just the environment in which media and technology lives and evolves but we will be if the current primitive philosophies continue to hold sway within mass media ownership and administration.

Death by Media

Not only do media die, media kill. Media kill other media and media kill their human hosts.

Like the virus a medium or technology can be malignant. Some viruses use all their host's energy to replicate themselves and by doing so, literally 'burn their host out'. War media prosper by killing people. Such viruses need not kill directly, it is enough to precipitate the movement of attention and materials from old forms to new forms.

The modern mass media has become war. War is media, media is war.

PlaNet TV's next programme and ongoing programmes, plus articles here at www.pl.net will continue to act as media peacenik, media-for-peace, media you can live with.