Plus ça change....

In my class tonight we were looking at a statement from the Fourth Plenary Assembly of the Federation of Asian Bishops Conferences (FABC), The Vocation and Mission of the Laity in the Church and in the World of Asia. This came from their meeting in Tokyo in September 1986.

Given the current concerns about the role of media in American society--consolidation of ownership, government manipulation, impact of the internet, censorship and secrecy, bias and disclosure--I found some remarks by these Asian bishops from 19 years ago to be most intriguing.

3.6.2. Finance and the mass media determine to a very large extent the destinies of nations; in fact, finance uses the media to this end. Those in power are well aware of the potentialities of the mass media, which they manipulate to mold public opinion and to consolidate and perpetuate their positions. One test of the freedom prevalent in any society today is the degree of autonomy enjoyed by the mass media. [emphasis mine]

Wow! A nice polished summary, completely applicable to here and now. The subsequent paragraph opens with this sentence:

3.6.3. Today, the mass media in Asia are predominantly controlled by authoritarian governments or by a handful of economically and politically powerful persons, while the vast majority of the Asian people are passive recipients.

Try re-reading just the bolded portion [again, emphasis mine].

It would seem that the world's sole remaining superpower has not made good progress.

The document may be found in Rosales, Gaudencio and Arevalo, C.G. (Eds.). For All the Peoples of Asia, FABC Documents from 1970-1991, volume 1

The BB