Remember when the US was touted as the shining example of freedom to the rest of the world? Yeah, not so much anymore.
The U.S. media is the 24th most free in the world – and dropping
Freedom of the press has declined for the eighth year in a row, according to Freedom House’s annual report. And while the media has focused on the lack of media freedoms in such places as China and Venezuela, they’ve virtually ignored the U.S. position – No. 24 (PDF).
And following in the footsteps of the Bush Administration, the Obama Administration seems intent on making the media less free.
To be completely fair, the American media is about as toothless as an 80 year old crack whore.
It is, indeed, a dread shame.
“I did not know that!” I wonder what factors give us the lower scores? I do think that about freedom of speech but thought that our ineffective media was based on their lack of backbone and intelligence/professionalism because of the infotainment brought on by corporate ownership===not because of government action.
Any link to the criteria used to rate countries and maybe the list? Who is No 1.
Gotta dig within the website, I gave up. I think they want you to buy their book.
When is the last time dvorak.org/blog got a take down notice? Freedom of press is still alive, it’s just more profitable to say and print what someone else wants you to.
News print fails because we can get the news in many different places and forms.
Look at the PDF for a list. Top tier is shared by the Scandinavian countries, minus Denmark which is at the second tier.
From the site (the page with the flash map):
The Freedom of the Press index assesses the degree of print, broadcast, and internet freedom in every country in the world, analyzing the events and developments of each calendar year. Ratings are determined through an examination of three broad categories: the legal environment in which media operate; political influences on reporting and access to information; and economic pressures on content and the dissemination of news. Under the legal category, we assess the laws and regulations that could influence media content as well as the extent to which the government uses these tools to restrict the media’s ability to function. The political category encompasses a variety of issues, including editorial pressure by the government or other actors; censorship and self-censorship; the ability of reporters to cover the news; and the extralegal intimidation of and violence against journalists. Finally, under the economic category we examine issues such as the structure, transparency, and concentration of media ownership; costs of production and distribution; and the impact of advertising, subsidies, and bribery on content. Ratings reflect not just government actions and policies, but the behavior of the press itself in testing boundaries, even in more restrictive environments.
I presume it is things like gags based on ‘national security’ (usually government criminality). For example (U.K.) DA-Notice etc.
The U.K. and Australia are ranked lower.
Our press is free. They are just lazy.
Freedom of speech is one of the very few things in the USA that is still an asset.
It has dropped off a little, a shame for sure, but as a general rule of thumb it goes close to completely unimpeded.
The fact that our media is largely owned by large multinational gutless organizations in bed with our government is only marginally related to the state of freedom of the press.
#1–Aberrant==your Musings on a Certain Feeling reminded me of one of my favorite New Yorker Cartoons: Picture of a cockroach lying in a gutter. Caption says: “I used to be a Captain of Industry and then somebody said “He’s just a Cockroach!!””
I’ve always been impressed with how much I “don’t know.” Noting how stupid too many other people are all too often, doesn’t make me feel smart. It only JUST NOW occurs to me that probably Einstein felt the same way–noticing the errors he had made, not coming to the Unified Theory and what not.
I’m sure a “good” bio would reveal some of his personal doubts? No? then he was a poser.
At last it’s a higher ranking than our HEALTH CARE!
I’m sure the recent Gizmodo incident didn’t help our position any.
Notice how they look at Freedom of the press from Post #5. Some of the reason we rate so low are self inflicted (vs caused by Government).
You can not have a free press when people do not want it which is what the ratings in the US show.
We collectively do not want what used to be considered the “News” (unbiased reporting of the facts). The ratings show we want biased opinions which support our individual views.
Because most news outlets are now more concerned with profits over providing unbiased reporting of the facts they give us what we want. Which has lead to either left or right biased opinion shows now being considered the news – which is destroying “Freedom of the Press”.
Luckily it’s been a slow descent towards this ‘novus ordo seclorum’. It’s not too late to change. Or is it? At least it’s not too late to emigrate.
Freedom should be curtailed in the defense of liberty.
Let’s be honest, 30 years ago the mentally deficient went to college as communications majors. Thanks to technological gains, the media grew and the mentally deficient got jobs on TV, Radio & the internet (newspaper is dying) and they actually think they know what they are talking about. It isn’t really about freedom of the press as much as it is about stupidity of the press.
When the US government was tapping my phone — WITH NO WARRANT — not one tea bagger spoke up for me.
When you read something like this, it is worth your while to ask pointed questions about the process and its findings.
1. What agendas are afoot?
2. What does the data really mean?
3. What does the data–as presented–really NOT mean?
1. Freedom House owes its living to a continuous “proving” that freedoms are eroding. Notice the very large, red DONATE NOW!!!! button on the upper right of their every page.
Think how small its donation stream would become if you read this headline:
“2011; Freedom of individuals, corporations and the press are significantly higher over last year. Trend expected to continue indefinitely!”
2. In this survey/compilation/report, you don’t get to see EXACTLY what the criteria for their conclusions was or is. They categorize their findings into three areas legal, political and economic pressures. So things like the Supreme Court’s finding that unlimited campaign contributions are fine with us can have an impact on the tally, for instance. Also taken into account are factors over which no positive action can improve, such as violent attacks on journalists. Are we lower in “score” because we are targeted more? Meaning, we might be doing real journalism and risking our necks more, thus get a “lower score” because we are fighting the good fight harder.
3. In this report, the US is actually 11 divisions down from the very top, due to low granularity of conclusion criteria and duplicates. For instance, the top four spots are in division 1. Nothing in the report says Sweden ranks any less at all under Finland. Since Denmark has one unit of difference under the top spot, I’d call that a #2 spot, not a #5 spot as the report skews it.
Note also the numbering system, from 10 (top) to 99 (bottom/worst), an 89 unit spread. We are only 8 units from the top by criteria not specified precisely. What is the statistical difference among the top 10 units of change? Not specified.
I can come up with a bunch of criteria that would lower US journalistic standing by arbitrary amounts for next year, if needed. And so could you:
New Category: Danger from living in a country with so many Christian Fundamentalists (-2 points).
New Category: Danger from living in a country with so many uninformed and uninformable political idiots such as are found in Congress and spin-off political sub-parties (-7 points).
New Category: Danger from living in a country with KFC’s Double Down (so meaty, there’s no room for the bun) non-sandwich (-10 points).
Gotta go. Freedom House just called. They want to hire me.
Buzz,
I didn’t wade through all your post, but I checked on Freedom House.
It was founded by Wendell Willkie and Eleanor Roosevelt and it’s agenda it is unabashedly pro-US government.
Here are my big gripes about erosions of freedom in America:
The erosion of habeas corpus. (or total suspension!) with “disappearing” people, secret prisons, kidnapping, detention-without-trial, etc.
Torture of prisoners.
Rounding up people based solely on religion.
Orwellian “Free speech zones”
Corporations secretly writing out laws and/or re-writing scientific reports to better suit industry.
,
Spying without warrants.
(I’m especially touchy on this one, since I believe I’m a victim of it.)
And, to throw salt in my wounded civil rights, I was called a “terrorist sympathizer” and “troop hater” by the VERY SAME PEOPLE who are now armed in the streets over “loss of freedom” because the Dems are trying to get them affordable healthcare!
@qb, #13
You said: “Freedom should be curtailed in the defense of liberty.”
In response, Ben Franklin said: “They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty nor security.”
@buzz, #16
Great deconstruction, but…
Government IS to be blamed for the state of the media in this country. Not that it is less free than in other countries, but it is very dumbed down. Ask yourself, why are so many Americans stupid, mindless sheep who believe anything they watch on the boob tube? Why don’t they read and learn history from different sources and perspectives? It’s because they have been indoctrinated in government schools. They’ve been taught that business is bad and government is good. And they haven’t been taught much else. Also, those who make up the media have been indoctrinated with the same propaganda. They defend the government because most of them believe that you need the government to solve problems and do social reform. So they all comprise one of two neatly set positions, liberal and conservative. Either camp works to grow the government, just in different ways. The left wants to grow social programs and interfere domestically, while the right wants to grow the military and interfere with foreign affairs. And since either agenda is never scaled back to the levels they were at before the previous administration, they build on each other, and the line between left and right blurs. But I digress…
“You are NUMBER 6”
“I am not a number, I’m a free man!”
@scadragon, #20
Be Seeing you!
Who should care about freedom? Don’t we have wall street. If we make wall street happy (very happy), we will surly eat the crumbs that fall from our master’s table.
Get with it America, stop being a whiny bitch! Get to work (both spouses), eat your fast food and drink up that cup of corn syrup.
America, you’ve made your bed, now lie on it.
Man I don’t care about freedom I have all of this STUFF: