“During the Cold War, a group of Russian journalists toured the United States. On the final day of their visit, they were asked by their hosts for their impressions. “I have to tell you,” said their spokesman, “that we were astonished to find, after reading all the newspapers and watching TV, that all the opinions on all the vital issues were, by and large, the same. To get that result in our country, we imprison people, we tear out their fingernails. Here, you don’t have that. What’s the secret? How do you do it?”
“In the British media, as in the United States, as in Australia, rapacious western actions are reported as moral crusades, or humanitarian interventions. At the very least, they are represented as the management of an international crisis, rather than the cause of the crisis.”
“The unspoken task of the reporter in Vietnam, as it was in Korea, was, to normalise the unthinkable – to quote Edward Herman’s memorable phrase. And that has not changed.”
Transcrições da palestra de John Pilger’s na Universidade de Columbia, Nova Iorque, 2006 – ‘War by Media‘
“O importante ensaio de Edward S. Herman, “A Banalidade do Mal”, nunca pareceu mais adequado. “Fazer coisas terríveis de um modo organizado e sistemático repousa na ‘normalização’ “, escreveu Herman. “Há habitualmente uma divisão de trabalho no fazer e no racionalizar o impensável, com a brutalização e morte directa feita por um conjunto de indivíduos … e outros a trabalharem para melhorar a tecnologia (um melhor crematório a gás, um napalm mais adesivo e com queima mais prolongada, bombas de fragmentação que penetram a carne em padrões difíceis de detectar). É função do peritos, e dos media de referência, normalizar o impensável para o público geral.”
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