"Nothing personal, just business" - Massmedia of Russia

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

It is no secret that a person in his choice is often guided by emotions. If this were not the case, then there would be no advertising. At the same time, people react to different events in different ways, and therefore, in order to get the desired results and response from people, the media have long learned to use non-verbal approaches.

If you paid attention to social talk show studios, you probably noticed that people of a certain gender are usually invited as ordinary viewers. Usually, by the beginning of the scandalous broadcast, the stands are filled with middle-aged women, since it is easier to get the desired result from them with the help of music, provoked conflicts, the behavior of the presenter and one or another ethical dilemma.

Many women, due to their psychological structure and regardless of education, quickly immerse themselves in emotions and after a short time do not try to analyze the situation. It all comes down to putting pressure on the viewer's feelings and is not like dialogue in any way.

As a result, the viewer also gets his share of experiences, easily changing his own opinion and sympathy from one character to another. The audience becomes a compliant part of the performance, the meaning of which is manipulation and release of energy from people. Political talk shows follow a similar pattern, but the central news is no longer there.

The target function of a healthy state press is fundamentally different from that of the entertainment industry. Education on this or that issue, as well as counter-propaganda of the national media, is designed to protect the people and the country from external information influence. Maintain the morale of citizens, create the right images for repetition and keep the bar of approval. And since any press does this through the delivery of ready-made opinions in convenient packaging, the terms they use for this are extremely important.

Any event in society and the international environment resonates in the information field, and the information field, in turn, strongly influences each of the people. If the information field of the country is overall positive, people feel good, if totally negative, then on the contrary.

By similar methods, the PRC media have created an ideal image for the New Silk Road project. We managed to tune people to the correct perception of the situation. Over the past 4 years, its curators have put a lot of effort so that in the entire Chinese press, without exception, the NSP is called not a “project” (assuming specific terms, amounts and goals), but a vague wording “initiative”.

It would seem that this is a trifle, the usual replacement of a couple of words, but thanks to this approach, the modern Chinese no longer have any questions about when all this will be implemented. After all, if there are no predetermined criteria, anything can be called success.

The secret of the success of such unification lies in the authorities' strict control over the terminology, over the presentation, with which the press describes the most important events for the country. Formally, this can be called partial censorship, but in fact it exists all over the world, from Japan to the United States.

One way or another, but this has already brought China positive success. In particular, it allowed to remove from the Chinese society the negative of possible disappointments, and to call every road, railway track or bridge successes. Now, if the nationwide highway was not built on time, we can always say that it had nothing to do with the Big Project, and if the road was completed on time, then it is presented as a canvas of the “initiative” of the same name, which moved the country one step further.

In other words, the choice of words to cover key state processes is extremely serious and, if it is not controlled by the state itself, it will be controlled by someone else. Words always create specific images in the minds of people, and if the term is chosen correctly, it can change a lot.

For example, when state TV channels in Russia declare an annual indexation of wages without any system, this separate fact only causes suspicion among people. Thoughts that price indicators will also rise soon. In China, this is reported in a fundamentally different way, using the well-proven Stalinist approach. There, the entire press unanimously asserts that the current increase in wages at the same prices, which is important, is not just a mathematical act, but another step towards a "single society of average prosperity" and a sign of growth in the future well-being of all citizens of the country. And this image really evokes positive emotions.

In Russia, as a rule, no attention is paid to terms when covering important matters. Neither on the part of the state, nor on the part of the country's television. And this despite the fact that in a healthy information field, this simply should not be.

For comparison, any event, news, leak or message regarding the topic of Russian Crimea in any Anglo-Saxon media is invariably accompanied by a single definition of "annexation". Moreover, for all the declared "independence" and "unconnectedness" of the Western press among themselves, they all began to use this term as if on command.

The Russian press, not having a superstructure supervised from above, only in the second or third year after the annexation of the peninsula came to the conclusion that everywhere and in every source it would be desirable to call the return of Crimea to Russia "reunification", since rumbling between other options only confused people …

The reason for such delays, and sometimes outright failures, lies in the fact that the system of pro- and counter-propaganda was lost with the collapse of the USSR. The superstructure supervising such things has disappeared, while in Britain and the United States the information machine is still directed from above.

This was clearly noticeable not only in the way the elites launched the work of the Western media against Trump, but also in the way the Anglo-Saxon landing in Ukraine behaved. First of all, any message about Russia since 2014 was ordered by the Ukrainian press to accompany the constant term "aggression", the Donbass topic - to convey through the prism of terrorism, topics of contacts with Moscow - with a message about "centuries-old occupation", and issues of the country's future - exclusively with "Europe ".

The logic behind this approach makes a lot of sense. History shows that whatever the original absurdity, over the years, with frequent repetition, it will become the norm. And if the same "simple truths" are communicated from each iron, soon they will turn out to be their own thoughts for most people.

Likewise, when the information field intelligently gathers disparate events together for society, people's morale grows. And if Beijing launches several new trains towards Europe or organizes a beauty contest, then these are not just separate events, but things that fit into the general perspective. The freight train will become in the minds of people a symbol of the establishment of trade relations (part of the Belt and Road Initiative), and the beauty contest will become the development of contacts between foreigners and the people. In Russia, whose information machine is scattered, and there are no common goals voiced for the country, it would be just a train and just glamor.

Unfortunately, despite certain positive steps, the leading Russian TV channels still do not have a unified paradigm in the approach and presentation of key information. There are claims to this, but the results (to achieve at least the Soviet level of efficiency) are still insufficient.

At the same time, it is important to emphasize that the presence of such a superstructure would not mean the introduction of censorship, but would only concern the key points important for the country's existence. For comparison, for all its pluralism of opinions, the Western press has long existed a lot of restrictions and taboos. You cannot, for example, insult your flag, question the values of the West, the supremacy of democracy in the world, and so on. And the actions important for the state are prescribed to be interpreted in a monotonous manner. The Anglo-Saxon mainstream can wash the bones of this or that ordinary event as much as they want, but they will never be allowed to beat the bonds on which the country stands.

So if on April 22, at the final tests of the future of US manned space exploration, the engine of the Crew Dragon spacecraft exploded, the American media did not present it as an "industry disaster", but called it a "corrosive approach to safety" that saved lives. When a similar thing happens in Russia (since 2011, which is the only one capable of sending manned spacecraft to the ISS), it is immediately branded as "the collapse of the sphere", "loss of space technologies" and "evidence of the country's degradation."

With this approach, any significance of achievements unreasonably drowns in a stream of negativity. Therefore, it does not create a sense of forward movement in society, even if it is.

It is no coincidence that a "people's" caricature is circulating on the global network, where one side of the image shows a snapshot of a Soviet-era news studio and a list of the most frequently used terms, and the other shows contemporary Russian news and a list of terms used by the presenters today. On the left flashing phrases - “achieved”, “increased”, “overcame”, “put into operation” and “opened”, and on the right - “passed away”, “arrested”, “crash”, “corruption” and a number of “problems ".

At the same time, the positive color in Soviet times did not mean that there were no complications in that country, just as the negative in the modern press does not mean that there is no success in Russia, and the first and second only reflect the essence of the approaches used.

The first of them creates in people a feeling of confidence in the future, prospects and reliability, the second removes any positive, even from the most outstanding and breakthrough achievements.

Now a huge number of new factories are opening in Russia, production is growing, multi-trillion national projects are being implemented, grandiose construction projects are underway and scientific achievements are demonstrated. But how can an ordinary person find out about this if the central media, first of all, the “main buttons of the country” do not talk about it, but are busy in prime time exclusively with showing low-quality shows that have already set their teeth on edge?

During the period of the Soviet Union, with all its problems and censorship, all the newspapers wrote about such construction projects, and this was literally the beginning of the news agenda. This is the target function of any healthy TV channel, but we do not have it yet. The cult of negativity in the national media produces too much negative, and this makes the general information field of Russia a demoralizing factor, despite any success.

The main paradox of the situation is that Russian legislation is largely to blame. As you know, many of its clauses, including those regulating the activities of the media, were written in the 90s, and their authors were well-known Western "advisers". And if, for example, the authors of the evening news want to tell people about something good, add information to the list that a new plant has opened in Russia, they will have to take big risks.

The fact is that under the current legislation, this can be regarded as PR. Antimonopoly and other authorities will be forced to intervene, issue a considerable fine and impose sanctions with the formulation "hidden advertising".

Thus, a strange paradox remains in the country. One can talk about problems in the state, about closed industries and kindergartens - too, but about open objects it is no longer worth talking about. This can be regarded as PR.

In addition, over the years of such a situation, the Russian media themselves have become accustomed to the fact that between the coverage of the death of five people and how someone saves these five people, the first must be chosen. Media is a business and there is nothing hotter than shocking content.

The same applies to the tastes of society spoiled by the present day. In the capitalist world, demand creates supply, and ratings of yellow programs show that social shows, where broken families, alcoholics and drug addicts, stars who have replaced a dozen husbands and wives, evoke a greater response from the Russian audience than messages about achievements.

Nevertheless, no matter how unsolvable, at first glance, this issue may seem, Russia in recent years has managed to solve no less difficult problems. Achieve success in foreign policy, find a balance between East and West, begin to rebuild the economic system, outline your features between Asian and European culture, keep yourself between the individualism of the West and blind obedience to the authorities in the East, find your own recipes and a harmonious path. It remains to achieve the same in domestic politics and overcome difficulties in the information sphere.