More on Power (of media)

My good friend and I had a little conversation about the fourth branch of the government. Sometimes, it's helpful to start with a little quiz: what's the fourth branch of a good government? Of course, I have some other good friends who would object to the presupposition behind this question: they insist government is bad. They are not talking about the corrupt local governments, they are armchair philosophers generalizing their value judgement to all governments. You know, right-wing kind of a "fact."

Of course, it is no fact at all. There are bad governments, there are worse ones, and there are terrible ones. Just pick up any history book. Or "Why Nations Fail, by Acemoglu and Robinson," a scholarly publication from not just Harvard, but also MIT. Yet, many good friends of mine, educated, upper -- or not much on the upper side -- middle income, but some retired, others fairly affluent... They seem to have all forgotten why we wanted a government in the first place.

Of course, it is fairly simple, once we remember that we can't get all the products and services we depend on in the free market out there. Tomatoes, cars, computers, and even a mercenary army, yes, but, can you buy good laws? Can you buy 911, a firetruck, an ambulance, a police car? Can you buy national security? We do indeed buy many such intangible things we depend on as city-dwellers by paying taxes to an institution we simply named as the government. Or call it the "state" if you prefer, or United States. 

The question then is also simple: how do we help the government to shape up? Don't get me wrong, the US government is pretty darn good, and in fact much better from many other governments in the world. Just pick any measure and we can debate it. But, if we can be a bit objective, we would count our blessings for the quality of the services this government provides. 

To be sure, it does some serious disservice, too, once in a while, like declaring and waging irrational wars like those on drugs, terror and the pandemic. They never work. You need to stay cool and rational to stop a pandemic, and terror and addictive and dangerous drugs. 

Coming back to power and the branches of the government, my friend was able to name the first three, but not the fourth. And, can you blame him? It is not even officially a branch of the government. The media. How we get to news and information. We can't have a good governance without a good media to provide us what we need to know. Facts. We may also need to be presented with Opinions. But, most media, to stay in profit, in immoral amounts of profit, in fact, resort to not only employing troops of paparazzi (read the sad story of the Spare, by Harry, the duke of Sussex), but also Drugs! Not the chemical kind, but, nevertheless, almost as addictive, almost as controlling and almost as dangerous. All the sensational fake "news," all the fear-mongering nonsense that pretends to be reasoned messages to help keep us informed. There are so many examples, it is almost heartbreaking. Where do you start? A professionally produced, high-quality reporting on China's one-child policy and its consequences for not only China but also the whole world, for example... It was 15-minutes of glossy slides, video shots of Chinese cities, fully alive, or under construction, perfect delivery by a smooth and convincing reporter, yet it was all built on false assumptions of the worst kind: population in China is collapsing, and it will cause the whole world economy to collapse! Wrong, wrong and wrong. You might object, saying it sounds like simply historical facts and economics. Yet, if you check again, history tells us the opposite: population usually goes up, and when it goes down, growth and prosperity follows! Of course, prosperity is also going up along with population, but, oh well, as I hinted at, things are a lot more complicated than those simple but terribly false assumptions that keep you and I hooked to such reporting. 

Let me leave you with a simple question to ponder: given that the fourth branch of any good government, making sure the governed as well as the governors are informed of facts, is crucial for the rest of the government to work well, what do we do about the media and the sorry state it is in right now? Personally, for your own sake, and collectively, for that of all human beings on Earth?

Oh, by the way, if you're wondering about "Power" and "More on Power", you can get started by reading: Power corrupts, does it? Please note that we, human beings, are unique amongst all animals that we are not content with our power and we always seem to want more. You don't believe it? Well, why are we hooked to "news" and more and more information? Of course, we are also as sane as our pets, sometimes and just say "Enough is enough" or "I am satisfied and grateful with what I've got." But, then, again, there are other moments when we are tempted to have a little more entertainment, news, money and, you know it, power.