From: word_chemist@hotmail.com   
      
   "Martha Bridegam"  wrote in message   
   news:gRpMf.54655$dW3.21885@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com...   
      
   > ...and here we are back in Orwell territory despite   
   > ourselves. You'll recall that in various despondent moments   
   > he wrote that "all art is propaganda," and that "all   
   > propaganda is lies, even when one is telling the truth."   
   > (Interesting, however: I've just Googled the phrase "all art   
   > is propaganda" and found that WEB DuBois said it first in 1926.)   
   >   
   > So the question I've got now is, is it possible to do any   
   > writing or speaking for public consumption that isn't   
   > propaganda in *some* sense of the term?   
      
   I think propaganda is crude and unbalanced material.   
      
      
   >   
   > Probably everything broadcast is propaganda in a general   
   > sense   
      
   I don't agree. I think the postmoderne inside you is attracted to that   
   argument.   
      
      
      
   , but your example is still grossly different from   
   > mine. Limbaugh is an extreme case of a communicator whose   
   > primary purpose is to inflame listeners' ideological anger,   
      
   The BBC do that when it suits; they'll put on plays about race relations for   
   example which are imflammatory and crude and unblanced works of art:   
   propaganda.   
      
      
   > while the BBC is a different type of entity entirely, one   
   > that reports major events of the world with the primary goal   
   > of conveying useful information, though also with a definite   
   > point of view   
      
   It has a Left-Wing agenda and is unbalanced (sometimes wildy) in its news   
   coverage and it bloody well ought not to be so. The real insult is that it   
   is paid for on pain of legal action. People often respond to this with the   
   feeble remark: 'you want it to be conservative?' Nope - a sensible balance.   
      
      
   . A point of view, btw, whose long history of   
   > unpopularity with totalitarian governments is a sterling   
   > recommendation in its favor.   
      
   Oh I dunno - when they execute one man in Texas it makes the top end of the   
   news on the BBC; when they hang homosexuals and children in the Middle East   
   it doesn't; ditto Chinese executions and their habit of locking people up   
   for doing yoga. I could go on.   
      
   ROBBIE   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)