Osnos, Remnick, and Yaffa write:
Just as Putin no longer fills prison camps with countless “enemies of the people,” as Stalin did, but, rather, makes a chilling example of a famous few . . . his propagandists have taken their cue from foreign forms: magazine shows, shout-fests, game shows, and reality shows. There are many figures in public life who are not permitted to appear on any talk show or news program. Russians can still find independent information on Facebook and various Web sites; critical books and magazines are available in stores and online; Echo of Moscow, a liberal radio station, hangs on. But, even in the Internet era, more than eighty per cent of Russians get their news from television. Manipulation of TV coverage is a crucial factor in Putin’s extraordinarily high popularity ratings, typically in excess of eighty per cent—ratings that Donald Trump both admires and envies.
If, as some journalists and policy experts argue, we are now in a “new Cold War,” what role might “manipulation of TV coverage” play in shaping both Americans’ and Russians’ understanding of that war?
It is no secret that almost all prominent television channels in America are owned by the same 3 or 4 mega corporations. It is because media has been so heavily monopolized that Americans have developed a sense of skepticism and distrust of funded media sources foregrounded with the objective of making money through ratings and furthering investors’ political agendas. Net neutrality within America allows for citizens to get unadulterated accounts of political events, or at least access a broader pool of political theorists than the select few that are broadcasted on network television. While the net still acts as a biased echochamber for many, the government has little agency over the content that is disseminated, thus having little control over public officials’ public perception. Not only are controversial leaders such as Putin able to maintain popularity due to their citizens’ reliance on television as their primary source of media, but by regulating the web and enacting censorship in other forums that circulate news they also corner people into a dependence on television in a way that America’s net neutrality (which is perhaps going to be repealed in coming days) doesn’t allow for.