The Last Days of Mankind

Today, each one of the assumptions that underpinned western policymaking and journalism for nearly three decades lie shattered

Pankaj Mishra (N+1)

(...) [J]ournalism had moved from being a neutral filter between the popular imagination and the external world. It had taken charge of forging reality itself. (...)

(...) Today, the war on terror is widely accepted as a military and geopolitical failure. But it is still not fully understood as a massive intellectual and moral fiasco: an attempt by the Western media as well as the political class to forge reality itself, which failed catastrophically, but not without embedding cruelty and mendacity deep and enduringly in public life. And partly because this disaster was unacknowledged—editors and writers pushing false narratives, and cheerleading large-scale violence, remained entrenched, and even received promotions—it is being reenacted today in the Western media’s coverage of Israel’s war on Gaza: another war that has ignited a bonfire of international legal and moral norms and deadened and perverted consciences. (...)

Complete article

Tags: #journalism #journalist #media #war_on_terror #israel #gaza #lebanon #human_rights #torture #violence #racism #brics #the_west #western_dominance #decolonisation