21^st Century Orientalist media

After recently watching Iron Man Three, it dawned on me that the last three or four big block buster movies that I had watched at the cinema were constructed amidst a back drop of Islamophobia, in that the villains were predominately bearded Arab militant type figures, that were hell bent on destroying America and that loved to fire their AK47’s aimlessly into the air at every given opportunity.

Iron-man Three:      The Mandarin, America’s most wanted, constantly depicted collaborating with Islamic militants throughout the Middle-East.  Granted The Mandarin looks more like Saruman from the Lord of The Rings  then Bin ladin  but you get the intention. 

 

 

 

 

 

Also the 10 ring symbol that the Mandarin endorses had an uncanny resemblance to that of the Islamic fundamentalist flag that is often projected across western news channels.

Other films of that also used this backdrop are:

 

James Bond: Skyfall, set in Istanbul

 

 

Taken 2, also set in Istanbul

 

 

 

Act of Valor, US navy seals against Islamic militants

 

 

The Dark knight rises, hijack scene

 

Many of Bane’s accomplices were bearded militant looking type figures

 

The List Goes on......

This barrage of imagery stirred the thought that how is this any different from the late 16^th century (them and us) propaganda the British and other European countries used to further their empires.  It was Edward Said that wrote prolifically on 21^st century orientalism.

Said was of the opinion that Orientalism both in the traditional and contemporary sense, was nothing more than a method used by the West (Occident) to conjure up a derogative image of the people of the East (Orient), in order to detach those that live in the West from any moral sense of responsibility to those ‘others’ that reside in the East.  

I emphasize in it accordingly that neither the term Orient nor the concept of the West has any ontological stability; each is made up of human effort, partly affirmation, partly identification of the Other.  That these supreme fictions lend themselves easily to manipulation and the organization of collective passion has never been more evident than in our time, when the mobilizations of fear, hatred, disgust, and resurgent self-pride and arrogance m — much of it having to do with Islam and the Arabs on one side, "we" Westerners on the other — are very large-scale enterprises. (Said, 2003)

It is interesting that in recent years much of the armed conflict throughout the world that the West have been involved in, has been linked to the Middle-East or Islam. From Afghanistan to Iraq, Libya to Kuwait.  What is also interesting is that all these conflicts were ‘Islamified’; in that throughout these conflicts the media was awash with imagery of Islamic Militants burning US flags and effigies   or young Muslim women who have obviously been brain washed or beaten into believing the west is bad.

Now of course these events happened, but does it tell us a complete picture?  I would argue not!  Norm Chomsky in his book Media Control highlights the adverse nature of media propaganda and how different conflicts are portrayed differently, depending on whether or not Western Governments intend to get militarily involved.  He gives the example of when South Africa’s occupation of Namibia was declared illegal in 1969.  He points out that little or no media  coverage was given by the main stream news channels in the west, and that ironically the West did very little to deter South Africa, no sanctions were implemented, no western boots were put on the ground, instead twenty five years of ‘quiet diplomacy’ was undergone (Chomsky, 2002).   Could the argument be that there was no real economic advantage for the West to be involved, in that, would Namibia have had the means to repay the huge loans the West would have had to offer her after they had turned her to rubble?  Was Namibia rich in oil and gas? Was Namibia in such a location that it would have been strategically beneficial for the West to have permanent military bases there? The answer is of course no to all of the above. 

This of course begs the question, has the capitalism system become so complex that it has managed to somehow infiltrate all aspects of media, in an attempt to condition how we perceive the world in order to shape our opinions in a manner that fits their general discourse.  Maybe this is what Karl Mark spoke of in his Communist Manifesto: ‘The Bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production and with them the whole relations of society’ (Marx & Engels, 2002)

Finally food for thought!

Not all empires expand for economic reasons but once capitalism has the upper hand it subordinates policy to the interests of development, perpetual growth, accumulation and territorial expansion (Worrell, 2011)

 

Chomsky, N., 2002. Media Control. 2nd ed. New York: Seven Stories Press.

Marx, K. & Engels, F., 2002. The Communist Manifesto. London: Penguin Books.

Said, E., 2003. Orientalism. 3rd ed. London: Penguin Group.

Worrell, M., 2011. Why Nations Go To War. 1st ed. Oxon: Routledge.