Well, does it?
By far the most effective branch of political education, is carried on by the Press. The Press is the chief means employed in the process of political 'enlightenment'. It represents a kind of school for adults. This educational activity, however, is not in the hands of the State but in the clutches of powers which are partly of a very inferior character.
At first I was quite surprised when I realized how little time was necessary for this dangerous 'Great Power within the State' to produce a certain belief among the public; and in doing so the genuine will and convictions of the public were often completely misconstrued. It took the Press only a few days to transform some ridiculously trivial matter into an issue of national importance, while vital problems were completely ignored or hidden away from public attention. The Press succeeded in the magical art of producing names from nowhere within the course of a few weeks. They made it appear that the great hopes of the masses were bound up with those names. And so they made those names more popular than any man of real ability could ever hope to be in a long lifetime. All this was done, despite the fact that such names were utterly unknown and indeed had never been heard of even up to a month before the Press publicly emblazoned them.
At the same time old and tried figures in the political and other spheres of life quickly faded from the public memory and were forgotten as if they were dead, though still healthy and in the enjoyment of their full lives. Or sometimes such men were so vilely abused that it looked as if their names would soon stand as permanent symbols of the worst kind of baseness.
In order to estimate properly the really dangerous influence which the Press can exercise one had to study this infamous method whereby honorable and decent people were besmirched with mud and filth, in the form of low abuse and slander, from hundreds and hundreds of quarters simultaneously, as if commanded by some magic formula. The Press, these highway robbers would grab at anything which might serve their evil ends. They would poke their noses into the most intimate family affairs and would not rest until they had sniffed out some petty item which could be used to destroy the reputation of their victim.
But if the result of all this sniffing should be that nothing derogatory was discovered in the private or public life of the victim, they continued to hurl abuse at him, in the belief that some of their criticisms would stick even though refuted a thousand times.
In most cases it finally turned out to be impossible for the victim to continue his defense, because the accuser worked together with so many accomplices that his slanders were re echoed interminably. But these slanderers would never admit that they were acting from motives which influence the common run of humanity or are understood by them. Oh, no.
The scoundrel who defamed his contemporaries in this villainous way would crown himself with a halo of heroic integrity fashioned of gushing language and twaddle about his 'duties as a journalist' and other moldy nonsense of that kind. When these 'journalists' gathered together in meetings and congresses they would give out a lot of slimy talk about a special kind of honor which they called the 'professional honor of the journalist'. Then the assembled species would bow their respects to one another.
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Originally Posted by tank_monkey
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