Pilger speaks to packed meeting

Graham Matthews, Melbourne

Six-hundred-and-fifty people packed the Capitol Theatre to capacity on November 26 to hear journalist and film-maker John Pilger speak on the power of the corporate media.

The public forum was organised by Green Left Weekly and Readings Books, and doubled as a launch of Pilger's new book, Tell Me No Lies: Investigative Journalism and its Triumphs, a compilation of 35 investigative articles by various journalists spanning 60 years.

"Propaganda and the media are absolutely crucial at this time", Pilger argued, comparing the media coverage of the US invasion of Iraq to the Duke of Wellington's coverage of the 1815 battle of Waterloo — "the general as journalist".

Commenting on last month's US presidential election, Pilger said that only the richest 1% of the US population were the winners. Everyone else was a loser — whether they voted Republican or Democrat.

Pilger said that in Australia, "there is only effectively one party with two factions [Liberal and Labor]".

Pilger argued that the world is heading into an era of "direct action", of mass struggles against governmental and corporate power. "There is across the world an extraordinary movement. Just because we're not told about it, doesn't mean that it doesn't exist."

He spoke passionately about the movement for radical social change in Venezuela. "What happens in Venezuela is incredibly important to all of us", he said.

Pilger also spoke passionately about the illegal war in Iraq. He particularly highlighted the findings of a study conducted under the direction of Les Roberts of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, the results of which were published in the British Lancet medical journal at the end of October, that around 100,000 Iraqis had died since the US invasion, largely as a result of air strikes and artillery attacks on Iraqi cities.

He decried the political pressure that is stifling the ABC and warned against the threat to SBS's investigative program Dateline.

In conclusion, Pilger paid special tribute to Green Left Weekly. "My name is often seen associated with Green Left Weekly", he said. "Everything I say about this newspaper, I mean", going on to describe GLW as one of the best serious newspapers, not only of the left, but generally in the world.

From Green Left Weekly, December 1, 2004.

Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.

From GLW issue 608