Pseudo events and their role in modern media

Pseudo-Event

In the scientific literature it is difficult to find a useful concept for the news craze. In Media Matters (1994) John Fiske uses the word 'media event'. These kinds of events have their own reality and their own patterns. "The term media event is an indication that in a postmodern world we can no longer rely on a stable relationship or clear distinction between a 'real' event and its mediated representation. A media event, then, is not mere a representation of what happened, but it has its own reality, which gathers up into itself the reality of the event that may or may not have preceded it." The media construct a 'hyperreality', in which a struggle is going on about the interpretation and meanings of what is going on in the world.

This kind 'hyperreality' applies to all forms of communication. According to an article in "

Wired Magazine," by R.

Rothenberg, no one understands how, or even if, advertising works. The author asserts that the system of production, distribution, sales, and communications is so large and complex, that it is impossible to isolate the effectiveness of a single element. He quotes Bill

Bernbach, a prominent figure in the advertising industry, who said, "advertising is fundamentally persuasion and persuasion happens to be not a science, but an art." Rothenberg, goes on to write that because advertising is so complex, advertising agencies have exploited the confusion by urging clients to buy more pages, more spots, more billboards and by creating more gimmicks. He also quotes researcher historian Daniel

Boorstin who has labeled these gimmicks as " pseudo-events" - news conferences, press releases, and stunts that "someone has planned, planted, or incited" to fill the print space and broadcast time. Other such gimmicks include copywriting, market research, psychological research

VALS), sales promotions, and public relations. All of the gimmicks were, and are, intended to distract people from the fact that the results derived from advertising, the media, are unverifiable.

According to researcher Daniel Boorstin, a pseudo event is an event planned for the purpose of producing dramatic images that be disseminated as reported. These aren't typical events in that they exist only to be publicized: press conferences, televised debates, photo opportunities. A pseudo-event has four characteristics. (1) It is planned rather than spontaneous. (2) It is planned primarily for the immediate purpose of being reported. (3) Its relation to the underlying situation is ambiguous. (4) It is intended to be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Thus, if the president of a financially sound bank holds a press conference in order to get out the word that his bank is sound, the announcement is planned and held for the sake of being reported, but it is not a pseudo-event. The statement's relation to underlying reality is one of truth. But if the bank is fundamentally unsound and the bank president is trying to prevent a justifiable run, then the news conference would be a pseudo-event, in Boorstin's sense.

It is obvious, too, that the value of such an event to its actors depends on its being photographed and reported in newspapers, magazines, newsreel, on radio, and over television. It is the report that gives the event its force in the minds of potential customers. The power to make a reportable event is thus the power to make experience. One is reminded of Napoleon's apocryphal reply to his general, who objected that circumstances were unfavorable to a proposed campaign: "Bah, I make circumstances!" The modern public relations counsel -- and he is, of course, only one of many twentieth century creators of pseudo-events-- has come close to fulfilling Napoleon's idle boast. "The counsel on public relations," Mr. Bernays explains, "not only knows what news value is, but knowing it, he is in a position to make news happen. He is a creator of events."

The intriguing feature of the modern situation, however, comes precisely from the fact that the modern newsmakers are not God. The news they make happen, the events they create, are somehow not quite real. There remains a tantalizing difference between the man-made and God-made events.

Still, the media, realizing its force to penetrate into the mass-conscience, "produces" events that are consciously integrative and deliberately constructed with a view of orchestrating a consensus. They are public rituals, emotional occasions. The broadcast does not include the assassinations but the ensuing funerals; not social dramas but their ritualized outcomes.

Fiske prefers to use the term 'discourse': "the continuous process of making sense and of circulating it socially." (p. 6) This is an ongoing process, in the minds of all people as well as in the media or politics. For this struggle he uses the metaphor of a river of discourses. "At times the flow is comparatively calm; at others, the undercurrents, which always disturb the depths under even the calmest surface, erupt into turbulence. Rocks and promontories can turn its currents into eddies and counter currents, can change its directions or even reverse its flow." (p.7) According to Fiske media events are the "sites of maximum discursive visibility and maximum turbulence." (p. 8) Media events are indicators of deep cultural crises in society: the O.J. Simpson case is about racism, Hill & Thomas and Bobbitt are about gender.

Many theories exist to tell us how we should behave within certain circumstances, but that the processes that determine the outcomes of our behavior are so complex that we can only, at best, attempt to make general predictions. The more we feed our cravings the more we demand. As Rothenberg wrote, "The less we have known about how advertising and the media work, the more advertising and media there have been." The media has huge impact on our society. Certainly the media has been as Rothenberg suggests, "as familiar and invisible as the air we breathe" We allow the media to permeate every aspect of our lives. It is impossible to go anywhere and avoid what so-called pseudo-events, events that are often fabricated to "sell" the media.

Whether it is the alleged sexual exploits of President Clinton or the ongoing controversy about O.J. Simpson's innocence or guilt.

By the nature and cost of television, the players have traditionally been big and powerful. Perhaps no different from the wealthy ruling classes and the church of the pre-modern era. However, with the proliferation of the Internet, we have created a worldwide democratic forum possibly taking the place of previous media. Then again, possibly only giving the illusion of being democratic.

As information grows exponentially we may, by necessity, rely on the similar sources of information. We may send out our automated agents to sources that ultimately are being controlled by similar pre-modern era powerbrokers.

Throughout history societies have had leaders and followers. Invariably, the leaders possessed the power and dictated the preferred behaviors and attitudes of the followers to insure their loyalty and servitude. Knowledge has always played a critical role in determining who had the power. In the pre-modern era, the church, in whatever form it manifested itself, had always been the keeper and purveyor of knowledge. Only the educated had the power. The source of all knowledge came primarily from the church guided and directed by people dedicated to formal study and teaching with a strong desire to maintain their power base.

Prior to Johannes Gutenberg's printing press, approximately 1450, learning took place primarily through the spoken word. Books were hand-written by scribes, they were expensive, and literacy was limited to the wealthy or those within the church. By maintaining illiteracy those in power found it easier to manipulate the masses.

Upon the growing availability of printed materials, more and more people had the opportunity to become educated. The more educated people became, the more people shared ideas, the more those ideas spread across geographic boundaries, the more cultures redefined themselves. History is a constant record, the accuracy of which is certainly questionable, of how cultures have changed. By the twentieth century, the modern era, improvements in transportation, communication, and technology again helped societies to redefine themselves..

Universal literacy is growing. We view events and access information in real time. But that does not mitigate the fact that the foundation of our education, and now, the mass invasiveness of the media, determine the control of information and how we process that information.

Pseudo-events are often associated with media-hypes. Under certain conditions the daily news can turn into very intensive publicity waves with their own dynamics. People can hyperventilate, but the media also show a sort of hyperventilation: an agitated and intensive breathing, caused by fears and anxiety, but at the same time intensifying these fears. The result can be a spiral movement, intensifying the media hype.

Mediahype' not only refers to hyperventilation, it also contains the original American word, the hype, used for the blown-up and mostly commercial publicity for new bestsellers or blockbusters. Hype in that sense stands for planted or organized, at least not spontaneous publicity by using press conferences, interviews or luxurious press trips.

The people and systems in control are still closely guarding the dissemination of information.

In 1994 the O.J. Simpson case got more coverage on American TV than 'real' political crises like Haiti, Cuba and Somalia, but there are some differences between these hypes and the regular coverage about war and disaster on the same front pages that run OJ stories. Publicity waves seem to have a specific and unique quality: In one way or another the relation between reality and the coverage seems to get lost somewhere in the whole process. The explosion of publicity is the result of the dynamic interaction between media and society, instead of being the reflection of a 'factual' developments in society. The sudden increase in the amount of reports about a new phenomenon can be the cause as well as the result of media attention. Because of the media's influence on the social development causes and consequences get mixed up. It is not sure whether there is really more violence in schools or more cases of sexual harassment, or we have changed our moral criteria for 'intolerable' behavior. At a certain moment the coverage seems to get a life of its own, disconnected from factual developments. There are many examples of hypes based on blown up figures publicized by sources advocating for their interests.

"Think back again to the missing children stories. What started as a few highly publicized cases about abducted children blazed into national hysteria. (...) Then the Denver Post exposed the truth behind the statistics. Its series of Pulitzer prize-winning articles showed that the number of children abducted had been overestimated by tens of thousands. Almost immediately, the coverage stopped." (Basheda 1992) Valarie Basheda researching these kinds of hypes discovered that a New York City action group started off the chain reaction. "It fed the media inflated statistics about the numbers of missing youngsters to gain publicity for their efforts." Instead of checking the 'facts' and the original sources, the media concentrate on all kinds of follow-ups, including the reaction of the authorities who feel that they have to take action. But - as will describe later- in many mediahypes it is impossible to relate media attention to any 'factual' developments, simply because these 'facts' do not exist.

Pseudo-events are also largely connected to politics. Political culture has basically assumed two very different -- and in some ways even opposite -- forms. On the one hand, politicians have become obsessed with trying to control, as much as it is possible, the way in which the public will judge their acts. By doing this, they reduce the necessary freedom and creativity of political acts -- through previous calculation of the possible social interpretation given to them. On the other hand, it is increasingly more difficult than in earlier times to avoid public discussion of unexpected phenomena. In contemporary democracies with relatively open media, it is not only difficult but often impossible to obstruct the immediate and varying coverage of relevant political events.

To equate 'live' television with 'real life' is to ignore all those determinations standing between the 'event' and our perception of it." On one hand, it is possible to say the same about any kind of perceptual relationship with an "event" -perception is always given in context. But, on the other, the argument is most deeply mistaken in saying that there is distance between an "event" and the perception of it. It is clear that an event is, politically speaking, nothing but the intersubjective perception of it. To be called up by certain eventualities is a necessary condition for the understanding of politics as creation. But public events are not always un-planned. Sometimes public events are planned precisely for the contrary -- to celebrate the reproduction of society, not to open up the possibility for the institution of the novelty. These kind of media events are those studied by Katz Dayan and "have given shape to a new narrative genre that employs the unique potential of the electronic media to command attention universally and simultaneously in order to tell a primordial story about current affairs. These are events that hang a halo over the television set and transform the viewing experience. Audiences recognize them as an invitation -- even a command -- to stop their daily routines and join in a holiday experience." Unfortunately, the "halo" over the TV-set is often not real, and a so-called "celebration" event is actually a pseudo-event, intended to deceive the public. So many political events, (launching a campaign, for instance), despite the glow that surround them, are actually staged events, which deliberately mislead the masses.

More and more events do no really exist, these days. For instance, the presentation of the Iraqi issue by Colin Powell at the United Nations, in February 2003, instead of representing a real event, actually existed just to appear on CNN, and on all other channels, for that matter. Mr. Powell's intention was not to convince the other members of the Security Council that Saddam Hussein is a threat, but to "publicize" the event. The fact that most of what Colin Powell said then turned out to be lies shouldn't surprise anyone. That proves that a pseudo-event does need to be convincing, but it does not imply that an absolute lack of truth will also reflect in peoples' conscience.

Regarding the necessity of a pseudo-event to be convincing, the following example should prove useful: "On Saturday April 12, under a perfect sky, the big day began when a chartered bus from Atlanta pulled up and Martha Burk's legion of supporters rolled into action -- all seventeen of them. Then, joining ranks with members of Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, the mother of all protests swelled to forty, outnumbered by the police two-to-one and by the press five-to-one. The whole thing was over in about an hour.

Ten months earlier, Burk had sent her fateful letter to ANGC chairman William "Hootie" Johnson, urging the club to open membership to women before this year's Masters Tournament. Since then, the New York Times alone had run ninety-five stories in support of Burk's demand. Miles of videotape had chronicled Burk's every appearance, accusation, and whine. Yet Burk and her henchpersons could not fill a single school bus. Nothing daunted, Burk found the pluck to declare, "I don't think we're hurt by [the paltry turnout] at all" (www.msnbc.com, April 17, 2003).

Martha Burk of the National Council of Women's Organizations (NCWO) has learned anything from her attempt to force the Augusta National Golf Club (ANGC) to admit women as members, it is that she has no future as an events planner. Her own protest was a flop. A host of bizarre exhibitionists turned the demonstration site into a circus. And the Masters Tournament went off without a hitch.