The Party-State Media
13th April 2023
Yesterday National Public Radio (NPR) announced that it is leaving Twitter, after the platform “falsely labeled” it as “state-affiliated media.” This is the “the same term it uses for propaganda outlets in Russia, China and other autocratic countries,” the indignant NPR huffed. Twitter CEO Elon Musk had the label changed to “government funded,” but this was still too much for NPR, which claims that—while it does receive government funds—such a label would tarnish its “credibility” and could somehow even “endanger journalists.”
Meanwhile the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is also throwing a hissy fit over being pasted with the same label, saying it “is, and always has been, independent,” and is merely “funded by the British public.” Also complaining is Voice of America (VOA), which, despite literally being run by an arm of the U.S. federal government, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, claims that, “The label ‘government funded’ is potentially misleading and could be construed as also ‘government-controlled’—which VOA is most certainly not.”
Each outlet claims it maintains “editorial independence” from the state despite receiving government funding, and so doesn’t deserve to be called “state-affiliated.” Regardless of what you think of Musk or Twitter, this is absurd. Let’s leave aside VOA, which was literally founded to conduct information warfare abroad on behalf of the United States, first in WWII and then during the Cold War, and is therefore so obviously state-affiliated that its claims otherwise are not really worth addressing. The BBC and NPR are only marginally less obvious in being state media.