Five Filters for War Made Easy

              In the film, War Made Easy, the subject of manipulation of the American public is broached by implying that a majority of decisions made, including those of going to war, are made due to deception. Certain media corporations along with the government have sorts of agreement to control, filter, and essentially chose what is exposed to the public in order to manipulate their opinions. Herman and Chomsky too the liberty of producing The Propaganda Model, which has five filters, to show how the media manipulates content in order to deceive the public audience. 

                The first filter is size, ownership, and profit made by the media. It sugests that a quasi-monopoly has been created in the Media industry since almost all media outlets are control by a few companies which have the most money and resources. This makes it very hard for resources such as local newspapers or radio shows to emerge. The larger companies take away the main source of profit, advertisement, and with now profit a media resource won't be able to prosper, thus making it crumble or become absorbed my one of the tycoons. 

                The second filter is the importance of advertisement in media.  Advertisers have a big say in what goes on in television and if something is suggested in a program or article that goes against their beliefs or is too controversial, advertisers pull out to avoid being associated with it. Thus causing the media company to loose its main source of profit. The example presented in the film was Phil Donahue from MSNBC. 

                  The third filter is that the government has control over what news is made public. The government is the highest authority in the United States, and because of this they can control or censure the news presented to the public if they deem it "harmful to the public". The government has done this on countless occasions during times of war, such as the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. 

             The fourth filter in knows as "Flak". Flak is a negative response from the public due to anything portrayed in the media. If a news network shows protestors or riots, advertisers are afraid it will have a negative effect on the public and ruin their reputation.  Going back to the film, this can also be seen through the Phil Donahue example from MSNBC. 

                   The fifth filter is the use of anticommunism as a way to control and influence people through media. This filter was heavily used during the Cold War for example. Another way to view this is today's current stigma towards those who are followers of Islam. Due to the events that transpires on 9/11, the media used this to implement a sort of anticommunism technique, only directed towards those who follow Islam in order to promote favor for going to war.