Occupy Wall Street - Media Silent

 by Roland Hulme

If you ever wanted an example of how our media is bought and sold, observe the silence about "Occupy Wall Street."

Real, breaking news is being ignored

As I write this, the New York City Police Department is battling head-to-toe with violent protestors on Wall Street, in lower Manhattan.

The protestors have encamped on the heart of the world's capitalist system to protest a variety of things - from the growing disparity between rich and poor, the fragrant abuse of power by Wall Street's fattest cats and even the concept of capitalism itself.

This might not seem all that astonishing - but I'll tell you what is. The fact that NOTHING is being reported about it in the news. In fact, if it wasn't for real-time social network Twitter, perhaps nobody beyond Wall Street would even know about it.

And why is that? I mean, it's certainly news. It's an epic protest that today turned bloody. Dozens of demonstrators have been locked up. On Wall Street itself, they're on the knife-edge of descending into anarchy that would give London's rioters a run for their money (and unlike Britain's best efforts, it's not fueled by Stella Artois and inspired by a desire to steal a flatscreen television.)

The fact is, though, that most of the major news corporations are owned lock, stock and barrel by Wall Street and reporting this inconvenient civil unrest would not be in the best interests of those in charge. It's a demonstration of the awesome power of America's capitalist elite - and also how little word travels when our ubiquitous news and information networks choose not to broadcast it.

But word is getting out - in the words of Mr. Universe: "You can't stop the signal." On Twitter now, using the hashtag #occupywallstreet, hundreds of protestors, supporters and critics are ranting, raving and reporting about what's happening.

Observe for yourself: #occupywallstreet

My issue is not with the protests that are going on, but the fact that there seems to be a global conspiracy to ignore and dismiss any attempts to publicize or promote them as a news story. Despite over 80 protestors having been arrested in the just the last few days, this story is conspicuously missing from the landing pages of Yahoo!, CNN.com and even the BBC. How can that be?

Or how, when the reality of how we're spoon-fed our information is becoming increasingly clear, can we believe anything we read from these mainstream news sources ever again?