Alternative Press

Alternative press, at its best, is a source of accurate, well-documented, counterhegemonic, investigative reporting and analysis that can advance social movements and serve as the basis for effective social and environmental justice activism. The term alternative press is most often used to refer to noncorporate social and environmental justice print and, more recently, Internet media. Other times, it refers to all sources of alternative media, including books, radio, video, film, and television. Although blogs may also serve as a source of independent information, this discussion will focus on alternative newspapers, magazines, journals, newsletters, and website media, primarily in the United States.

Accurate information and analysis are essential for ordinary people who care about and want to work toward creating a better world. Democratic decision making can be based on nothing less. Self-serving elites, governments, and business interests have long been aware that the easiest way to control people is to restrict access to information and to shape public perspectives of reality in ways that increase power and profits for the rich and powerful. Thus, various methods of censorship and propaganda have been used separately and in combination to misinform and/or disinform (lie to) people. Yet, despite such manipulation, ordinary people have often sought or created alternative ways of investigating, analyzing, and sharing information crucial for the well-being of themselves, others, and the earth. Thus, it is not surprising that the first alternative press in the United States emerged from black, Native American, women's, and working-class movements.

To understand why independent media sources are viewed as a powerful alternative, it is necessary to examine significant characteristics of mainstream corporate-owned media. Media analysts Herbert Schiller, Benjamin Bagdikian, and Carl Jensen (founder of Project Censored) led scholars of journalism in critiquing and documenting the methods and consequences of corporate media ownership and concentration. They exposed the inherent conflict of interest between maximizing profits and informing the public. Early in the 20th century, media corporations discovered they could make more money by selling advertisements (actually selling affluent audiences to advertisers) than selling the most papers (circulation). With this change, Bagdikian documented how media businesses became uninterested in groups that had little or no disposable income.

As media companies grew larger, they found it beneficial to interlock their boards of directors with other large manufacturing corporations, thus consolidating the interests of wealthy elites. Through purchases and mergers, the mass media became concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer corporations, whose primary interest was—and still is—in maximizing profits, not informing the public. These corporations, who also dominate industries like weapons and fossil fuels, understand that if the public were fully informed about corporate and government [Page 79]activities, more than a few of which are unethical and even criminal, it would be difficult or impossible to continue them. Contrary to the myths of objectivity and fairness in reporting, this financial conflict of interest creates conditions for censorship, manipulation, propaganda, and disinformation to dominate mainstream media outlets. Corporate media and public relations firms have developed methods of creatively packaging selective information designed to gain public support for policies and practices beneficial to corporations and government collaborators and detrimental to the public interest. Herman and Chomsky aptly labeled this shaping of public opinion “manufacturing consent.”

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