{"id":2285,"date":"2016-10-11T09:13:08","date_gmt":"2016-10-11T07:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/?p=2285"},"modified":"2016-10-11T11:57:15","modified_gmt":"2016-10-11T09:57:15","slug":"amanda-knox-a-story-of-media-depravity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/2016-10-11\/amanda-knox-a-story-of-media-depravity\/","title":{"rendered":"Amanda Knox: a story of media depravity"},"content":{"rendered":"

I thoroughly recommend the new documentary Amanda Knox<\/em> to anyone interested in either human nature or the role of the media \u2013 which should include\u00a0most of us. Here is the chance to hear the main protagonists tell their stories. Don\u2019t be put off by the lukewarm reviews. Journalists don\u2019t much like this film because it reveals so much about how journalism works \u2013 and it isn\u2019t pretty.<\/p>\n

The man feeding the media monster in the Knox case was Giuliano Mignini, the local prosector. He shifts uneasily in his chair as he justifies a series of poor decisions that led to Knox and boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito\u2019s wrongful incarceration for four years for the murder of Meredith Kercher. Mignini gives every impression of being a man whose rigid Catholic upbringing left him easily persuaded that life is a struggle between good and evil, innocence and depravity. Knox did not conform to his idea of a good girl, so she had to be punished.<\/p>\n

But more fascinating still is Nick Pisa, the Daily Mail\u2019s thoroughly repellent reporter. His interview, in which he revels in his discredited scoops, suggests a man who lacks even the faintest trace of empathy. Here is an individual who dwells\u00a0entirely on the surface. If there is a monster in this tale (aside from the real murderer, Rudy Guede), it is Pisa.<\/p>\n

Following the film\u2019s release, Pisa has found himself caught up in a twitter storm<\/a> of disapproval for his ugly behaviour. Most of the outrage, however, misses the mark.<\/p>\n

It would be profoundly mistaken to blame\u00a0Pisa for casting Knox as a\u00a0cartoon villain. Pisa \u2013 and the many other reporters who wrote similar lurid tales about Knox \u2013 did not dupe their editors. They provided a service that their media outlets desperately wanted.<\/p>\n

Pisa was selected by the Daily Mail editors to cover the Knox story for two reasons: he spoke fluent Italian and they were confident that a man of his low scruples would produce the exciting copy they needed. He did not fail in his job by misrepresenting the Knox case, he succeeded gloriously in \u201cmonetising\u201d Knox for his paper. That is why he continues to look so self-satisfied, despite\u00a0ruining the lives of two innocent people.<\/p>\n

There are many thousands of Nick Pisas in our newsrooms.\u00a0Like a pack of baying dogs, every media outlet chased after the same false scent: of a femme fatale at the centre of a deadly sex game. Liberal media adopted the more restrained tone their readers expected, but they were just as excitable, just as aroused by the prospect of cashing in on Knox.<\/p>\n

The Knox story is not an aberration. These misrepresentations\u00a0happen every day in our media, and in relation to\u00a0far more vital issues. Not least, we see a similar process\u00a0unfolding\u00a0in the corporate media\u2019s efforts to create\u00a0another cartoon villain, this time of Britain’s Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and those who support him.<\/p>\n

This is essentially about money too. Corbyn is seen by the wealthy elite that\u00a0run our societies\u00a0as a threat to a system they have created over many decades to ensure their permanent enrichment, and their innoculation against the consequences of failure (remember those bank bailouts). The media is one branch of this corporate power structure \u2013 its public relations wing, if you like. Its primary job is not to depict\u00a0the world as it really is but to construct a set\u00a0of illusions that will keep us docile, uninformed and intermittently baying for blood \u2013 not the blood of those who cheat and abuse us daily, but of unfortunates\u00a0like Amanda Knox.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I thoroughly recommend the new documentary Amanda Knox to anyone interested in either human nature or the role of the media \u2013 which should include\u00a0most of us. Here is the chance to hear the main protagonists tell their stories. Don\u2019t be put off by the lukewarm reviews. Journalists don\u2019t much like this film because it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[6],"class_list":{"0":"post-2285","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"tag-media-criticism"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2285","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2285"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2285\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2285"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2285"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2285"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}