Thursday, February 26, 2009

London's PressTV?

In watching the PressTV programming, I notice more and more of the shows are not only based in London but focus on British issues. One program called "Comment" is hosted by British MP George Galloway and allows viewers to email and call into the show and pretty much talk about whatever they want. Viewers comment from Spain, the UK, Nigeria, Cyprus and other corners of the world. One caller brought up the torture of Guantanamo Bay prisoner, Binyam Mohamed. Galloway criticized Britain for its role in the situation. The show had its fair share of Israel criticism as is common on PressTV, but one viewer email from Nigeria stated that its author was glad to see Netanyahu elected but stated that Palestinians should have a state and that Israel needs to stop the indiscriminant killing of Palestinians "because it's better than that." Galloway replied that Israeli’s have overwhelmingly chosen war by electing Netanyahu. Which is not exactly true because Livni actually won the popular vote. Anyway, the program that followed dedicated its entire 50 minutes to Britain's laws regarding the custody of children in divorce. The show took to the streets of London interviewing Brits about how they felt about these laws. Clearly this means PressTV is catering to a largely British audience. I find myself wondering how this program topic furthers Iran's mission with PressTV. On that note, let's look at this clip from PressTV's "Comment" in which Galloway defends an email accusation that Iran is a dictatorship. Maybe this is Iran's mission with PressTV...

1 comment:

  1. Very interesting. The UK focus is a great observation, but Galloway's rant about how Press TV allows dissent to be aired IN THE UK means little for how much dissent is allowed within the Persian information sphere. I doubt it will work. If there is one thing to be learned about the failure of US public diplomacy in the last ten years, it is that the rhetoric must, at least in some way, match the policy. Selling the world on the fact that the Iranian government does not strictly regulate press within the country is not realistic.

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