[A-List] "The nonrenewal of RCTV license is a revolutionary act because it touches the core of world power"

[Charles Brown]

The nonrenewal of RCTV license is a revolutionary act because it
touches the core of world power

Autor: Marcelo Colussi, 4 June, 2007

Traductor: Translated by Eufemia Zapata



The nonrenewal of RCTV license has caused widespread political
repercussions both in Venezuela and worldwide. So far, it has sparked
an unusual media stir that has given the right grounds to claim that
the revolutionary government is a dictatorship where human rights are
violated. Based on such claim, a huge campaign is being organized to
request not only the renewal of RCTV license, but plainly and simply
put the resignation of President Hugo Chávez.

To know all the details about what is at stake and what this decision
entails, as well as the future perspectives on the issue, Argenpress'
correspondent in Caracas, Marcelo Colussi, interviewed Vladimir
Acosta, Venezuelan historian and political analyst, one of the
sharpest observers of the current Bolivarian process.

Argenpress: What is the present meaning of the nonrenewal of RCTV
license in political, social, and cultural terms? What is all the fuss
about, at the national and international levels?

Vladimir Acosta: In the context of the profound changes implemented in
Venezuela in recent years, changes in favor of the great majorities,
two specific moments can be considered revolutionary: the process that
allowed us to gain back control over our oil resources, and the
current times we are living. The process that led to the control of
Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) as a State-owned company included two
stages: the first was about supporting a new oil act and a new board
within the company. The cost was a coup, back in 2002. The government
was overthrown, but popular mobilization succeeded in restoring its
power after two days thanks to the support of the constitutionalist
sectors of the armed forces. The President, after taking power again,
generously and perhaps naively reinstated the same board in PDVSA, and
those people began to plot against the regime and organized the oil
sabotage in December 2002-January 2003. Once the sabotage was
successfully countered after a period of intense struggle, then and
only then, in what is the second stage, the government was able to
take effective control of a company that already belonged to the
State, but was managed by an elite called meritocracy that worked in
the interests of the US Imperialism. That was a revolutionary moment,
because it implied taking control over the oil and the oil company
that exploited the oil serving the heavy interests of the Empire, and
confronting the local elite that benefited at the expenses of the
great majorities. That moment helped us radicalize an already existing
process that originally emerged as a reaction to the aggressions of
the right, and helped us advance on the fulfillment of a series of
tasks related to social transformation. So the missions emerged with
the purpose of bringing health, education, social security and decent
living conditions to a majority that had been historically excluded.
I.e., for the first time in national history, the oil revenues
actually served the people. It was an undoubtedly revolutionary
initiative that was accompanied by other equally important
initiatives, like the implementation of exchange control regulations
to stop the plundering of our country and the new taxes collected from
the wealthy.

Right now a similar initiative is being discussed in terms of the
progress of our revolution: turning a private TV channel, the property
of which has been in the hands of a wealthy family for over 50 years,
into a public service company. And we are not even talking about
expropriation; no way, because this is a very legalistic revolution.
In Venezuela, as in almost every country in the world, radio space
belongs to the State, i.e., it belongs to the society. The State, as
an expression of society, administers it. So, those who present
themselves as owners of TV stations are not so, they are licensees.
Licenses, as any person with a minimum knowledge of law, are granted
for a specific time under specific conditions. Once that time is up if
the authority who granted the license believes that the other party
did not comply with the agreed conditions, the license is plainly and
simply not renewed. That kind of decision does not mean that the
authorities are against private property or that they are acting
arbitrarily. That is what happened here with Radio Caracas Televisión
–RCTV–, a channel that commercially exploited a frequency for 53 years
and after all those years made people believe that a public good
became a private good, an endlessly private good. It also made people
believe that the company owns the channel. By manipulating the
feelings and thoughts of the public, as the media do, it managed to
put that image in most of the people's minds. But this frequency does
not belong to any private company.

Now, the fact that the State does not renew the license of any
frequency, be it radio or TV, is not uncommon, it happens all the time
everywhere around the world. For different reasons, legally justified,
the States, and this happens quite often, decide not to renew
licenses. So, what is all the scandal around RCTV about? Why are the
world press, the international media power and the right turning this
fact into a struggle flag with such violence? We see a strictly
Venezuelan problem on which Parliaments of different countries,
international organizations, the Inter-American Press Society (SIP),
Reporters without Borders, and all sorts of organizations all around
make strong statements and adopt specific attitudes. It would seem as
if the entire galaxy were pronouncing itself against the nonrenewal of
the license of a private TV channel. Why? Because it is a
revolutionary fact. And why is it a revolutionary fact? Because it
touches the core of world power. Today, the world power is completely
dependent on the media.

When the political electoral system that we call democracy, but
actually is not democratic  –the representative system to elect
authorities in which the poor end up voting for the rich, and the
exploited end up voting for the exploiters–, when the system needs
electors, it manipulates and deceives them. In the past, when there
was no democracy parody, when the poor did not have the right to vote,
there was no need to manipulate them. In modern societies, when the
great majorities have access to the electoral process and to elect the
same rich people in a game of purported democracy, that is where the
need to manipulate them emerges. Then, the groups in power must
manipulate, domesticate the masses, deceive them, dissolve their
brains, bombard them with banal images so that they are unable to
think, so that become mindless. And the media are the key to all that
manipulation. Take the media out of the equation, particularly TV,
something that has acquired a decisive importance in today's world and
the system would collapse. It would collapse because people would
start using their own heads if there were no constant invasion from
commercial TV, if there were no constant pressure to prevent us from
thinking, if our brains were not repeatedly washed to accept the
values embedded in indoctrination shows like series, movies, deceitful
news shows and low-quality programs that prevent us from seeing
reality as it is. Therefore the media and TV above all, are crucial to
the continuity of an exploitation system.

Venezuela is giving an example to the world. Sacred interests of the
private companies are being touched. There is no need to defend
freedom of speech or any of those claims vociferated around. What this
particular company loses is, among other things, a big share of
profit. It was recently made public that only because of the drop in
advertising-derived sales it will stop receiving an approximate amount
of 200 million dollars. They are not defending freedom of speech to
all and sundry; they are defending the interests at stake. If there is
an ideology being defended here, that is the ideology of money, the
ideology of power reserved for a small group, i.e., the elite. That is
what is at stake. Thus, transforming a channel exploited by a wealthy
private company, linked to the US Imperialism and a bitter enemy of
the revolutionary changes being implemented in the country,
transforming that channel into a public service, democratic and
participatory channel in favor of the majorities, that is a measure
that the right cannot tolerate. Transforming the channel that only
serves its own interest and manipulates people and makes them numb
into a channel to serve the people is a revolutionary measure. And not
only in favor of Venezuela, but a terrible example for other nations,
according to the international right. SIP said it very clearly in
recent days: they are worried because the Venezuelan example could be
followed in other Latin American countries, such as Ecuador or
Bolivia, nations that are also implementing changes.

Hopefully the example will spread and be replicated. Hopefully we will
see many cases where private TV channels are turned into public
channels to serve the majorities, public channels that defend our
cultural values and bring us closer to our own history. We are all
familiar with the American history and values, but we know nothing
about ourselves. Their TV is universal, it is everywhere around the
world and they force us to consume their values, their lifestyle. That
is how they control us. We do not know anything about our roots, our
own values, our cultures. Through TV, mostly American TV, we have been
forced to adopt a culture based on values that are foreign to us. Of
course we can make our own TV based on our traditions, meeting our own
needs. We can make cultural TV that is not opposed to good quality and
entertainment. That is a myth disseminated by tacky TV: the myth that
fun and entertainment cannot go hand in hand with high-level culture.
We can and we must make good and catchy, enjoyable TV. There is
Telesur, for example. That is a different communication model: Latin
American TV, made by Latin Americans, able to help us see each other
and discover each other as we are, not as third-category Americans.
We, Latin Americans, do not know each other because of the cultural
invasion. A Venezuelan knows much more about the US than about
Paraguay, Argentina or Brazil; he or she knows about stereotypes,
which is precisely what commercial media broadcasts. Knowing each
other in a different way is indispensable to function as brothers and
sisters, people united in a true bloc, sharing common goals. And
sharing a common enemy too. That is what the Empire does not want,
that is why the bombard us with trash TV that can do nothing but
confuse us.

In Venezuela, we have said it, enormous changes and profound
transformations are taking place. In that sense, education is crucial.
The system preserves itself, partially, through an ever-present
repression. Even if it is not evident all the time, in critical
situations it manifests to its fullest: there is always a Pinochet
crouching somewhere. Repression is always present. But the system also
preserves itself day by day through a non-physical kina of repression
based on three pillars: the Church, education, and the media. The
Church is for the youngest, it serves to instill in them, from an
early age, a series of ideas that spoil the possibility of having a
critical nature from the very first years. Then comes elementary
school, where they become highly ideologized. Education always means
ideologization, the introduction to certain values. Education is not
possible without ideology. And the education we are used to helps
introduce ideas of competition, selfishness, consumerism, racism,
i.e., all the values of a capitalist society grounded on such
principles. Finally, you have the media, but especially TV. It turns
out that the Church remains as part of our childhood; many grownups
even contradict religious teachings: the Pope prohibits the use of
condoms, and people use them; the Pope prohibits divorce but people
get divorced; the Pope prohibits pre-marital sex and sex out of
wedlock, but people do not listen to him. But they are still catholic.
So the power of the Church is not that big. Education, on the other
hand, goes halfway, because not everyone has access to all education
levels in the capitalist system. Many, many people hardly finish
elementary school, maybe a few manage to move on to high-school, and
even fewer make it to college. Now, the media reaches everybody,
absolutely everybody. The media reaches the youngest, it reaches
teenagers and grownups, the elderly, the illiterate, the educated: so
it has become the fundamental and focal point of power. Nobody can
match the media in terms of its penetration: certainly not he Church
and not formal education. It even competes with and beats schools most
successfully: if we want to create a new citizen with new values, with
a new ideology, whatever is accomplished during the day, the TV
dismantles at night. That is why it is necessary, in order to create a
new citizen, to develop a different kina of TV, a public service TV. A
terrible element of the system and one that we must fight as strongly
as possible: the media cannot be private. A corporation should not
have all the resources at hand to manipulate the heads of millions of
people in favor of its own sectorial interests while disguising them
as collective interests. The media does not have to belong entirely to
the State Esther, because a similar situation could be reproduced.
They have to be social property. Their tremendous weight demands that
they be administered and manager by society. The citizens have to
supervise communication. Even more: the citizens have to make
communication. Here, in the western area of Caracas, we have a
community TV channel called Catia TV. I love their slogan: "Do not
watch TV. Make it". That is what we ought to do, that is the model we
must move towards. We need to create a new communications initiative.

read the rest of the interview at
http://www.tlaxcala.es/pp.asp?reference=3059&lg=en


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