|
There was a clandestine recording of a Lula minister's meeting.
Chicanery and surprise attacks are
part of the political game,
but the contract between society and press presupposes a
critical distance
from these methods, not their reinforcement.
By
Alberto Dines
The recording of the meeting between minister Antonio Palocci and the PT faction of the House of Representatives
(which took place on Friday, January 31) was not authorized by the representatives present. It was a clandestine recording.
Therefore, the delivery of the tape reproducing that tart discussion to a newspaper was illegal, as was its distribution through the Internet.
The recording was made by one congressman interested in disclosing the discussion between the government and
the most radical factions of the party to the public. The newspaper trusted the source and the source trusted the
newspaper—a clean deal, which does not minimize the infraction.
The copy made significant noise and revealed a sizeable fracture in the government party. The PT leadership
reacted impulsively but the result of this return of bluff journalism was awful for the press.
What happened during the tumultuous PT meeting would surface naturally, with no need to resort to
pseudo-tapping. Brasília has an excellent team of political reporters who don't need to use such resources. And readers are beginning to
grow tired of the scandalous tone involving our political life, including a clear case of ideological divergence.
The phone tapping and the tapes released with huge clatter by the media during the Fernando Henrique Cardoso era
followed the same procedures:
** Annoyed interests activate a hidden tape recorder.
** A medium interested in making noise releases it with no investigative support.
** With the resulting repercussion, the infraction becomes legitimate.
Chicanery and surprise attacks are part of the political game, but the contract between society and press
presupposes a critical distance from these methods, not their reinforcement.
Abobrinha News
The organizers of the III World Social Forum of Porto Alegre are happy with the repercussion of the event in the
media. In a note, political columnist Tereza Cruvinel
(O Globo, January 27, page 2) informs, based on information from the
Forum's spokespeople, that content polls revealed that the Brazilian event won over the World Economic Forum of Davos in the
battle of the media.
This year, 4,000 journalists were credentialed in Porto Alegre against only 2,600 last year, and the coverage of what
happened here was "larger and broader" in the communication media all over the world.
These content polls, however, did not register that an event of the utmost importance within the panel about media,
organized by journalist Daniel Herz and announced by everyone for the morning of Saturday (January 25), did not receive a single
line from the great Brazilian press, either local or national.
With the title "Strategies for democratization of the media", the event was a case study about control by the media.
Until the following Monday (January 27), there was nothing at all in the newspapers
Zero Hora, Correio do Povo, Folha de S. Paulo, Estado de S. Paulo, O Globo
and Jornal do Brasil about it—if the seminar had in fact taken place, what was discussed in
it, if the media is fulfilling its role or if it is only distracting the attention of the Brazilian society.
The seminar would certainly cover media concentration, its cartelization, the transformation of political
oligarchs into media oligarchs and other serious issues, which are at the root of our social and political aberrations. If this agenda
was discussed, it could not have been omitted. Hiding it away represents explicit manipulation. If it was not discussed in
spite of the scheduling, ignoring it constitutes carelessness.
On the other hand, the abobrinha news [superficial press] worked beautifully. Everyone put their best foot forward
to show how Porto Alegre resembled Woodstock, the young crowd and its camping grounds, the "alternative" mood,
the rediscovery of the 1960s and 1970s, etc. etc.
Obviously, all the major national newspapers stamped in their front pages the photo of the pie in the face of
congressman José Genoíno, the president of PT. You can't deny the readers a trick like that. But it is exactly because of the
exaggerated attention to facts such as these in the press that we have the "Confeiteiros sem Fronteiras" (Confectioners without
Borders), all imbued with an inexhaustible talent to secure their 15 minutes of fame.
Inauguration and Accuracy
Twenty two days after taking office—an eternity in terms of daily
journalism—Folha de S. Paulo published a study
that the newspaper had ordered to the Civil Defense of the Federal District about the size of the crowd who attended the
inauguration of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
"Exhausting" may seem a cliché, but it is exhausting work indeed. Based on aerial shots taken by the newspaper's
photographers from different areas (with known dimensions), the specialists were able to calculate that at 3:30 p.m. of
January 1st, there were 63,230 people at Esplanada dos Ministérios and, at the same time, at the Três Poderes Square, a crowd of
8,080 had gathered. Total: 71,310. The merit of the Folha story (January 22, page A9) was not so much its final report, but the intention to mistrust the
journalistic numerology used to cover the inauguration, including its own:
** Military Police calculated the crowd as 150 thousand people.
** Folha followed this estimate and released its source.
** O Globo came up with 200 thousand people, "according to the organizers" (but who are the organizers—the
government of the Federal District, the federal government, the PT?)
** O Estado de S. Paulo attributed to the same Military Police the total of 200 thousand people.
By the end of the week, the magazines were unable to give a precise number and did not even bother to come up
with an average of the results published in the papers. With the exception of
Isto É, who repeated the calculation of
Folha but, in the caption of an aerial photo at the Esplanada dos Ministérios, extremely clear and in color, was overcome with
emotion and declared that the whole avenue was "taken by the people" in spite of the large areas of green grass shown in the image.
Época talked about a "crowd as never before seen in Brasília", but the accuracy of the weeklies was oriented
towards calculating irrelevances; the swearing-in took "exactly" 20 seconds, the speech contained "exactly" 3,826 words (the
computer can calculate) and Lula was interrupted 31 times by applause (this time with no "exact" statement).
The number of people present at the inauguration ceremony is not crucial. It does not change the evidence, even if
its actual number has been lower than the estimates. What was important is the effort undertook by
Folha to activate its
desconfiômetros (suspicion-meters) and not just trust
olhômetros (eyemeters).
Alberto Dines, the author, is a journalist, founder and researcher at LABJOR—Laboratório de Estudos Avançados
em Jornalismo (Laboratory for Advanced Studies in Journalism) at UNICAMP (University of Campinas) and editor of
the Observatório da Imprensa. He also writes a column on cultural issues for the Rio daily
Jornal do Brasil. You can reach him by email at
obsimp@ig.com.br
Translated by Tereza Braga, email:
tbragaling@cs.com
This article was originally published in the
Observatório da Imprensa (The Press
Observatory)— www.observatoriodaimprensa.com.br
Send
your
comments to
Brazzil
 |
Subscribe to this comment's feed