The Free Press–Capitalist Style
On Sunday, July 5, President Mel Zelaya attempted to fly back to Tegucigalpa, Honduras, after he was overthrown by proto-fascist forces and forcefully flown out of the country the week before. The army had blocked the tarmac with cars and trucks, making it impossible for President Zelaya to land. Army snipers, posted on the terraces of airport buildings, began shooting at the large crowd of pro-democracy demonstrators who were assembled at the airport to receive their president. Several people were killed and injured by the gunfire.
La Prensa, one of the pro-coup newspapers in Honduras (and only pro-coup papers are allowed to operate), was forced to report on the demonstration because of its magnitude. However, with Reaganesque and Stalinist flair it distorted the facts on the ground. Not only did it fail to report that the demonstration was peaceful; it also retouched pictures of killed demonstrators to show, I suppose, that Army bullets are peaceful. La Prensa’s own sanitized version of the picture at the top of this entry follows below.
Why are media in this country so circumspect about the brutal repression of pro-democracy demonstrators in Honduras? The obscene infotainment coverage of Michael Jackson’s death is simply an excuse not to think about the world when the oppressor is on the side of U.S. imperialist interests. If Neda had been Honduran, her blood would have been sanitized out of existence, and the U.S. media would have been as indifferent as it is in the case of Honduras and it would have implied with barely perceptible coverage, as it does in the case of Isis Obed Murillo, “Who cares, Screw her!”