Political Language In Daniel J. Boorstin's Pseudo-Events

“Political Language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable.” So states George Orwell; an English novelist famous for his essays and numerous novels such as 1984. Though his essay Language and Politics was written as far back as the mid 1940s, his ideals and perspectives on political language still ring true in many of today’s current events. He discusses the vagueness that political writers use in order to sound better to their audience, as well as basic rules to follow when writing to prevent repetition. Then there’s also Daniel J. Boorstin; an American historian at the University of Chicago, who wrote the essay Pseudo-Events that stressed arranged news articles to gain publicity in certain areas of media. He discussed

how some forms of business create fake events in order to boost the prestige of their business, and how they rely on magazines and the news for success. After reading these eye-opening and well written essays, one can truly see the corruption that occurs today in major news outlets, as well at most political writing. Whether it is through vague and misleading information, or falsifying events for personal fame, these essays can not only connect to the way current events are handled in the mass media in general, but also the way that political writers tip toe around what’s truly going on in the world to sound better to their audience.
In his essay, George Orwell emphasizes the fact that deeds marked as unaccepting and unforgivable, are later twisted in the mass media to look as a justice to society. The words used to explain what exactly happened, are sugar coated to make people think the opposite of what they should think. Orwell listed situations such as British rule in India, and atomic bombs in Japan as examples of the horrific events that political writers would misrepresent in the media so that people wouldn’t cause an uproar as to how our government could do such a thing. Instead of saying that the Americans bombed innocent Japanese citizens as an act of war, it would be stated that there was a “pacification” or an attempt to create peace with the Japanese in order to end the war. This can definitely connect to current events in our own society, as news outlets and government officials use this same tactic to further confuse citizens on the actual horror of what is happening in the world. A simple example is President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Infamy Speech, delivered on December eighth of 1941. In it, Roosevelt chose to avoid the details of Japanese-American relations, instead focusing on the emotional impact of the event on the country as a whole. Roosevelt's Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, had pushed for an exposition of the Japanese-American peace talks; President Roosevelt declined, feeling that a shorter speech would be much more dramatic. This minutia, if used effectively, makes it so Americans don’t think to know what’s truly going on in the world, further benefitting the government and mass media in their attempt of hiding information from its citizens.
The way this tactic becomes so discreetly successful is because of the use of meaningless words, and other passive vocabulary that sounds good to others when listening to the speech. Orwell specifically stated a guideline of rules to follow to avoid being vague in writing in order to avoid the confusion that most political writers turn to. He discusses the fact that one should never use a metaphor, long words in place of short ones, and the passive voice to be as transparent with your audience as you can be. These crucial steps are often avoided by political writers, as they want to prevent being transparent to their audience. When one is too transparent, there’s a risk of letting out information that needs not to be known by this specific audience. This connects back the examples of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the Japanese bombings; he was intentionally very vague with the information given, to avoid giving the American public too many details on Japanese-American relations. This example ties in with what Orwell states about political writers being vague, specifically in the sense of misinformation to an audience; concerning Japanese-American affairs, if President Roosevelt had given up too much information, he would risk consequences with the Japanese and other countries in the future, as the United States government may not have been trusted to keep items such as peace talks confidential.
These ideas also tie into the Pseudo-Events’ concept of falsified events that were created simply to gain recognition in the Mass Media.

In this essay, Boorstin discusses the business tactic of creating faux, or “pseudo”, events and galas that will later be photographed in order to gain recognition in the public eye. This incredibly manipulative tactic allows people to believe that businesses, once in the hole economically, are really a “distinguished institution” in the media. One example of this would be General Motors after they filed for bankruptcy in 2009. Motors then had to be completely reconstructed by the help of the Treasury in order to survive. Following their reconstruction, General Motors carried on as before, turning profits as high as twenty-two billion dollars in 2014. The seemingly never-ending success of Motors proves Boorstin correct in regards to the idea of the faux event. The media coverage of the bailout only lasted until the newly-restructured company turned a standard profit in the billions; at that point, coverage returned to its pre-Bankruptcy standard and the filing was barely acknowledged outside of the auto industry itself. As a result, the average consumer was left unaware of the events which remained ongoing. This sense of security allowed for the bankruptcy case to fade into the background, emphasizing Boorstin’s main point; that faux events will be used and manipulated through the media in order to maintain a positive

image.

Clearly it is evident through these two essays how corrupt and secretive the mass media can be in the eyes of our citizens. This is apparent in Orwell’s quote concerning political language and their lies being seen as truthful in the media. Though it isn’t too obvious when these tactics of hiding information from our citizens was developed, what is apparent are the techniques used in order to hide them in the first place. Whether it is the language used similarly to what Orwell stated, or the pseudo-events that Boorstin brought to light, the fact that information is being withheld from our government is evident if one does a little digging and research. With the tactics being used as early as the publishing date in 1946 for Orwell’s essay, one could wonder if this approach has always been the norm in releasing information in the media or if it’s a newly developed strategy. In saying that, in the future, who knows if this secretive tactic will change for good, or continue on as a social norm in today’s Mass Media.