Non­fic­tion

The Influ­enc­ing Machine: Brooke Glad­stone on the Media

Brooke Glad­stone; Josh Neufeld, illus.
  • Review
By – August 24, 2011
There is no con­spir­a­cy,” declares NPR’s Brooke Glad­stone in the intro­duc­tion to her enter­tain­ing, infor­ma­tive graph­ic book about the media. But as she recounts, the his­to­ry of mass media is rife with con­spir­a­cy the­o­ries and with demands that the pow­er of the media be curbed. The pub­lic doesn’t trust jour­nal­ists, and Glad­stone explains why.

Most­ly the media want to be pop­u­lar. News out­lets seize on sto­ries that are dra­mat­ic or excep­tion­al or visu­al­ly strik­ing because the pub­lic prefers them. Espe­cial­ly in wartime, jour­nal­ists may frame infor­ma­tion accord­ing to a wide­ly held nar­ra­tive, or dis­tort facts to appear bal­anced, in order to gain approval. When pub­lic opin­ion favored a par­tic­u­lar con­sen­sus described as objec­tiv­i­ty” dur­ing the Cold War, the media com­plied then too.

In one chap­ter Glad­stone repris­es a bril­liant seg­ment from her On the Media show last year about bogus sta­tis­tics. NBC claimed in 2005 that 50,000 preda­tors are online at any giv­en moment,” attribut­ing the fig­ure to law enforce­ment offi­cials.” In the ear­ly 1980’s it was report­ed that 50,000 chil­dren were abduct­ed by strangers each year; the actu­al num­ber was 200 – 300. A few years lat­er, satan­ic cults were sup­pos­ed­ly respon­si­ble for 50,000 human sac­ri­fices (!) a year, although the total num­ber of all mur­ders in the Unit­ed States was 20,000. The fig­ure of 50,000 was repeat­ed not because it was cor­rect but because it seemed plau­si­ble — in oth­er words, it fit the audience’s expec­ta­tions. As Glad­stone con­cludes, we get the media we deserve.”

The graph­ic-non­fic­tion for­mat of The Influ­enc­ing Machine per­fect­ly match­es the tone of the radio pro­gram, con­vey­ing seri­ous infor­ma­tion with clar­i­ty and wit. The inven­tive and expres­sive illus­tra­tor, Josh Neufeld, places a Brooke avatar in almost every sto­ry, a reporter in super­hero boots who man­ages to be on the scene through all of his­to­ry. This clever, com­mon-sense chron­i­cle and analy­sis should be read by any­body with hopes or fears about the media and their role in pub­lic life.

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