The enemy of truth is corporate media. The media's role is to serve the public interest, keeping a check on those who hold power. The media's role is to inform us when the elite, whether government or private-interest, abuses their power and becomes detrimental to the rest of society. Our corporate media does not serve us; instead they serve themselves.

Just as government-controlled media in totalitarian dictatorships cannot be counted on to keep the governments they serve accountable to the people, corporate-controlled media cannot be counted on to keep the corporations that they are partnered with accountable to the consumers they profit from; us.

The competition-fueled market-based capitalist ideal has been hijacked and turned into something completely different. Instead of competing, corporations are merging in order to monopolize the market. Although all mega-corporations are merging at such an unprecedented rate, media corporations have been cannibalizing each other at even higher and more alarming speed. Since 1983, according to Ben Bagdikian's book, The New Media Monopoly, the number of corporations controlling the vast majority of news media in the U.S. has fallen from 50 to only five. The mega-merged AOL Time Warner leads the pack as the world's largest media company.

The media monopoly is global, and the control of Canadian media is just as monopolized as that of the U.S., if not worse. CanWest Global, Canada's largest media corporation, is also the most blatantly biased, rivaling Murdoch's Fox News Corp. for its lack of journalistic integrity. The Canadian Association of Journalists has denounced the media giant for its relentless repression and censorship of journalists with dissenting views. There are only four other mega-corporations controlling the rest of Canadian television, radio, print, and web media, these include Bell Canada, Torstar, Quebecor and Rogers.

This mass concentration of what is supposed to be the peoples' voice by mega-corporations is frightening. Can any of our mainstream media outlets be expected to serve the interests of any other sector than the elite class of society when the owners of these outlets are all multi-millionaires and billionaires? Corporate money always serves corporate interest, not the common interest of us average Canadians. It would not be in any of these corporations' interests to inform us of the Canadian companies that are war-profiteering in Afghanistan, nor would it be in their interests to expose the notorious activities of Canadian mining corporations, who are devastating indigenous communities and the environment, while exploiting third-world countries.

On a greater scale, the Canadian public, as well as the rest of the world, cannot rely on the conventional media outlets to expose the truth about the relevant issues that are facing humanity today.

Our media has been vastly reduced to the vehicle for other trans-national mega corporations' advertising. Instead of the awful truth about the real motives of ‘war-Presidents' (and Prime Ministers), we are fed lies by weapons and energy corporations. Instead of the truth about terrorism, our media uses scare tactics to pump us with fear without reason and leaves us with unanswered questions and impossible explanations.

If you want to free yourself, free the media. We all have the power to take back our media. Watch out for Empowerment Independent Media coming soon.

For good local independent media check out londonontario.indymedia.org.

Editorial opinions or comments expressed in this online edition of Interrobang newspaper reflect the views of the writer and are not those of the Interrobang or the Fanshawe Student Union. The Interrobang is published weekly by the Fanshawe Student Union at 1001 Fanshawe College Blvd., P.O. Box 7005, London, Ontario, N5Y 5R6 and distributed through the Fanshawe College community. Letters to the editor are welcome. All letters are subject to editing and should be emailed. All letters must be accompanied by contact information. Letters can also be submitted online by clicking here.