A reader recently offered to "promote" me a bit to get me out of obscurity. His generous offer, which I greatly appreciated by the way, reminded me a point I have been meaning to make for some time.
I joking noted, in my column three weeks ago, that writing for a “tiny, obscure paper that no one cares about” relieves me from having to provide rigorous forecasts. However, a bigger advantage, not only for me but for all the columnists and journalists working for the Hurriyet Daily News & Economic Review is that "with obscurity comes freedom".
I hate to get involved in marketing, for myself or anyone else, but truth be told: The paper does enjoy a freedom of speech much higher than the average standards of the sector in Turkey. How come? Not only writing in English protects us from the wrath of the prosecutors, of the legal or illegal variety, but we are also "too small and insignificant to matter".
This line of thought actually belongs to Naom Chomsky, who has often argued that the mass media in the United States serves the interests of the government and large corporations, manufacturing consent. I am not going to go into if this is accurate or not, but when asked in a documentary if he thought the media in any country were free, based on his standards, he simply said "Belgian media" and then went on to explain more or less the reasoning I outlined above.
Hat Tip to David Judson, who likes to tell this story a lot, but he has only mentioned it in public at Ali Kirca's Siyaset Meydani, which aired a couple of months ago. As for me, if you think political pressure and censorship should not matter for an Economics columnist, have a look at my column almost a year ago on the value of political connections a la Turca...
So I find being tiny& obscure very bearable, although I would have liked a free dinner every now and then:)...
I joking noted, in my column three weeks ago, that writing for a “tiny, obscure paper that no one cares about” relieves me from having to provide rigorous forecasts. However, a bigger advantage, not only for me but for all the columnists and journalists working for the Hurriyet Daily News & Economic Review is that "with obscurity comes freedom".
I hate to get involved in marketing, for myself or anyone else, but truth be told: The paper does enjoy a freedom of speech much higher than the average standards of the sector in Turkey. How come? Not only writing in English protects us from the wrath of the prosecutors, of the legal or illegal variety, but we are also "too small and insignificant to matter".
This line of thought actually belongs to Naom Chomsky, who has often argued that the mass media in the United States serves the interests of the government and large corporations, manufacturing consent. I am not going to go into if this is accurate or not, but when asked in a documentary if he thought the media in any country were free, based on his standards, he simply said "Belgian media" and then went on to explain more or less the reasoning I outlined above.
Hat Tip to David Judson, who likes to tell this story a lot, but he has only mentioned it in public at Ali Kirca's Siyaset Meydani, which aired a couple of months ago. As for me, if you think political pressure and censorship should not matter for an Economics columnist, have a look at my column almost a year ago on the value of political connections a la Turca...
So I find being tiny& obscure very bearable, although I would have liked a free dinner every now and then:)...
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2 comments:
You have one reader, at least.
Thnx... I know I have a few, but in terms of readers, I am trying to focus more on quality than sheer quantity:):):)
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