Assange and Yoani: double standards from the foreign press

To date, the commercial and private press, whether through their editorials or through their editors, columnists, or bloggers, who ridiculously call their bosses colleagues or buddies, has not shouted, kicked, cursed, or struggled against the persecution of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange by the US government, nor has it protested against the censorship of its website.

Nothing that moved or surprised me. Expecting discernment and impartiality from journalists who consider their bosses as colleagues is the same as expecting a good deed from the devil or from newspapers and magazines, such as "Folha", "Estadão", "Zero Hora", "O Globo", "Época" and the Last Flower of Fascism — the cunning and reckless "Veja".

Meanwhile, Cuban blogger Yoani Sánchez is received by the Brazilian right-wing media as if she were the savior of the nation when it comes to criticizing Cuba and the socialist regime. It's a double standard. While Yoani is on her world tour attacking her own country, Australian Assange has lost his freedom and the right to speak because he is threatened by the governments of England and the USA, countries that consider themselves defenders of democracy and freedom of the press and expression.

Yoani delivered a speech and showed what she was there for: to attack the Cuban government and defend the establishment, which she serves, represents, and is financed by, without, however, showing any embarrassment. She was received with applause by representatives of the Brazilian right-wing parties, while also being cheered by editors, columnists, bloggers, and commentators of the conservative and private business press, who opened the pages of their publications to her, as well as granting her image access to television spaces.

The Cuban blogger is accused of being funded by the United States government to spread propaganda against Cuba. Major newspapers and magazines also finance her, and her trip, which began in Brazil, will last 80 days, during which she will visit ten countries. However, what draws the attention of her critics is Yoani Sánchez's blog. The Cuban blog is different from most blogs, even the large ones.

On the site, one can read texts in 21 languages, including Spanish. To give a better idea of ​​the blog's quality, not even the UN website offers as many translations to readers. Furthermore, the entrenched elite within the highly conservative Inter-American Press Association (IAPA), owners of media organizations and newspapers, awarded Yoani Sánchez's blog, earning her monetary prizes. Meanwhile, WikiLeaks, run by Julian Assange, who is currently in exile in London and whose release could result in his arrest or death, has published documents revealing meetings and relationships between the blogger and the US government. Yoani is also accused of involvement with the CIA.

These facts and realities are both unbelievable and plausible. And nobody, absolutely nobody in the mainstream press, comments on the differences in treatment given to Yoani Sánchez and Julian Assange, both by governments and by the hegemonic media system. Wikileaks revealed the dirty and reckless backstage dealings of US (hexed) diplomacy and was therefore censored, its creator imprisoned and later granted asylum. Nobody in the foreign press contested or protested. The historically coup-supporting press remained silent and only reported the events, but did not protest, did not criticize, and did not publish editorials in favor of Julian Assange, who lost his freedom, as he was granted asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. Meanwhile, the treatment given to Yoani Sánchez...

The media oligarchy doesn't protest this persecution of the Australian as much as it protests and struggles when the Brazilian government says it wants to discuss communication and information, when it wants to regulate the sector (our laws are from 1962, which is why they are outdated), and when it talks about creating the Federal Council of Journalism, an organization that, in my opinion, should have existed a long time ago, as is the case in other professional and business categories and segments of the economy, which have their councils and, most importantly, their regulatory frameworks.

No. Not a chance. No protest whatsoever. They only feel indignant and behave this way when the Government calls upon Brazilian society, in a democratic manner, to discuss the direction of the communications sector, as well as to debate freedom of expression, freedom of the press, freedom to print, and public concessions, among other issues that were seriously discussed in the plenary sessions of the 1st National Communications Conference (Confecom), held at the end of 2009 in Brasília.

Confecom listened to society and prepared a document that will be analyzed by Congress, which will one day have to provide a solution to the media issue. But there is a problem: the mega-businessmen of communication, the "owners" of the different media outlets, the media oligopolies, boycotted Confecom and continue to boycott and fight any action aimed at regulating the sector through a regulatory framework approved by Congress, which is the branch of government where Brazilian society is represented, because it voted for and institutionalized its representatives, who are recognized by the Constitution.

This is the issue; the rest is dissimulation and lies from the bourgeois, corporate, and private press, the most backward in the world, where the most conservative businessmen in this country operate. This reality was proven in the last elections, when their companies (many of which are public concessions) acted illegally as right-wing political parties and evidently supported the PSDB candidate José Serra.

Now, business leaders and their editorial cronies are silent about WikiLeaks because it doesn't suit them to defend the freedom of the press and expression that these business leaders so vehemently claim when it comes to defending their economic and political interests. They have remained silent because they are spokespeople for the capitalist system, the US government, banks, industrial and rural business entities, and security, investigation, and espionage agencies like the CIA, for example.

That's why they remained silent, as they did during the military dictatorship. Folha, at the time, was a "partner" of the DOI/CODI. And TV Globo was a Siamese twin of all five governments of the military presidents. It's a genuine child of that era. Lamentable, but having to put up with the Brazilian press is a mammoth, or perhaps even a mastodon, burden. Only in Brazil, an important and powerful country, does a private press still exist that wants to perpetuate its status as a feudal lord or governor of a hereditary captaincy.

Obviously, with the continued strengthening of the democratic rule of law in Brazil, one day this reality will end. Well, let's wait and see how this process will end and how the bourgeois press will behave from now on, although I know that its position will always be to side with conservative groups in society and have its own media companies as mouthpieces for reactionary thought. The emblematic cases of Julian Assange and Yoani Sánchez are proof of that. Double standards. That's it.