Pacific Free Press was launched in March 2007 by Dutch-Canadian Richard
Kastelein of V.O.F. Expathos, in the Netherlands along with Chris Cook- CFUV radio journalist and Editor in Chief of Pacific Free Press. Cook is based in , Victoria, British Columbia.
The mission of Pacific Free Press is simple: to dig out nuggets of truth from
the slag-heap of lies, ignorance and witless diversion that has buried
public discourse today. Pacific Free Press provides a new venue for
disseminating hard news and insightful, fact-based analysis of the
harsh realities too often ignored or distorted by the mainstream press.
Getting with the Pogrom: Surrendering to Fear
by C. L. Cook It is the best of times, and worst. Not since the banking crisis of the 1930's, now known as 'The Great Depression,' has the global situation looked so grim, its challenges seeming intractably insolvable.
The media daily informs of impending ecological collapse, and the peril posed by terrorists, determined to destroy "our freedoms," while salving the public's growing apprehension with assurances of a buoyant economy whose perpetual growth requires we only keep faith. These apparently contradictory messages utilize a single device, designed to serve a single purpose: making Fear, through endless inculcation, the preeminent force ruling human existence.
What the press will not reveal is the correlative connecting the
dying throes of industrial civilization with its profound despoiling
of the natural world, and the systemic injustice of capitalism,
creating the desperate conditions fostering armed resistance; globally
known as "terrorism," and locally called "crime."
Instead of
addressing the crux of the matter, today's corporate media, (a small group
of cross-invested, trans-national entities that cannot both serve the public
interest and tell the truth without compromising the charter
obligations to their corporate share-holders) stays mum, because a free and informed public would not countenance the
escalating brutality required to maintain the profitability of the status quo.
Or at least
one would hope, if not for Humanity's sake, common sense would prevail
the perverse ambitions of those currently sitting atop the
global power paradigm, recognizing a just and financially equitable
distribution of the planet's bounty ultimately profits us all best.
But clearly, we are neither free, nor informed by capital "M" media.
Nowhere
is this proved more tragically than in the benighted land of Palestine,
where despite a continuous program of dis-entitlement, the relentless
disbarring of a targeted population's participation in all aspects of
what is normally recognized as the natural human experience of life,
the corporate media remains largely silent, skewing the issue when they
do deign comment.
Subsequently, most citizens of the countries
responsible for terrorizing and killing Palestinians daily do not howl
at the inhumanity in protest, but go about the business of making the
bombs and bullets and policies that enable Horror's continuance,
incognizant of their complicity.
"Injustice anywhere, is a
threat to justice everywhere," Martin Luther King Jr. briefly intoned
from the pulpit, and true to his fears of what America might come to be
regarded as, today there are few worldwide who do not look on America
and its satellite Israel with fear, loathing, and disgust.
But at home,
expressing those sentiments is difficult.
While small publications,
college and community radio, and the internet still remain as platforms
for information and opinion believed inconsequential, or dangerous to
corporate media, those venues and the minds of the people operating
them are not immune from the over-riding concurrence of accepted truth, (and acceptable opinions) and the price paid for
transgressions of it.
People wish for peace in their lives, and
prosperity for their families. If political expediency is required to
maintain one's fortunate position, then the well-being of the anonymous
"others" must necessarily take a back seat.
The Role of Fear in the Short Future of Civilization
Those
long years ago, between the twin hallmarks of the 20th Century, World
Wars I and II, while planetary economic systems were in collapse,
Fascism on the rise, and environmental disaster dislocating millions in
America, Franklin Delano Roosevelt addressed the nation, uttering the
now iconic line: "...[W]e have nothing to fear, but Fear itself..." Today, FDR's wisdom has been
grasped by those engineering the slide into perpetual injustice and
warfare for profit, not to serve as a free people's inspiration to
courage, but as a recognition of the potency of Fear and its use for
the opposite effect, to paralyze and enslave humankind.
In
practice, it means punishing dissent through intimidation, public
ridicule, economic exclusion, imprisonment, and most extremely, death.
In Canada, for those that would air opinions critical of Power's
interests there are special provisions. In the stated case of the
dismal fate of Palestine, and criticism of the State of Israel's daily,
and determined criminality, agents professing to speak for the Jews of
Canada have found useful the device of the country's Hate Crimes laws
in the form of the Canadian Human Rights Commission.
That body,
duty-bound to investigate claims of propagating hatred toward
identifiable groups, is now being used as deterrent to those with the
temerity to call Israel's obvious crimes for what they are, an affront
to all of humanity.
Those same guardians against truth spoken
on this issue are currently waging a campaign to amend Canadian Hate
Crimes legislation to have included to its provisions protecting people
discriminated against due to gender, age, race, and religion, the proviso: national
origin. This they hope will conflate criticism of hateful Israeli
government policies practiced against its neighbours, to an
anti-semitic, actionable criminal offense here in Canada. And, the current
political climate
in Canada would encourage this, including criticism of the illegal and
murderous foreign policies of the United States of America as
"anti-Americanism" and thus criminal too.
Something to consider for
small newspaper editors, radio programmers, and internet news site
publishers, if they wish to continue their journalistic pursuits
unmolested by the B'nai Brith, or their allies in government who
administer the law.
A Fearful Prospect
Recently, I
became acquainted with this disturbing trend in Canada, (and currently,
similar legislation is proposed for both the U.S. and E.U.) being
branded by B'nai Brith as a racist and promulgator of hatred for articles published at an
internet news web site I once served as Senior Editor to. The
allegations were consequently picked up and carried coast to coast by "Canada's
national
newspaper," the Globe and Mail of Toronto, in an article by Sid Tafler, a Jew and Zionist, whose book, 'Us and Them' details his halcyon days living in Israel.
I won't mention the name of
that site because my co-accused are fearful, and feel further airing
of the charges serve the interests of those that would smear our
collective reputation, affecting our standing in the community and
prospects there. People could be hurt financially, perhaps lose their
heavily mortgaged houses, etc. So, silence greets the issue of
Palestinians currently losing their homes to the bombs and bulldozers
of Israeli government fanaticism on that site's pages, as those behind
the false charges designed.
But, I will not be silenced!
Less
famously than Roosevelt's "Nothing to fear..." admonishment, the FDR
speech of 1933 also contains the language and sentiment whose relevance
has not changed in the intervening 74 years since first elucidated. I
would adopt his words now as more than cautionary, but marching orders
to maintain truth, justice, and what was once known as the American
way, to wit:
"This is preeminently the time to speak the
truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. Nor need we shrink from
honestly facing conditions in our country today."
Chris Cook
is Managing Editor of, and contributing writer to,
www.pacificfreepress.com, and hosts Gorilla Radio, a weekly public
affairs program, broad/webcast from the University of Victoria, Canada. The GR Blog is here.
Writings 
It is the best of times, and worst. Not since the banking crisis of the 1930's, now known as 'The Great Depression,' has the global situation looked so grim, its challenges seeming intractably insolvable. 
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