One of the greatest ironies in literary history has to be the discrepancy between Russia’s pathological strangling of free speech and how many great writers and poets—Dostoevsky, Lermontov, Nabokov, Visotsky, to name a few—came out of its womb.
Vladimir Putin has pointed out that the mere discussion of whether or not there is a free press in Russia is a move in the right direction. Such a discussion is surely a good thing, but that’s where it pretty much ends. The Russian government still exercises tight control over the three major television networks and many print publications.
And where the government is not practicing direct censorship, it is being aided by the private sector. A few months ago, the Kommersant newspaper reported that non-media corporations—mostly financial and industrial—are buying media outlets in order to increase their political influence. In short: the quality of Russia’s serious news media is in decline.
The Russian literati mentioned above are surely not turning over in their graves, because they know better. They’re probably just smiling, with sarcastically curled lips.
October 25, 2006 at 7:38 pm |
So how does this play out in the laws of the land? And how has the public’s perception of journalism changed in the last 20 years?
January 18, 2007 at 12:12 pm |
One thing I notice about Communist and other forms of repressive regimes is this: They ALL tightly control the media. Cuba. Iran. China. Vietnam. North Korea. And most recently, Thailand (after last September’s military coup).
John E. Carey
http://johnib.wordpress.com/