The media under the ‘Rules-Based Order’

IF people want “evidence” as regards the double-standard practice and hypocrisy of the Western mainstream media in observing everyone’s right to freedom of the press and freedom of expression, the press briefing by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken at the State Department last January 16, is revealing.

Probably wishing to be remembered as a “statesman” of the first order far better than the likes of Henry Kissinger, Blinken called for the press briefing, his last official act as Secretary of State.

Nothing lasts forever and Blinken had to vow from office—and in disgrace, we should add— with the coming in of the (second) Trump administration on January 20.

But to his great annoyance, and that of his equally devious spokesperson, the ever poker-face Matt Miller, Blinken’s last attempt at greatness was spoiled by two journalists, Sam Husseini, an independent journalist and Max Blumenthal, editor of the independent media outlet, ‘The Gray Zone.’

Repeatedly, Husseini kept asking Blinken, ‘Why are you not at the Hague,’ referring of course to the headquarters of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

In Husseini’s mind, Blinken should stand in front of the dock at the ICC, along with President Joe ‘Dementia Joe’ Biden and Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as a war criminal for Israel’s ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people in the Gaza Strip going two years now with full American backing.

In an act that proved as lie all Blinken’s words that America is for freedom of expression and of the press, Husseini was physically and forcibly carried out of the Press Room by armed security guards on the order of Miller, to avoid further embarrassing his boss whose face, anyway, is as thick as a rhinoceros’ hide.

The same maltreatment was accorded to Blumenthal when he asked Blinken over America’s full support to the daily bombing, since October 7, 2023, by Israel of the defenseless Palestinians in what remains of the Gaza Strip, West Bank and Lebanon.

If the incident was not scandalous enough, the reaction or rather, the non-reaction demonstrated by the other journalists present while Husseini and Blumenthal were being manhandled before them is far more galling and shameful.

All the “big names” were there—The Guardian, Washington Post, The New York Times, NBC, CNN, BBC, Reuters, etc. and yet, they did nothing except to report the incident later in their news dispatch.

There was also no statement of condemnation from any of the world’s self-appointed “guardians” of media rights, such as the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) or Reporters Without Border (RSF).

Not a word of protest too from Irene Khan, the UN Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Opinion and Expression who was all gung-ho in lashing at our government when she visited the country in January 2024. The same ‘It-is-not-my-concern’ silence goes to Maria Ressa, the West’s handpicked Nobel Peace awardee for journalism.

We wonder: How would the Western mainstream media and the global media organizations drawing largesse from the “democratic” Western governments and institutions reacted had a similar incident happened in a third-rate country like the Philippines? Or in countries the West deemed as “enemies” like Iran, China, and Russia?

All would have been pilloried and condemned in a matter of seconds.

The incident at the State Department is another eye-opener for everyone. Under America’s rules-based order, some, even in the media, are indeed more equal than others.