Towards Media Consciousness: Bridging The Divisive Gap & Celebrating Free Speech With Tony Brasunas, Author Of Red White And Blind
Care More Be Better: A Podcast For Sustainable Social Impact and Regeneration
Corinna Bellizzi
5 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 2 November 2022
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Supporting free speech is easy if the speech is something you agree with. But it’s often hard to not be hypocritical about it if the speech in question is something you disagree with. Renowned free speech advocate Tony Brasunas believes that to truly advocate free speech, we need to support it in principle. And that means giving space to ideas that we may not agree with, even those that we perceive can be harmful to society in some way, because the alternative is more insidious. Tony solidified his views on this issue following a personal experience of censorship in 2016. Since then, he has been an outspoken critic of media gatekeeping and censorship and a staunch advocate for free speech, alternative media, and media consciousness. In this conversation, Tony talks about the institutional impediments to constitutional free speech and shares some key points from his upcoming book, Red, White & Blind.
About Guest:
Tony Brasunas was censored by Huffington Post in 2016 for covering the Democratic Primary from the supposed “wrong perspective”. His writings have nevertheless been published online, in newspapers and magazines, and in both corporate and independent media. He has just completed his second book, Red, White & Blind which offers unique insights into how we can take our blinders off and open our minds. Tony lives in Sebastopol, California, with his wife, son, and two dozen apple trees.
Guest Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/tonybrasunas
https://twitter.com/tonybrasunas?lang=en
Show Notes: (raw audio)
02:22 Why Tony was censored by the Huffington Post
08:55 We’re living in a state of deception
11:48 We need a balanced media diet
17:18 How social media and tech giants worsen the situation
25:58 The most sophisticated propaganda machine
30:01 Supporting free speech on principle
35:55 Why social media censorship is a violation of constitutional free speech
39:39 Shadow banning and the Streisand Effect
43:18 It’s going to get worse before it gets better
47:22 Media consciousness is a path, not a state
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Whereas the American system, I call it the most sophisticated propaganda instrument in the history of mankind, because we have this wide array of news sources, right? |
| 0:09.5 | It's like you walk down the aisle and there's like 100 brands of toothpaste. |
| 0:12.8 | And so you think you've got this grand, but actually it's the same product just in different bottles, right? |
| 0:17.0 | So it's the same kind of thing. |
| 0:18.4 | It's not that they're the same. |
| 0:19.7 | It's Noam Chomsky has this really good quote that I use in the book, which is the most successful way to control the way people think is to allow two viewpoints that are relatively close to each other to vociferously disagree. |
| 0:32.2 | So that's what we have, right? We have this sense of this like echo chamber where like the Republican and the Democrat can like really, |
| 0:38.0 | really argue about this one thing, but kind of within these narrow confines. |
| 0:42.6 | Welcome to Care More Be Better, a podcast for people like you who care about the social |
| 0:48.2 | impact of conscious companies and everyday heroes. Here inspiring stories from those who put people in planet before profit and |
| 0:56.1 | personal gain. You'll learn how you can make a difference, vote with your dollars, and get |
| 1:00.6 | involved today. Here's your host, Karina Belizzi. Hello, fellow do-goaters and friends. I'm your |
| 1:09.5 | host, Karina Belizzi. Every week, I invite you to care more so we can create a better world together. Today, we're going to explore concepts around free speech, idea policing, censorship, and divisiveness. This is a subject we've covered from time to time, beginning even with our very second episode of this podcast as we connected with Genevieve Smith. |
| 1:32.5 | In that conversation, she revealed herself to be a, quote, professional bummer. |
| 1:37.4 | And we talked about healing divides and why we're stuck in the divisive world of today. |
| 1:43.9 | Now we're going to deepen that discussion as we |
| 1:46.5 | connect with Tony Brasunis. Tony was censored by Huffington Post in 2016 for covering the Democratic |
| 1:54.6 | primary from the supposed wrong perspective. You'll see a lot of error quotes if you're |
| 1:59.5 | watching me on video right now. |
| 2:01.7 | His writings have nevertheless been published online in newspapers and magazine and in both |
| 2:08.4 | corporate and independent media. He has just completed his second book called Red, White, and Blind. |
| 2:15.4 | This book offers unique insights into how we can take our blinders off and open |
... |
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