Since the emergence of Marxism Economic determinism has been proved as the hammer that shapes our lives.

Marxs superstructure which is the dominant ideology is determined by the base or production which is controlled by the ruling class. Althusser takes the idea of ideology from Marxism and gives his own definition of controlling the people of the government through ISA and RSA. He provides two new notions through which a government controls its people. RSA or Repressive State Apparatus is usually used by a military government in controlling its people. This kind of suppression procedure is disliked by the people and quickly makes way for overthrow of the ruler through revolution. For example 9 years military rule by Ershad in our country. Ideology is a much more subtle fact and works on a subconscious level of the mind. Thats why modern government all over the world now uses the ISA or Ideological State Apparatus. To put it simply its a brain-washing procedure through which the ruling class controls the working class. It makes one feel that they have free will but in reality he is choosing what he is being made to choose. Quoting the Movie Inception, An idea, resilient and highly contagious and once it gets hold of you it is impossible to eradicate, an idea that is fully formed and fully understood that sticks. Now lets come to our subject matter which is the media. Media or Electronic media is the tool through which idea or ideologies are conveyed. Our modern day media is being used in the implementation of ISA and in our country it is no different. Media is not only there for mass communication but also for mass control. In a developing country like Bangladesh the literacy rate is very low let alone media literacy. The majority of the population recognizes media as entertainment and information. There is no qualm which would lead them to ask question about the media. They presuppose or just suppose that what is being shown or broadcasted is the truth. These are the people that the government need, who would not ask any question. From this we might come to a hypothesis that the government needs

literally illiterate people who would not bother about asking. The government does not need people who can think and think critically. The government resents those who would ask question about them. So the media plays the biggest role in keeping the mass in line. An illiterate man would think the ruling class wants him to think but a person with media literacy would think otherwise. An illiterate person would think he is free but a media literate person would know that he is not free and how he is being controlled. Thats why to write a review about the politics of Bangladeshi media one needs to be media literate and think critically. In analyzing the media one does not need to search for the right answer but rather one need to ask the right questions. Since the invention of the word politics the word has become more complex and now in the modern era the word has attached itself to almost anything. Politics is like a chess game where the right move can decide the victory. The political parties can play this chess game very well and media is the queen of the king. Media controlled by the government shows the people what they want to show and know what they want them to know. In the post-modern era we know that there are many sides to a truth and media is the brainiac who shows us the sides which the government wants us to see and stay loyal to them. The most popular media are the TV channels. Anybody who watches BTV would never for a second think that the country is at struggle for development. The obvious reason is that the Channel is our national channel and any party who forms the government its their property. So the channel only sings the good song of the government and bad songs of the opposite party. Anyone who watches BTV can tell that this media always says on behalf of the government that the glass is always half full. Only the progresses that the government is making become the subject of its reporters. This is the key to control the mass and by mass I mean most of the people who are not living in the cities. As they do not have connection to the satellite TV channels the only channel

they get entertainment from is BTV. So BTV plays the role in keeping the mass in check always circulating the slogan like in the movie 3 Idiots all is well. It works as a sedative in relaxing the mass that you are in good hands. Certainly this is not the scenario in a country which leads in corruption. Like I have said before, this is only one part of the truth. There are other TV channels which regularly show the suppression that is being dealt over the opposition party. Channels like NTV and RTV are the two channels almost all the time broadcasts the protests by BNP and what the police is doing about it. Seeing these news one would definitely have sympathy for the party and would want to vote for them. We are very well aware that these two channels are BNP property. Peoples support is the biggest power in a democratic society. One very recent talked of topics is the MLM company Destiny 2000 Ltd. When is very widely known and proved that the geometric increase of the money is illegal and why the pyramid system is banned is most of the countries of the world, the company on a regular basis started to hold its talk shows where the companys chairman Dr. Rafikul Amin talks in proving that they are not a fraud. If one asks the question that why only one channel is saying for this company when all the other channels are saying what a big fraud this company is. Then one needs to go a bit deeper in finding that Destiny 200 Ltd. owns 40% of the shares of Boishakhi TV channel. These channels and the newspaper media goes side by side with the same type of propaganda. The newspapers which are controlled by the political parties or any company they only print their goodness to win the hearts of the mass. One thing to be noticed in our day to day watching of TV or newspapers is that everywhere you see violence. There is a reason behind it. There is something called TV ratings. Violence attracts people like honey for bees, so Most of the TV channels or newspaper reports are about violence and crime. You rarely see any success stories. Even if we do those stories are capable of making the national news. If we notice the Grameen Bank incident it will be clear to us. There wasnt as

much news when Dr. Yunus won the novel prize compared to the amount of news reported when the government removed him from Grameen Bank. Advertisement is a brain washing process for the modern capitalist world. It also creates wrong notions or to be specific, notions what the ruling class want us to have. The repetitive nature of advertisements work like a memorization process and obviously when we go to a shop to buy something the name of that particular product comes into mind. Advertisement also creates wrong notions like a soaps foam has to scientific explanation of getting dirt off clothes but the advertisements make us believe that the more foam the better the cleaning strength. Biasness or side taking has become a common thing for the media which is definitely a matter of concern. No matter what media is a very important part of a nation as well as their active participation in national matters. Media sometimes help to destroy a nations culture like the Banglish we hear on the Radios by the RJs. On the other hand internet media works as a vast media where everyone can participate. This participation makes it one of the strongest and safest media around. Books are storage house of knowledge and the habit of reading books must be increased, so that our nation becomes media literate and can make decisions for themselves in what to take in and what to throw out. If only we are media literate we can hope to survive the politics of Bangladeshi media.

Work Cited:

Media Control, The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda by Noam Chomsky. Seven Stories Press/ New York.

Noam Chomsky on Media, Politics, Action by Aaron Stark