Media
Is a re-set likely in our media’s China coverage?
Andy Park, the host of Drive on ABC Radio National, asked one of his guests the following question about Albanese’s visit to China: ‘Scoring an invitation to go to Beijing is obviously a coup for Mr Albanese. Obviously, much was said and done under the table diplomatically speaking. … Do you think the average Australian Continue reading »
Believability: Sexual Violence, Media, and the Politics of Doubt – review
In Believability: Sexual Violence, Media, and the Politics of Doubt, Sarah Banet-Weiser and Kathryn Claire Higgins examine how a turn to media culture and the development of an “economy of believability” shape the processes wherein women seek justice for sexual violence committed against them. Banet-Weiser and Higgins’s timely book presents a powerful feminist analysis of the interacting forces of belief, media and sexual violence in the post-truth era, writes Olumide Adisa.
Believability: Sexual Violence, Media, and the Politics of Doubt. Sarah Banet-Weiser and Kathryn Claire Higgins. Polity. 2023.
Find this book: 
Netflix’s 2020 fascinating true crime docuseries Trial by Media examines the most gripping trials in US history (including the “Big Dan’s case” about the rape of a woman in a bar) by considering how the media may have influenced the verdicts. With the visibility of hashtags like #MeToo, many accounts of sexual violence by women that never resulted in criminal trials have come to light and are playing out through the media. What happens when rape allegations come to light in this way, and what does this mean for sexual justice in a post-truth era of “fake news” and “alternative facts”? In their new book, Sarah Banet-Weiser and Kathryn Claire Higgins position the thought-provoking concept “economy of believability” in arguing for a “turn to media culture” as a way to achieve sexual justice in a society where the default positions disbelieves women and their accounts of sexual violence. The authors define their “economy of believability” as a term that involves “representations, ideologies, labour, products, resources, and intersecting power hierarchies” (5) within a sexual violence and media culture context.
This book showcases sexual violence as a culturally mediated phenomena, which interconnects with post-truth, power, historical constructions of doubtful subjects, and the authors’ concept of economy of believability
In the text, the authors consider the manifestations of subjectivity and performance as dependent on media culture. This book showcases sexual violence as a culturally mediated phenomena which interconnects with post-truth, power, and historical constructions of doubtful subjects, and the authors’ concept of economy of believability.
Banet-Weiser and Higgins’ text offers a complex feminist analysis of the interacting forces of post-truth, belief, media, and sexual violence. This text is arguably a transdisciplinary masterpiece that is likely to engage the informed public, students, feminists and media scholars on sexual violence. It is written in an accessible style that does not assume insider knowledge. The text’s complexified notion of believability disentangles the ways these subject areas overlap and connect (3). The authors invoke their innovative concept, of the “economy of believability” throughout the text and take the reader through the text’s discursive engagement with feminist theory and praxis to underpin the constructions of believability. Multiplicity and the “dynamism of believability” are also conceptualised as complex terms, but in a metaphorical sense. The dynamism of believability (198) is made up of two components – the capability of being believed and the quality of being convincing. Sexual violence is considered as “multiply factual”, and testimonies as “multiply believable/doubtable.” Believability is further considered to be made up of three registers in accounts of sexual violence: personal experience, harms, and structural phenomena (24).
Women’s believability is dictated by subjectivity (rooted in women’s voices) and performance, which overlap and may then be considered as informing each other
This book has four key chapters as well as an introductory and concluding chapter. The first chapter focuses on the authors’ construction of their concept of believability, using various useful examples and case studies from the media sphere. Women’s believability is dictated by subjectivity (rooted in women’s voices) and performance, which overlap and may then be considered as informing each other. The well-publicised Heard/Depp trial is referenced briefly by the authors in the introductory chapter (and also in Chapter three) to illustrate these points. Noteworthy is the role of powerful media actors, concentrated among a small group of organisations who stand with the accused to keep the accusations out of the public eye. The text describes these silencing practices (used by powerful men) as “forms of believability work“ (55). The text goes on to characterise this ‘believability work’ as the significant money and time resources marshalled by powerful actors to protect powerful men (who have harmed women), solely for the purpose of diminishing women’s believability.
Chapter two focuses on the commodification of believability, something the authors term “the buying and selling of belief”. This characterisation of belief as something transactional is further positioned within the emerging feminist marketplace of “well-intentioned” products such as wearable tech and surveillance. In the text, the buying and selling of these wearable products aimed at women places the responsibility of preventing of sexual violence on women, and normalises sexual violence as part of their everyday lives (109).
Chapter three grapples with the contested notions of believability funnelled through the intersection of the cultural notion of women as doubtful subjects, and a digitisation process described in the text as ‘the digitisation of doubt’ (121). The chapter discusses how well-publicised calls for belief in a digital age is mediated through three aspects: access/amplification, democratisation, and platformisation of truth (149). The authors draw on these concepts by heavily relying on the literature, which have been studied in other disciplines.
The authors discuss how believability is conditional on “felt” believability, which follows historical patterns of anti-Black racism, the subordination of Black women as lesser in being believed
In the fourth chapter, the authors discuss how believability is conditional on “felt” believability, which follows historical patterns of anti-Black racism, the subordination of Black women as lesser in being believed (as seen from R. Kelly and Bill Cosby’s crimes), and negative tropes about Black women in media culture, stemming from the adultification of Black girls. This is in contrast to a history of greater validity attached to white women’s stories, and as seen in the false rape accusations of Black men weaponised by white women (as evidenced by the false claims made by Carolyn Bryant against Emmet Till, which led to his brutal murder), and in the “felt” believability as seen in the case of Amy Cooper who called the police and made a false charge against a Black man in Central Park.
Banet-Weiser and Higgins highlight the role of believability in these well-known, tragic examples which gained spectacular visibility in media culture. The authors use these examples sensitively to buttress their points on the struggle of victimhood in their economy of believability. In this retelling and analysis, they perhaps (consciously or unconsciously) reveal themselves as potentially white allies in the struggle of Black women, whom society routinely places as undeserving of being visible in any continuum of believability.
Banet-Weiser and Higgins’ economy of believability contains gendered, class and racial dimensions, but the text does not explain the subjectivities which determine these. Rather they choose to focus solely on “a set of historical conditions that form the context for struggles over believability’ and by extension struggles over truth”(13). While the entangled complexified nature of belief and intersectionality is acknowledged, it could be considered a limitation that the text fails to substantively discuss these important dimensions in tandem.
Believability plays out in media domains and in silencing practices which lend themselves to the commodified silencing of women’s voices through Nondisclosure Agreements (NDAs) and confidentiality agreements.
Another criticism that could be levied against the text is the ways in which Banet-Weiser and Higgins’ delineation of “credibility” (in a context of criminal trials) differs from their concept of believability. The authors themselves may already have anticipated this criticism, as they position their text clearly as one that calls for “a shift from credibility to believability” and one that “adds to these conversations on criminal trials” (7). The authors want readers to understand that many aspects relating to seeking justice for sexual violence are decided outside of the courtrooms, decentring the state as the ultimate decider of believability. For example, believability plays out in media domains and in silencing practices which lend themselves to the commodified silencing of women’s voices through Nondisclosure Agreements (NDAs) and confidentiality agreements. Yet, because the notion of doubt features in concepts of credibility, as well as the authors’ concept of believability, the demarcation of both concepts are not clearly defined. Banet-Weiser and Higgins go on to say that, “in a mediated economy of believability, doubt often works in a similar way” to credibility (25). As a result, this may suggest to readers that credibility and believability can be used synonymously – at least in relation to doubt and doubtful subjects.
The text […] makes immense contributions to an understanding of how women’s accounts of sexual harassment and violence are framed and positioned as unbelievable by the media.
Despite these shortcomings, the text as a whole makes immense contributions to an understanding of how women’s accounts of sexual harassment and violence are framed and positioned as unbelievable by the media. The authors convincingly suggest how their concept of an economy of believability offers a more radical and comprehensive account of why women (and their accounts of sexual violence) are cast in disbelief and doubt in media culture, contributing to a timely and ongoing conversation on sexual justice beyond simplified notions of truth and testimony.
Note: This review gives the views of the author, and not the position of the LSE Review of Books blog, or of the London School of Economics and Political Science. The LSE RB blog may receive a small commission if you choose to make a purchase through the above Amazon affiliate link. This is entirely independent of the coverage of the book on LSE Review of Books.
Image Credit: Sundry Photography on Shutterstock.
Offloading Azuracast Media, Recordings, and Backups to S3
I’ve been on a bit of an offloading kick these last months, and I’m digging the idea of controlling server environment bloat by having media hosted in an S3 storage situation. It simplifies cloning, updating, and/or migrating a server environment, and often times results in faster load times. I’ve been doing it with bigger WordPress sites for months now, and it’s high time to turn my attention to some other applications, in this case the web radio software Azuracast.
More than 3 years ago ds106radio was migrated from Airtime to Azuracast. It was the right move, and Azuracast has proven to be the best in the business, I love it. Buster Neece, the primary developer of Azuracast, has made a big push the last several years to containerize the software, making it much easier to host. Updating Azuracast is now a piece of cake, and new features just keep on coming. One feature that’s been around for a while that I’ve yet to take advantage of is offloading media, and given the instance has surpassed 100GB of live broadcast recordings, it’s officially overdue. I realized the value of offloading media after hosting Mastodon for a year, social.ds106.us has 168GB of offloaded media, and that’s for a very small server. Offloading at just $5 a month for up to 250 GB on Digital Ocean’s Spaces is a total deal, and it frees up significant space on Reclaim Cloud.
A few of our S3 buckets in Digital Ocean’s Spaces
So, below are details of how I offloaded all media, backups, and recordings on the mighty ds106rad.io to Digital Ocean’s S3-compatible object storage Spaces. You can find a quick-start guide for getting a bucket up and running on DO’s Spaces. Apart from that, I installed the handy, dandy s3cmd tool on the Azuracast server to help with moving files to S3. I also recommend installing NCDU on your environment to see where all the larger files live (this could have saved me some hassle if I installed in sooner).
When working in Reclaim Cloud, I do all my testing on a clone of the production site that I spin up to make sure no changes I make break the live site. If all works as planned I do the same thing on production. One could also just as easily destroy the production server and point DNS to the clone where all the changes were made successfully, but I am superstitious and inefficient so I do everything twice.
When configuring s3cmd (s3cmd --configure)you will need your bucket access key, secret key, region, endpoint, and bucket name. Something like this:
Access Key: <your S3 access key>
Secret key: <Your s3 secret key>
Region (my region for Spaces is frankfurt): fra1
bucket: filesds106radfio
endpoint: fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com
The above format worked for me on DO’s Spaces (you will need your own access keys), and thereafter the server will automatically connect to the S3 bucket, which is convenient. Beyond that, it is time to locate the files and start offloading them to S3. Here is where I should have used the ncdu command sooner, given it’s a handy command line tool that lets you know how much space is being used in each directory, allowing you the ability to drill down by directory. So, if I’m trying to figure out where the 100GB of recordings are stored on the server, I could track it down with this command. But I did things the hard way, I essentially used a command I had learned from my colleague Taylor to remote login to the container within the server environment to copy all the files out of the container into the broader server environment.
I know, it’s confusing, but that’s part of wrapping your head around working with containers. Each container can be logged into separately using the command docker exec -it containerid sh -this will allow you to move around in the Alpine linux container and use a few, very limited commands. For example, s3cmd does not run within the specific containers. So I got the brilliant idea of copying the media, backups, and recordings directories from the container to the docker environment so I could then use s3cmd to put them in the S3 bucket. You following? Probably not, but think of it like this, the server environment is a container running a Docker Engine environment that can harness all the tools and commands of CentOS 7, whereas the specific container running Azuracast is packaged as an Alpine Linux container with far fewer server bells and whistles and only limited packages and command line affordances. Containers within containers, and the simplification of the container envrionments within the Docker environment make them run more efficiently.
Here is the command I used to copy files from the Azuracast container into the general server environment:
docker cp containerid:/var/azuracast/stations/ds106radio/recordings /var/azuracast/
I was stoked that this worked, and all the files from /var/azuracast/stations/ds106radio/recordings could be copied out of the container and into /var/azuracast so that I could then run the following command to put everything I just copied into the S3 bucket:
s3cmd put /var/azuracast/recordings/* s3://filesds106radio --acl-public --recursive
That worked, but when I had finished the process and was deleting the media on the server I offloaded, I fired up the NCDU tool to find any larger files. It’s then I realized all the media was in /var/lib/docker/volume/azuracast_station_data/_data/ds106radio/recordings and I did not need to remote ssh into the container and copy everything, I could much more easily have run s3cmd from that directory to offload media. Nothing like learning that after the fact, but working through this conceptually has helps me understand how containers operate, which is very useful–despite all the extra work.
S3 Bucket with directories for backups, media, podcasts, and recordings
Once all the data was moved to the Spaces bucket, I then needed to login to Azuracast and update the storage locations to point to S3 for media, recordings, podcasts, and backups.
In System Maintenance–>Storage locations you can add the new S3 storage location using much of the same data referenced above for setting up s3cmd.
Once you add the bucket data for each type of media (having some way to carry the S3 details over for each storage type would make it easier/quicker) you’ll be asked to update your server configuration with a quick reboot, and the media will start offloading immediately. Given we’ve already copied pre-existing media to those buckets, the broadcasts and media archive will be already be populated with old recordings and previously uploaded media.
With that, you can remove all the media files on the server and save yourself well over 100GB of space.
When is genocide ever balanced?
‘Balance’ between supporters of Israel and of the Palestinians is what most police and State governments in Australia say they seek. So does the ABC. But what’s happening in Gaza isn’t balanced: it is asymmetric warfare. Genocide is never balanced. Reporting on Gaza isn’t balanced either. Israel’s disinformation industry went quickly into overdrive after 7 Continue reading »
The Right-Wing Blind Spot Over Free Speech
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Evening Standard owner Evgeny Lebedev used a speech in the House of Lords this week to praise the UK’s “great tradition of free speech” and warned against it being given up so easily.
Baron Lebedev of Hampton in the London Borough of Richmond on Thames and of Siberia in the Russian Federation told his peers in the upper chamber that he was alarmed with the pace at which “the erosion of free speech that is taking place here”.
The Russian-British businessman – who also co-owns The Independent newspaper – has sat in the House of Lords as a crossbench life peer since November 2020, after being nominated by then Prime Minister Boris Johnson for philanthropy and services to the media.
It was a move that drew much criticism, with Byline Times being one of few media outlets to report extensively on Lebedev’s relationship with Johnson. As recently as last month it was revealed that Johnson held two unminuted meetings with Lebedev at the height of the build-up to the first Coronavirus lockdown, according to the COVID Inquiry hearings.
Lebedev’s evidence that free speech is under attack highlighted author JK Rowling’s views on gender “that are probably the views of the quiet majority”, before describing his shock that “Coutts Bank decided that Nigel Farage was no longer suitable to be a customer”.
A 2021 investigation by Byline Times revealed how some on the right are using ‘gender critical’ arguments to further their anti-LGBTIQ agenda, while Farage’s “serious political persecution" earlier this year appears to have been based on what were, at the very least, highly questionable claims.
In an attempt to head off the assertion from any of his peers that he might be considered a reactionary, or a conservative, Lebedev said he “equally supports the right of Jeremy Corbyn to air "his views on Hamas”.
He eventually raised some concerns about the provisions in the Online Safety Act that he felt could give further legal basis for a process of censorship and self-censorship “that is already under way”. Lebedev said: “It is not just the left that is guilty of cancel culture.”
EXCLUSIVE
Boris Johnson is Trying to ‘Silence’ Questions About Evgeny Lebedev
A Labour MP says the Prime Minister and his friend tried to stop him from asking questions about lavish parties held at the newspaper proprietor’s Italian villa, reports Adam Bienkov
Adam Bienkov
'Culture Control Left'
The idea that the left is corroding democratic freedoms by policing language use is something the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) think tank made the point of a recent report that took aim at what it described as the emergence of the ‘Culture Control Left’.
The IEA has been widely credited as a driving force behind Trussonomics, the thinking that underpinned Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng’s disastrous mini budget last year. Under this ideology, you can read here why it believes it is impossible to reduce inequality because characteristics such as race, gender and class that cause disparities are fixed.
In the IEA’s latest 56-page paper – 'Dictating Words: The Culture-Control Left and the War Against Free Speech' – the word 'protest' can be found just six times. In fact, there is no mention at all of legislation passed by this Government, such as the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022, or the Lobbying Act 2014.
It is a significant omission as many rights groups have raised concerns on the impact of these laws on the right to protest, at the same time as having a 'gagging' effect on anyone that might criticise Government policy.
The IEA asserts that it is the approximately 120,000 non-crime hate incidents entered on police databases that are an example of the left's weaponising of concepts such as ‘hate speech’ and ‘harm’ to push legislation that silences their political opponents.
“Being accused of hate speech is the contemporary equivalent of being charged with blasphemy or seditious libel,” the author of the report states.
The paper also argues that hate speech laws are enforced in a politically partial and inconsistent manner.
For Marc Glendening, head of cultural affairs at the IEA and the report's author, censorship of some views based on the alleged harm is incompatible with liberal democracy.
“Britain’s liberal political culture presently faces a threat greater than any it has encountered since our country emerged as a representative democracy in the early 20th Century.
“This is the result of the emergence of a ‘culture control left’ ideology that sees state regulation of language as the principal way to enforce greater social equality.
“This necessarily involves violating the speech rights of individuals who wish to express views considered transgressive. Defenders of political pluralism now need to wage a counter-attack based upon a foundational, natural rights-based defence of free speech.”
The solution, the paper concludes, is to restate the case for each individual’s inherent right to think and peacefully express themselves.
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'Blatant Hypocrisy'
It would appear, then, that the right of an individual to express themselves does not extend to concern about what one campaign group told the Byline Times are “authoritarian anti-protest laws”.
Morag Livingstone, co-author of Charged: How the Police Try to Suppress Protest, said: “There is a blatant hypocrisy of those who apparently promote the right of hate speech as free speech, whilst remaining silent about a Government that is limiting our ability to protest at all.
“Under the Police Act 2022, the police have been provided vast discretionary powers to restrict noisy protest that may cause ‘serious disruption’ and limit the length of protest. We may be left with a quiet, short protest that doesn’t annoy anyone. That’s not protest but obsequiousness”.
In response to the IEA’s latest paper, Green peer Natalie Bennett said that "the threats to democratic free speech and expression of views are many, but none of them are covered in this paper".
“Charities are left fearful of speaking up for the purposes they serve by the Lobbying Act, which has been labelled the 'gagging law'," she added. "Repressive trade union laws – kept under Labour after being brought in by the Tories – prevent freedom of expression for workers.
"And under this Government, we've seen multiple Acts deliberately targeting peaceful protests, the monitoring of the social media accounts such as by the Department for Education of teaching assistants and librarians, and special advisors monitoring Freedom of Information requests from journalists.”
Indigo Rumbelow, founder of Just Stop Oil, asked: “Where were these free speech warriors when I was arrested at my home for giving a speech about the climate crisis? Where were the free speech warriors while our Government brought in a sweep of authoritarian anti-protest laws?"
“They are only interested in inflaming division in our society in order to distract us from the utter failure of politics to find a route out of this mess,” Rumbelow added.
Compass director Neal Lawson told Byline Times he believes the right chooses to ignore the fact that the right to protest is a crucial component of free speech – because protests threaten the establishment and vested interests they represent.
“Given inevitable protests as the effects of climate change kick in and the inequality gap widens, the right wants to clamp down now," he added. "This builds a pressure cooker of frustration as there is no outlet for people’s discontent – neither democracy nor protest let them be heard.”
Sky News Encourages Their Viewers, All 6 Of Them, To Get Behind Dutton
Low rating news channel, Sky News Australia, has put out the rally cry for their viewers, all 6 of them, to get behind low-polling Opposition leader, the Dark Lord Peter Dutton.
”We need our viewers to muck in and get behind good ol’ Petey Dutton,” said Sky News host, convicted racist Andrew Bolt. ”I can’t wait for a country led by Pete.”
”The air will be crisper, the sun brighter and everything will be a comfortable shade of white.”
When asked why a news channel, admittedly a very low-rating one, would seemingly be barracking for one side of politics rather than remaining neutral, Mr Bolt said: ”We just want what’s best for Australia.”
”And by Australia, of course I mean our demographic, aging, predominantly white boomers,”
”Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m having a little soiree for all my fans and must make sure the telephone booth down the road is free.”
@MWChatShow
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Beyond the mainstream media: The ‘why’ of Chinese foreign policy
China is very important for Australia. The recent Prime Ministerial visit to Beijing, the first in seven years, underscores that. The fundamental question we need to ask ourselves across all the various sectors of Australia’s multi-faceted China-interested community is, are we getting China right? Do we know as much as we think we know? If Continue reading »
The Nord Stream Dream Is America’s Nightmare
All this geopolitical hot air was always going to be about gas, and, predicting that, before all the horse trading and brinkmanship began, we caught up with two independent energy experts, Irina Slav and Ben Aris.
The post The Nord Stream Dream Is America’s Nightmare appeared first on Renegade Inc.
Russia: A Recent History Lesson
Is the Wests triumphalist anti-Russian rhetoric based on historical delusions?
Ross Ashcroft met up with Professor of Slavic Studies, Vladimir Golstein, and Writer and Film director, Andrei Nekrasov, to discuss.
The post Russia: A Recent History Lesson appeared first on Renegade Inc.
Poking The Bear
Ross Ashcroft met up with Analyst and former marine corps Intelligence officer, Scott Ritter, and Independent foreign policy analyst, Michael Averko, to discuss whether it's time for us to question the narrative fed to us by so-called Western humanitarians?
The post Poking The Bear appeared first on Renegade Inc.