In a satirical article published in the London daily Al-Quds Al-'Arabi, Syrian journalist Hakam Al-Baba harshly criticized the poor quality of the Syrian media and its attempts to keep global media developments from influencing Syria. He also derided the censorship in the media, which he claims prevents the Syrian citizens from obtaining information and exercising free thought. He joked that the Syrian media proves that Darwin's theory of evolution can work in reverse, since it has managed to transform the Syrian citizens from human beings back into apes.
The following are excerpts from his article: [1]
"Generations of Syrians Have Spent Their Lives Hearing the Same Report on [Syrian] TV, Over and Over Again"
"Generations of Syrians have spent their lives hearing the same report on [Syrian] TV, over and over again. According to this report, their leadership spends the first 12 hours of every day receiving telegrams [of] support, gratitude and good wishes, and the remaining 12 hours meeting with various dignitaries to discuss bilateral relations, and [then] seeing them off.
"[In this report,] the [leaders always] unanimously emphasized the importance of strengthening Arab solidarity and the [need] to harness all energies in the struggle against the Zionist enemy. They also congratulated the countries of the socialist bloc, and especially our friend the Soviet Union.
"All [these] reports on Syrian TV... were [always] accompanied by calm footage of a leader with some guest, both of them wearing excessively somber expressions, and by monotonous music that lent the report a funereal air.
"When the luminaries of the Syrian media decided to progress with the times, they [reluctantly] introduced some changes into this one favorite report of theirs. They permitted the showing of the Syrian leader and his guest gesticulating [in an animated manner], in order to highlight the earnestness of the meeting, the grave importance of the issues discussed, and their fateful [significance] for the Syrian viewer...
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"As another step towards media transparency, the Syrian [viewer] was introduced, for the first time in his life, to [the concept of] a press conference, in which the leader and his guest stand and answer the journalists' questions. The Syrian viewer was then filled with indescribable joy and happiness. He praised God and thanked him a thousand times for his grace, for being permitted to live long enough to witness these press conferences, which are best described as a lesson in reading, listening, and learning by rote - [like the lessons given to] elementary school pupils.
"The top Syrian media people would put their questions - which never had more than one answer - to the leader and his guest, [asking about] the correctness of Syrian policy. The leader and his guest would answer the question the way a schoolchild recites a poem or qasida [ancient Arabic poem] he has learned by heart... The questions always repeated themselves in all the press conferences, and were always asked by the same individuals - only by the top media people. They [even] read the questions from the same scraps of paper every time, and then put them back into their wallets until the next press conference..."
"The Development of Global Media... Disconcerted the Luminaries of the Syrian Media" - Since They Could No Longer Block Information Coming Into Syria
"But the immense development of the global media, and the advent of satellite channels and the Internet, disconcerted the luminaries of the Syrian media. For many years, they had been able to jam the [reception of] Jordanian TV [channels] in Damascus, and to prevent Arabic newspapers from entering Syria.
"However, since the advent of satellite channels and the Internet, they can no longer block all the media channels and all this information which comes in from every [direction], exposing the Syrians to what their eyes have never before seen and their ears have never before heard - things they never even thought of.
"[This information] has contaminated the sterilized air in the country, which had been transformed by the luminaries of the Syrian media into one big biological laboratory. In this laboratory, an unrelenting experiment was conducted, day by day, in attempt to prove Darwin's theory in reverse [by turning] man back into ape!"
The Syrian Media Tries to Keep Syrians Away From Any Information that Would Remind Them... That They Have a Brain
"The luminaries of the Syrian media faithfully did their best to continue their biological experiment on the Syrian [citizen]. They did their best to deal with the storm of media developments. They described the Al-Jazeera [TV] channel (before it was tamed) as a Zionist channel, [and said that] several of the people funding it were Israeli businessmen. They accused newspapers like Al-Nahar (before pressure was brought upon it) of isolationism.
"They combed through the Arabic dictionaries looking for all the terms that can be used to frighten the Syrians, so that they would not go near any source of information that would remind them that there is an atrophied organ in their bodies which they barely use, namely, the brain - [since] they might [actually] start to use it after more than 40 years of neglect. But [their] efforts were to no avail, and they were like people fighting the storm with a sword!
"However, they have not yet given up, [but continue] in their attempts to 'close up the sky' in Syria. More than half the sites [on the Internet] cannot be entered from Syria.
"One of the main conditions that [Syria sets] in its relations with Lebanon involves restraining the [Lebanese] media. A major part of the job of the Syrian Ambassador to Kuwait is to protest against what is published in the Kuwaiti papers. All discussions [between Syria and] Saudi Arabia inevitably include [demands to] gag the media channels funded by Saudi Arabia.
"[But] most Syrians have begun to use their brains again, and they read, follow [events], and find some way to obtain the information they desire. As for the minority of Syrians - the experiment [conducted on them by] the media luminaries has managed to prove Darwin's theory in reverse. The [Syrian] newspapers Tishreen, Al-Ba'th and Al-Thawra, as well as Syrian TV and the [web]sites Akhbar Syria and Champress [demonstrate] that man can be regressed back to his original [form], according to Darwin's theory..."
[1] Al-Quds Al-'Arabi (London), April 24, 2006.
