Quote:
Originally Posted by CliffFletcher
So tell me how it really works.
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In practice governments have a lot of ways to put pressure on media and individual journalists, and especially in the post 9/11 era and especially around peak wikileak era. Some used those powers at times very aggressively, at times even resorting into things like raids and seizures. Also, just harassment like putting people on no-fly lists, or simple scare tactics like threatening anonymous phone calls and obvious surveillance.
That stuff was pretty big news at the time, if you read the news at all. The Guardian for example was raided by British intelligence around the Snowden leaks, and had it's all it's office hard drives destroyed. Some journalists were arrested and kept under interrogation for hours "suspected of terrorism" around the same time. Extreme and rare example of course, but it showed free media everywhere that this is on the table when government thinks it's necessary.
You can also simply blackmail individual journalists. If the journalists have personal secrets, there's a good chance the surveillance state knows about it. (Ķind of the point of the Snowden leaks really.)
More typically of course it's just your average corruption and soft power. Making nice with not just journalists but also editors and the owners of news outlets, getting them to "see things your way".
Access is also a highly valuable currency for journalists, so journalists who you give access to material and interviews you don't give just anyone have a high motivation to play nice. They're quite likely to write roughly what you would like and not write about what you don't to be written about.
You can also just find the journalists who already see things your way and who will write what you want because they're already "patriots" or something, and give them the info you want to put out there.