“It happens on occasion that, unable to maintain the distance necessary for reflection, journalists end up acting like the fireman who sets the fire. They help create the event by focusing on a story (such as the murder of one young Frenchman by another young man, who is just as French but “of African origin”), and then denounce everyone who adds fuel to the fire that they lit themselves. I am referring, of course, to the National Front which, obviously, exploits or tries to exploit “the emotions aroused by events.” This in the words of the very newspapers and talk shows that startled the whole business by writing the headlines in the first place, and by rehashing events endlessly at the beginning of every evening news program. The media then appear virtuous and humane for denouncing the racist moves of the very figure [Le Pen] they helped create and to whom they continue to offer the most effective instruments of manipulation.”
On Television (The New Press, 1998 Trans).
Sonic Geography 