Corporate Media Uses the Word 'Militant' to Crush Dissent: Call People 'Militants' — Suddenly They're Worthy of Being Killed

Adapted From Hamed Saber's "White, Gray and Blacks."

By Mark Karlin
The mainstream media performs its transcriptionist role flawlessly every time it reports about "militants" being killed in various attacks around the world.

The world "militant" marginalizes anyone who is slain by those in power, deeming those people worthy of being killed because they are an alleged threat to the US (or an ally who supports US hegemony). Of course, if you are an advocate for regime overthrow in a country where the US wants to establish a new, pro-neoliberal government, then you are labeled a "freedom fighter" in the press.

Virtually no corporate media reports uses the word "alleged" before the word militants. If people are opposed to a status quo power and organize armed resistance, and the US or a friendly government calls them "militants," they have - the media implies - been killed justifiably.

There are a lot of perilous implications of labeling people killed in military or CIA attacks as "militants." First, how does the press know that the individuals killed are actually armed fighters and not just people going about their business? As Buzzflash noted last week in a commentary entitled, "Few People Killed in US Drone Strikes Identified as Terrorists":

[...]

The basic premise of US military and CIA strategy in non-European nations is, "If we killed them, they must have been militants." Occasionally, the US killing of civilians, particularly in the Middle East, is so egregious and obvious - such as the bombing of celebrants at a wedding - that a garbled admission is issued and grief payoffs made. That, however, is rare.

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