Role of Propaganda in DMZ Graphics Novels - Research Paper Example

Pavlo Lashmanov College: Kingsborough Community College English 2400 Bekim Kacaj Introduction DMZ Graphics novels is an unforgiving novel that highlights what ‘war on terror’ has done to the human population through its tough, provoking, addictive and brutal comic stories. DMZ is a comics and graphics novel about and inspired by the Iraq War and stories contained in the novel are shocking. Brian Wood was inspired by the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York and subsequent invasion of Iraq that occupied American news stories for the decade. The novels utilizes horrors and images of un-witnessed stories to create a replica of life during wartime using images that Americans are accustomed to seeing on news. However, DMZ is not about Iraq or Afghanistan, but the Manhattan Island (New York City) which is the continental United States while New Jersey and Inland is the Free States of America and the two sides are regarded as the frontlines of American second civil war. In reality, the novel is a comic since Matty Roth does not encounter any guerilla forces or any helicopter attacks. Matty’s contribution and biased reporting Matty accompanies a veteran journalist to the warfront in order to cover news of the war and soon their helicopter is shot down. Matty is the only survivor and starts writing news, but his reporting is not objective. Matty is not a qualified journalist and is not capable of reporting stories without bias and remaining objective since he advances partisan interests of the Continental American forces and portrays Iraq as evil. The reporting is not accurate, fair and credible since Matty does not provide the details of the sources of his news information and the other perspectives of the war according to the enemy (Kamalipour 20). The reporting is not governed by public interest or truthfulness since the entire information is inaccurate and not about the war in Iraq, but New York City (NYC) which is viewed as the battlefield of America’s second civil war. Matty is one of the best characters and is reporting is full of biasness and propaganda since Matty he does not personally witness any rooftops with phrases like ‘HELP’ or building towers engulfed in fire and smoke (Wood 19). Matty is not impartial since his reporting depicts the Free States as evil and providers undue coverage on the snipers. Matty does not attribute the news stories to their sources, but just provides certain titles of military commanders and fails to conduct private inquiries in order to determine the authenticity of the news (Chomsky 152). Concisely, Matty exaggerates the real struggles of American population such as the economic conditions, the social class struggles and the employment related problems. Matty claims to go underground and disrupt the terrorist cells that are determined to disrupt any construction sites in the cities. Again, Matty Roth misleads the readers that he has returned from his misadventures In Staten Island to find a provisional New York governor (Parco Delgado) and his tasks are to track down some of the DMZ’s urban legends. Another example of propaganda is the ‘friendly fire’ in the Haditha massacre in Iraq where Matty claims that Marine Corps squadron gunned down innocent protestors (Wood 34). Burchielli and Wood do not offer real life stories or personal accounts of the war in Iraq since they capitalize on the interplay between the mass media and military to perpetuate powerful propaganda (Kamalipour 45). Warfront news make flashy headlines in American media and DMZ Graphics novels offer scary stories of corpses strewn in streets of Iraq and various car bombings without personal accounts of the reporting journalists. Matty lacks journalistic integrity since his reporting on strewn bodies across streets and descriptions of horror images leaves the readers with more discomfort on the real-life in the warfront (Chomsky 51). The political commentary in the novel serves more as propaganda that aims at demonizing unknown American enemies through placing the military confrontation in an American city. The insurgents in DMZ Graphics novels are the workers of American society such as chefs, doctors and engineers who host their dinners in rooftops for fear of car bomb attacks and snipers (Wood 56). DMZ graphic novels focus on the conflict aspects of Iraq War without looking at the ongoing humanitarian efforts and portray one side as good and the other as evil. Matty creates the impression that armed conflict is evitable and focuses on the violence without outlining the underlying causes of the problem such as high unemployment, poverty and government repression. DMZ graphics novels represent mere propaganda since it does not give an account of actual number of casualties on both sides of the conflict or personal accounts of the military commanders on the progress of the war. Other channels such as the BBC that claimed that ‘hospitals in Baghdad were overwhelmed’ even without any BBC journalist visiting the hospitals in Baghdad. Large portion of the reporting by Matty focuses on the horrors of the war through images of anarchy, mass demonstrations, looting, hunger, desperation and chaos thus creating an impression of a continued violence with uncertain end. The novel exaggerates the economic and social struggles in US by comparing them with military conflict zones since problems underlying the US are everywhere in all parts of the world unlike the War in Iraq that was just unique in its nature (Chomsky 66). Comparison with real-life examples of use of propaganda The various examples of propaganda used in DMZ Graphics novels are similar to real-life examples of use of propaganda in warfare. The US media distorts news information in order to shape the public attitudes towards military campaigns, political ideologies and national interests of the US government. During the Iraq War, every American newspaper, radio station, television channel, magazine and novel carried stories of propaganda that aimed at spreading misinformation on the nature of War in Iraq and Afghanistan (Chomsky 149). The propaganda aimed at intimidating Iraq insurgents and Taliban terrorists through depicting the immoral acts that they have committed against Iraq innocent citizens and their possible terror attacks on American installations in the Middle East. The Journalists in Iraq filmed images of insurgents attacking innocent citizens and their main purpose was to bolster the support for the War among American public in order to avoid any divided views on the purpose of the war. Accordingly, propaganda in Iraq was evidenced by United States dropping of leaflets and radio broadcasts in Iraq cities that blamed ‘Dictator’ Saddam Hussein for the suffering and human rights violations in Iraq (Chomsky 190). The propaganda messages played a critical role in getting Iraq citizens to support the coalition forces since messages aimed at persuading ordinary citizens to help the coalition forces identify the insurgents and not attack the American battalions. US TV networks terms the Iraq war as ‘operation Iraqi Freedom’ while the Arabian newspapers termed the happenings as ‘occupation’ or ‘invasion’ without outlining the real reasons for the war or any other alternatives that would avoid the war (Kamalipour 78). The US newspapers intensified the war ideology through biased interpretation of preemptive US strikes that that provided the military buildup and support from other nations. The TV channels often asserted that the war was inevitable and that America had no hidden agenda in going to Iraq other than enforce the UN resolutions and shut down weapons of mass destruction. The Iraq regime was termed as ‘axis of evil’ by American media while Al Jazeera network expressed concerns on invasion and attack on innocent Iraq people (Kamalipour 126). Conclusion DMZ Graphics novels makes readers assume that the pictorial reports are from Baghdad by providing images of suicide bombers massacring urban crowds gathered for clean water. In reality, the scenes are from New York, frontline in a full-scale civil war between the US government forces and middle Free states rebels. The novel offer an account of the struggles that ordinary working class Americans is undergoing and not real-life stories from combat zone in Iraq. The novel contains propaganda of nicely imagined combatants and non-combatants such as snipers without guns, and further uses his gun to date an enemy who is miles away in New Jersey. The use of propaganda in DMZ Graphics novels aims at eliciting the emotions of the readers through horror stories in combat zones in Iraq. The stories convey non-factual information and misrepresent the real-life battle in Iraq War since the journalists do not offer unbiased reporting. The propaganda has can influence the perceptions of the readers towards Iraq and Afghanistan and DMZ capitalizes on the existing American popular debate on the War in Iraq to offer biased stories that will shape the public opinion. Matty’s use of propaganda hinders journalistic integrity since it distorts facts, information and images in order to elicit predetermined emotions and change the opinion of the audience towards the news subjects. References: Chomsky, Noam. Media control: the spectacular achievements of propaganda. New York: Seven Stories Press. 2010. Kamalipour, Yahya. War, media, and propaganda: a global perspective. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield. 2004. Wood, Brian and Burchielli, Riccardo. DMZ 2, body of a journalist. New York: DC Comics. Wood, Brian and Burchielli, Riccardo. DMZ, vol. 1: on the ground. New York: Vertigo. 128 pgs. Wood, Brian and Burchielli, Riccardo. DMZ, Vol. 4: friendly fire TP. New York: Vertigo. Read More