POLITICAL DISCOURSE THROUGH POPULAR MEDIA:

A COMPARISON BETWEEN EASTERN AND WESTERN CULTURES

Name: Thoby Dwi Pramudito

NIM: B0316048

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT OF FACULTY OF CULTURAL SCIENCES

SEBELAS MARET UNIVERSITY

2018
 A. Background

It has been said that there are three things that one must not discuss with other people:
Religion, politics and money. However, these three are essential things to be talked about –
religion talks about how one’s fate will be on the afterlife, politics talks about how the society
around an individual currently running, and money talks about how someone will trade
materials that they earn or have for materials that they need or want (although it doesn’t
necessarily covers immaterial things).

Differences in cultures makes differences in how a society discuss things. Eastern and
Western cultures differs in how they discuss and handle things, due to the Western’s bedrock
of civilization with the Judeo-Christian values (and their subsequent secularization), and
Eastern’s bedrock of civilization with the Confusianism-based Eastern cultures (Pohl, 2002).
This leads to differences in many attitudes – from style of communication, outlook in life,
classroom & workplace attitudes, cultural attitudes of happiness, behaviour on public spaces,
how they view self-enhancement (Boucher, 2001) the individual vs collective dichotomy (in
which Westerners tend to see themselves as highly individual, independent and more
competitive (with behaviour regulation comes from the judgement of a public, which is a
separate being from the individual), for better or worse, and Easterners tend to emphasis
interdependence and ‘fitting in with the group mindset’ with the emphasis that they’re a part
of society), how each view human rights (Chan, 2011) and many other things – including
how each culture discuss politics. How each culture discuss politics in general can be seen at
how the media discuss politics.

B. Discussion

1. Western Cultures

Western cultures, at least the modern Western cultures, are more politically active in general.
Many popular media, in the modern world, for better or worse, inject a bit (or a lot) of
politics and criticism of society and laws in their works. The entertainment industry often
inject politics into their works, the politicization of journalism and media, and the debating
culture that is far more present in Western countries.
For example, when it comes to popular media: The Simpsons (David, 2013) and South Park
(Kaize, 2017) are two of cartoons that frequently inject politics into the episodes, often as a
criticism or satire of the US society in general. This also happens in other countries, such as
Charlie Hebdo with their frequent Muhammad controversy (Black, 2015).

News often has their opinion commentators that presents an often very biased views on
certain topics, the usage of emotionally loaded terms that is biased on certain viewpoints are
common, individuals commenting on their opinion and gaining followings are common. For
example, on the American conservative side, the talk show hosts Bill O’Reilly and Tucker
Carlson in their respective programs (Tucker Carlson Tonight and The O’Reilly Factor), as
well as many conservative talk radio in the US. Meanwhile, on the American liberal /
progressive side, CNN in the US has various political commentators on its news (User: CNN,
2018), as well as having the program CNN Crossfire. Discussion regarding personal and
social issues are more common, and debating is encouraged in classroom.

Huffington Post (a liberal / progressive news site) front page. Notice some titles blatantly
presents one viewpoint only.
 2. Eastern Cultures

Eastern cultures with the higher emphasis on social conformity (Baer, 2015) tends to view
compromise and herd conformity in more esteem, resulting in the foregoing of proving that
one individual is right above all else in favour of consensus. This, combined with historically
agricultural & kingdom-based background, makes Eastern cultures tend to not having as
heated debates regarding political & policy changes compared to the less apathetic Western
world, unless if a base ideology (such as the majority’s religion or national identity) is under
attack (The Jakarta Post, 2017; Charmila, 2017). This is reflective in, for example, the
Javanese concept of ‘mangan ora mangan sing penting kumpul’ (eating or not, at least we met
together). Political news tend to be less biased or less one-sided, or less ‘clickbait’
(purposefully designed to catch attention).

Kompas front page headline. Notice the titles are not as one-sided as the Western headline.

Despite this, biased opinions or emotionally charged comments are still present, however the
bias tend to be a majority-opinion bias. For example, there are various Islamic talk shows in
Indonesian television, and they were located in regular channels (instead of channels that
stating its stance clearly since the beginning that they’re religious channel) – for example,
there are a news talk show Berita Islami Masa Kini in Trans TV. Or TVRI (Indonesian state-
owned TV channel) has talk show Jalan Jalan Islami, Indahnya Pagi and Permata Nurani
Islam – all are Islamic talk shows or news in TV channels that, in the Western world, are
supposed to be secular, or various n. Public political discussion are also common, however
they’re far less bipartisan unless it involves base ideology (such as religion). For example, in
Indonesia there is a talk show program Mata Najwa on Metro TV, and Indonesian Lawyers
Club program on TV One.

3. Implications and Effects

Political discussion in the Western world are often hostile, and the interjection of politics
through media can results in oversimplification and ‘wanting quick solution to end
complicated problems’. This also contributed to the hostility. In Eastern cultures, people tend
to compromise who they are, ideologically, for the sake of society. This means a politically
passive culture and discussion, except when there is something that the majority of society
agrees.
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