Ugly War, Pretty Package: How CNN and Fox News Made the Invasion of Iraq High Concept

4 War Characters

War Characters On March 22, Geraldo Rivera, one of Fox News Channel’s maverick reporters who was stationed in Afghanistan, used a bit of well-worn rhetoric to imply that antiwar protesters were somehow acting in concert with Middle Eastern extremists . He directed viewers’ attention to a map of the Middle East and said, Look at that band, that belt of absolute threat to freedom-loving people everywhere . You know, I just wish that the antiwar demonstrators would pull out their atlas one day and . . . look at this potential anarchy, a belt where governments heretofore have been extremely hostile to anything that democraticloving people believe in. (Fox News Channel March 22) Rivera’s suggestion that protesters at home were a threat to democracy was the beginning of an extended effort to characterize antiwar protesters as traitors to the U.S. government. Like stars, character types have a function in terms of the narrative, in terms of the marketplace, and in terms of ideology. The reductive nature of a type is of great intertextual value because it draws on viewers’ knowledge of other embodiments of that type. Types also have exchange value: they simplify the process of creating characters, they fulfill audience expectations, and they are easy to market because their motivations are easy to communicate. Finally, types blunt complexities. Types are easy to love and hate because they do not allow room for gray areas; as a result, they are ideal components of a product’s marketable concept. This chapter traces the use of the basic character types of 4 UGly war, pretty package 122   heroes, villains, and sidekicks at CNN and Fox News Channel. A close reading of the networks’ character typing also reveals an unexpected and decidedly more complex character known as the false hero, a type Vladimir Propp elucidated . The networks’ character types were possibly the most blatantly constructed elements of the war narrative because network news personnel were able to control the process of constructing them. The Value of Types Sarah Kozloff argues that television’s formulaic structure invites us to look for rules and configurations that form the basis of television programs (1992, 72). Character types help in this process, and though the characters on television programs are quite formulaic (typified by such well-worn tropes as detective or father or working woman), Kozloff argues that “the viewer’s interest is continually engaged by the personalities who fulfill these roles” (76). Not all television characters are as cleanly drawn as Kozloff proclaims—the amount of character development engendered by the serial narrative is one strong argument against Kozloff—but one cannot deny that formulaic characters are essential to commercial television. Formulaic and predictable character types are narrative and ideological tools that consistently attract audiences and endow events with loaded meanings . Karim H. Karim discusses the implications of character typing in violent storylines: Actual physical violence is endowed with high symbolic value when it is de­ picted as supporting one or another view of political and social reality. Narratives that dramatize deadly struggles involving heroes, villains, and victims give meaning to the conflicts that exist in human society. Portrayals of particular uses of violence by specific kinds of people identify which social roles they are playing. Those who control the production and dissemination of these dramaturges have the means to influence public opinion regarding the types of people that are to be considered as the heroes, the villains, and the victims in society. (2003, 19) Karim’s argument forces us to consider the effect that character typing has on actual participants in a war. As I will show, CNN and Fox News Channel news personnel maintained the character types created by the Bush administration and developed others on their own to sustain a simple narrative based on clearly opposing forces. Iraqi military officers also employed this tactic by calling Bush a “gangster” in a press conference, later explicitly comparing him to 1920s Chicago gangster Al Capone. War Characters 123   Former ABC foreign correspondent Malcolm Browne explains the appeal of character typing to news: Especially in America, we like to think of things in terms of good guys and bad guys. If one of the partners in a conflict is one that most people can identify with as a good guy, then you’ve got a situation in which it’s possible to root for the home team. That’s what a lot of news...