S6K - Monition E-Zine

We are launching a website redesign of Monition E-zine in summer 2003. This will improve our distribution and simplify user access. We will also be moving to a quarterly issue publishing model. We will then be enabled to better follow the media spin to supply better coverage to our readers. Our redesign will serve to provide links to a wide variety of informative social & cultural media and will help facilitate the search for the myriad of information, which is hidden in plain sight.

Our specialized media guide will return as a vehicle to help you sift through the innumerable amount of TV, radio, and internet media with the hope of informing and entertaining you. Though the guide will be primarily New York media centric, most of our selections are internationally accessible via Internet

While you wait for the new issue of Monition E-Zine, here's a little fun introductory test that originally appeared in our December 2001issue of Monition E-Zine. ( That means you should have no problem answering the questions now...right?) Good luck. :)-

We now embark on a series of social / media literacy tests designed to examine how much you comprehend about our government's processes and the media that has the job of informing the masses about it.

(1) George Bush, Jr. or Osama Bin Ladin made the following statements. I have removed identifying words to disguise their origin. It is up to you, my astute class, to determine who made each statement. This is to show how rhetoric can have various affects depending on phrasing and the context in which it is propagated.

(a) "In my view, if an enemy occupies a __________ territory and uses common people as human shield, then it is permitted to attack that enemy. For instance, if bandits barge into a home and hold a child hostage, then the child's father can attack the bandits and in that attack even the child may get hurt."
(b) "I ask the ___________ people to force their government to give up ___________ policies. The _________ people had risen against their government's war in ___________. They must do the same today. The __________ people should stop the massacre of _____________ by their government."
(c) "The mission is to spread the word of ___________, not to indulge massacring people. We ourselves are the target of killings, destruction and atrocities. We are only defending ourselves. This is defensive __________. We want to defend our people and our land. That is why I say that if we don't get security, the ____________, too would not get security."

(2) To stimulate the economy, our wisdom endowed political leaders have come up with a plan, but they need your help. The following five companies have been selected to receive stimulus packages. The catch is, with school budgets, social services, health care and other primary US infrastructure needs being cut, the government realized that the people didn't know how much these companies would get. Here are the actual amounts the five companies listed below were being granted when the Fall 2001 US economic stimulus bill was recently debated.

Match the company (1 - 5) with the stimulus package (a - e) you believe the company was offered. Once you've done this, then the companies can receive the money in the people's name.

(3) While our government is busy creating a myriad of new laws that are aimed at protecting its population, it is important that you know what they are, whom they will affect and what the long-term objectives of the laws are. Below is the exact wording of a new law that has been signed into existence in NY State. What criminal offense would you be guilty of if you did one or all of these 3 things?

A person is guilty of this offense when he or she commits a "specified offense" with intent to accomplish one of the following three goals:

(4) By government statistics, what is considered to be the number one committed violent crime resulting in death in the US?

(5) What US public service facilities did not have to create a protocol for dealing with terrorist threats that involved actual or supposed biological / chemical agents when confronted with attacks during Fall 2001?

(6) What US terrorist group uses or threatens the use of chemical weapons, bombings, murder and intimidation to coerce public opinion to adhere to their "Christian" agenda? (Hint) They executed a large scale attack in early November 2001 and are one of the highest ranked on the FBI's domestic terrorist list.

(7) In 2001, before September 11th, the Taliban ceased its involvement in poppy (the raw material for heroin) production. How much of our money did the US government give to them for this?

(8) Lastly, click here http://www.self-gov.org/quiz.html. You will find a short quiz that is fascinating and enlightening. This demonstrates that we all fit into categories that others have analyzed, quantified & evaluated to assess what (y)our public relevance and impact is or more to the point isn't.

Remember, after you're done, have some fun and do this test with your friends. You have a month.
See ya later with the answers...and another test.

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