‘If those who support aggressive war had seen a fraction of what I’ve seen, if they’d watched children fry to death from Napalm and bleed to death from a cluster bomb, they might not utter the claptrap they do’. –John Pilger. 13/11/2005.

The renowned documentary maker was one of the greatest journalists in all of history, Going Underground host Afshin Rattansi has said. Investigative journalist and documentary filmmaker John Pilger died at age 84 on Saturday, December 31 at his home in London, his family have announced.

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Pilger was known for his hard-hitting exposés on the human cost of empire, from the wars in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Iraq, to Western democracies’ systematic repression of their own working classes.

His documentaries include Year Zero: The Silent Death of Cambodia, Breaking the Silence: Truth and Lies in the War on Terror, The War on Democracy, Palestine is Still the Issue, and The Coming War with China. 

‘Every journalist, even though they may not know it, owes a debt to John Pilger,’ Afshin Rattansi told RT on Sunday, calling the award-winning filmmaker ‘one of the greatest journalists in all of history.’

‘Many journalists now are no more than channelers and echoers of what George Orwell called the ‘official truth’. They simply cipher and transmit lies.’ ~ John Pilger, Australian Investigate Journalist.

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Pilger realized journalism was about illuminating things for the ordinary person, not for elites, it’s not for awards, Rattansi explained, praising his late friend and colleague for his moral compass in which he looked at everything from the bottom up, from the viewpoint of the average person. 

‘He was a vocal critic of fake journalism that is so on display when we look at Gaza, when we look at Ukraine, and of course, that’s why he found Russian media as an outlet he could speak to because he was banned de facto by Western Alliance mainstream media,’ he said.

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‘We have got to stop using the term mainstream (media). It is actually an extreme. What could be more extreme than institutions that incite rapacious wars, and deception about economic policy, what could be more extreme than that? There is nothing mainstream about that.’ ~ Veteran British Journalist and Broadcaster, John Pilger.

Pilger was long a fixture at mainstream news outlets, working for the Daily Mirror, Reuters, and ITV’s World in Action. However, he was gradually frozen out by government-neutered media barons over the last decade. The government and corporate interests dependent-Guardian were the last to end the regular publication of his column in 2015. The journalist himself described it as a ‘purge of those who were saying what The Guardian no longer says anymore.’ 

Former colleagues nevertheless flocked to social media to pay their respects. Pilger was a great Daily Mirror journalist back in the day, one of the very best. Brave, insightful, challenging authority, and instinctively on the side of the underdog,’ that outlet’s associate editor, Kevin Maguire, wrote. 

ITV managing director Kevin Lygo called Pilger ‘a giant of campaigning journalism’ who ‘eschewed comfortable consensus and instead offered a radical, alternative approach on current affairs and a platform for dissenting voices over 50 years.’ 

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Rattansi highlighted Pilger’s tireless campaigning on behalf of internationally renowned investigative journalist Julian Assange, held at Britain’s Guantanamo Bay Belmarsh Prison since police dragged him out of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2019, as a prominent piece of his legacy.

‘Some journalists who are actually quite open-minded and are aware of the real situation but have no choice but to write what is expected of them by their editors to make both ends meet and have a decent salary.’ ~Fernando Casado, Spanish Analyst and Legal Expert.

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