The News, continued

" ... And then, beside the few real horrors, there are the countless pseudo-events, the come-on's, the releases, the statements, the surmises, the slanders, the quarrels, the insults and the interminable self-advertising of the image-makers.

"We believe that the "news" has a strange metaphysical status outside us: it "happens" by itself. Actually, it is something that we fabricate. Those who are poor artisans make only pseudo-events. These are the tired politicians and businessmen, the educators, writers, intellectuals and the tiredest of all, the Churchmen."

- Merton "Events and Pseudo-Events", Faith and Violence, 1967, p. 152