MIND INDUSTRY
109
vised in its single operations, is never completely controllable as a whole.
There are always leaks in it, cracks in the armor; no administration
will ever trust it all the
way.~
In order to exploit people's intellectual, moral and political facul–
ties, you have got to develop them first. This is, as we have seen, the
basic dilemma faced by today's media. When we turn our attention
from the industry's consumers to its producers, the intellectuals, we find
this dilemma aggravated and intensified. In terms of power, of course,
there can be no question as to who runs the business. Certainly it is
not the intellectuals who control the industrial establishment, but the
establishment which controls them. There is precious little chance for
the people who are productive to take over their means of production:
this is just what the present structure is designed to prevent. However,
even under present circumstances, the relationship is not without a
certain ambiguity, since there is no way of running the mind industry
without enlisting the services of at least a minority of men who can
create something. To exclude them would be self-defeating. Of course,
it is perfectly possible to use the whole stock of accumulated original
work and have it adapted, diluted and processed for media use, and
it may be well to remember that much of what purports to be new is
in fact derivative.
If
we examine the harmonic and melodic structure
of any popular song hit, it will most likely turn out to employ inven–
tions of serious composers centuries ago. The same is true of the
dramaturgical cliches of mediocre screenplays: watered down beyond
recognition, they repeat traditional patterns taken from the drama and
the novel of the past. In the long run, however, the parasitic use of
inherited work is not sufficient to nourish the industry. However large
a stock, you cannot sell out forever without replenishment; hence the
need "to make it new," the media's dependence on men capable of
innovation, in other words, on potential troublemakers.
It
is inherent
in the process of creation that there is no way to predict its results. Con–
sequently, intellectuals are, from the point of view of any power struc–
ture bent on its own perpetuation, a security risk. It takes consummate
skiII
to
"handle" them and to neutralize their subversive influence. All
5. A good example of this instinctive sense of insecurity shared by the
most entrenched political powers is offered by Senator Joseph McCarthy's
lunatic crusade against Hollywood producers, actors and writers. Most of
them had shown an abject loyalty to the demands of the industry through–
out their career, and yet no abnegation of their talents could free them
from suspicion. Much in the same way, Stalin never trusted even his most
subservient trustees of the intellectual establishment.
