Mark Crispin Miller
Mark Crispin Miller | |
---|---|
Born | 1949 (age 71–72) |
Nationality | American |
Occupation | Professor |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | Northwestern University (BA) Johns Hopkins University (MA, PhD) |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Media studies |
Institutions | New York University (NYU) |
Website | https://markcrispinmiller.com/ |
Mark Crispin Miller (born 1949) is a professor of media studies at New York University.[1]
Background and career[]
In the introduction to Seeing Through Movies, Miller argues that the nature of American films has been affected by the impact of advertising.[2] He has said that the handful of multinational corporations in control of the American media have changed youth culture's focus away from values and toward commercial interests and personal vanity.[3]
Conspiracy-theory and disinformation promotion[]
In his social and political commentary, Miller frequently espouses conspiracy theories.[4][5]
On social media and in other statements, Miller has promoted conspiracy theories and falsehoods, including conspiracy theories about the September 11 attacks; anti-vaccine misinformation; the claim that Joe Biden stole the 2020 presidential election; the claim that the beheading of the journalist James Foley by ISIL was fake; and the claim that the Black Lives Matter movement is funded by the CIA.[5] Miller is a signatory to the 9/11 Truth Statement[6] and a member of the 9/11 Truth movement.[5][7] He dislikes the term "conspiracy theory", calling the phrase a "meme" used to "discredit people engaged in really necessary kinds of investigation and inquiry."[5] In a 2017 New York Observer interview, he said anyone using the term "in a pejorative sense" is "a witting or unwitting CIA asset".[8] In a June 2001 New York Times profile by Chris Hedges, Miller called himself a "public intellectual" and criticized television news "that is astonishingly empty and distorts reality".[9]
Election fraud conspiracy theories[]
In his book Fooled Again, Miller claims that the 2000 and 2004 U.S. presidential elections were stolen.[10] He has since claimed that the 2020 U.S. Presidential election was stolen.
9/11 hoax conspiracy theory[]
In 2016, Miller gave a speech to the Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth.[4] After a "truthers" symposium on 9/11, Miller told Vice that the official explanations for 9/11 and John F. Kennedy's assassination "are just as unscientific as the ones that everybody feels comfortable ridiculing".[11]
Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre hoax conspiracy theory[]
In a blog post, Miller suggested that the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre was a hoax; in a subsequent interview, he denied that any children died in the shooting and voiced "suspicion" that "it was staged" or was "some kind of an exercise."[4] Miller praised a Sandy Hook denial book by James Fetzer as "compelling" (a $450,000 defamation judgment had previously been entered against Fetzer, after the father of one of the murdered Sandy Hook students sued him for false statements made in the book).[4]
Anti-vaccination misinformation[]
Miller has invited Del Matthew Bigtree, a prominent anti-vaccination activist and promoter of COVID-19 misinformation, as a guest speaker to his classes on multiple occasions.[5] Miller has also screened for his students the anti-vaccination film Vaxxed, produced by disgraced former physician Andrew Wakefield (who was struck off the medical register in the UK for scientific misconduct).[5][8] He has appeared on the Useful Idiots podcast and was praised by its host, Matt Taibbi.[12][13]
Miller has spread COVID-19 misinformation, including misleading claims about the efficacy of masking and false claims that COVID-19 vaccine alter recipients' DNA.[4]
Academic sanction[]
As of September 2020, Miller is under a behavioral review by New York University; the complaint was prompted by a letter to the Steinhardt School dean and the NYU provost signed by 25 of Miller's departmental colleagues, requesting such a review.[4][14] The letter alleged that Miller used "intimidating tactics, abuses of authority, aggression and microaggressions, and explicit hate speech, none of which are excused by academic freedom and First Amendment protections."[15] The letter also stated that Miller used his "highly visible website" to espouse the "characterization of transgender surgery as a eugenic form of sterilization, direct mockery and ridicule of transindividuals, and denial of the Sandy Hook elementary school shooting."[4] Miller denies these allegations, and responded by suing 19 faculty colleagues in state court, alleging defamation.[4][15]
Books[]
Miller's books include:
- Miller, Mark Crispin (1988). Boxed in: the Culture of TV. Evanston, IL. ISBN 0-8101-0791-0. OCLC 18017073.[16][17][18][19]
- Seeing Through Movies (edited, 1990)[20]
- The Bush Dyslexicon: Observations on a National Disorder (2001)[21]
- Cruel and Unusual: Bush/Cheney's New World Order (2004)[22]
- Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election and Why They'll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them) (2005)[23]
See also[]
References[]
- ^ "Mark Crispin Miller: Professor of Media, Culture, and Communication". NYU Steinhardt. Retrieved 15 June 2020.
- ^ Rothenberg, Randall (March 13, 1990). "The Media Business: Advertising; Is It a Film? Is It an Ad? Harder to Tell". The New York Times. Retrieved June 15, 2020.
- ^ "Interview: Mark Crispin Miller". Frontline. PBS. 2012 [2000]. Retrieved June 15, 2020.
- ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g h Dery, Mark (May 12, 2021). "The Professor of Paranoia: Mark Crispin Miller, who is suing his colleagues, used to study conspiracy theories. Now he pushes them". The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved May 18, 2021.
- ^ Jump up to: a b c d e f Kennedy, Dominic (June 13, 2020). "Conspiracy theories spread by academics with university help". The Times. ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved June 14, 2020. (subscription required)
- ^ Rossmier, Vincent (11 September 2009). "Would you still sign the 9/11 Truth petition?". Salon. Retrieved 19 March 2018.
- ^ Keate, Georgie; Kennedy, Dominic; Shveda, Krystina; Haynes, Deborah (April 14, 2018). "Apologists for Assad working in British universities". The Times. London. ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved June 14, 2020. (subscription required)
- ^ Jump up to: a b Stutman, Gabe (July 26, 2017). "NYU Professor Uses Tenure to Advance 9/11 Hoax Theory". Observer. New York. Retrieved December 5, 2018.
- ^ Hedges, Chris (June 15, 2001). "Public Lives; Watching Bush's Language, and Television". The New York Times. Retrieved June 15, 2020.
- ^ Kaminer, Ariel (2012-11-08). "Long Day for a Professor Suspicious of Voting Machines". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2021-05-15.
- ^ Thompson, Alex (September 12, 2016). "9/11 'truthers' vow to never, ever forget". Vice. Retrieved April 11, 2020.
- ^ Taibbi, Matt; Halper, Katie (December 31, 2020). "Stimulus Checks, Larry Summers, Plus Mark Crispin Miller on Academic Freedom". Rolling Stone.
- ^ Taibbi, Matt. "Meet the censored: Mark Crispin Miller". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
- ^ "NYU Student Calls for Professor's Firing After He Urged Masks Are Propaganda". NBC New York. 23 September 2020. Retrieved 8 December 2020.
- ^ Jump up to: a b Saltonstall, Gus (December 3, 2020). "NYU Professor Sues Fellow Faculty Members Over Mask Controversy". Yahoo! News. West Village Patch. Retrieved January 1, 2021.
- ^ Rabinovitz, Lauren (1991). Marc, David; Miller, Mark Crispin; Kaplan, E. Ann; Fiske, John (eds.). "Television Criticism and American Studies". American Quarterly. 43 (2): 358–370. doi:10.2307/2712935. ISSN 0003-0678. JSTOR 2712935.
- ^ Fromm, Harold (1989). Levine, Lawrence W.; Miller, Mark Crispin (eds.). "Cultural Power". The Georgia Review. 43 (1): 179–188. ISSN 0016-8386. JSTOR 41399517.
- ^ Peck, A. (1988). "I Am a VCR, by Marvin Kitman and Boxed In: The Culture of TV, by Mark Crispin Miller: Chicago Tribune". Cite journal requires
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(help) - ^ "Books". Journal of Communication. 40 (2): 128–192. 1990-06-01. doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1990.tb02266.x. ISSN 0021-9916.
- ^ Seeing Through Movies, Pantheon, 1990. Reviews: James E. Vincent ETC, JSTOR 42577289; Janet. Staiger, Journal of Communication, doi:10.1111/j.1460-2466.1991.tb02325.x; Publishers Weekly
- ^ The Bush Dyslexicon: Observations on a National Disorder, W.W. Norton, ISBN 0-393-32296-3, 2001. Reviews: Jill Ortner, Library Journal, [1]; Elayne Tobin, The Nation, [2]; Publishers Weekly
- ^ Cruel and Unusual: Bush/Cheney's New World Order, W.W. Norton & Company, 2004, ISBN 0-393-05917-0. Reviews: "Early Evaluations of the Bush Presidency", Karen M. Hult and Charles E. Walcott, Rhetoric and Public Affairs, JSTOR 41940149; Michael A. Genovese, Library Journal, [3]; David Lotto, Journal of Psychohistory, [4]
- ^ Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election and Why They'll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them), New York: Basic Books, 2005, ISBN 0-465-04579-0. Reviews: Publishers Weekly; Kirkus Reviews; Farhad Manjoo, Salon, [5]
External links[]
Wikiquote has quotations related to: Mark Crispin Miller |
- Official faculty biography from New York University's Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development
- Official blog
- Appearances on C-SPAN
- Mark Crispin Miller at IMDb
- 1949 births
- 20th-century American male writers
- 9/11 conspiracy theorists
- American conspiracy theorists
- American male non-fiction writers
- American media critics
- American political writers
- Johns Hopkins University alumni
- Living people
- New York University faculty
- Northwestern University alumni
- American anti-vaccination activists