The Voice of the Voiceless
PRESS TVLIBERATION LANGUAGE / STATE CONTROL
The vocabulary of liberation theology and anti-imperialist solidarity, deployed by an authoritarian state to defend its foreign policy while suppressing dissent at home.
Press TV launched in 2007 as the 24-hour English-language news channel of the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) - explicitly designed as a political and informational response to Western geopolitical pressure. Its slogan, The Voice of the Voiceless, is rooted in progressive, anti-imperialist, and human-rights traditions. The phrase has a long lineage in liberation theology and Global South advocacy. Press TV reaches into that lineage and uses its moral weight.
The network positions itself as a counter-hegemonic force challenging the global media stranglehold of Western outlets. It claims to represent oppressed populations of the Global South. It frequently highlights the Palestinian struggle and Western military interventions, drawing on legitimate historical grievances of marginalized groups to validate its existence and build trust with global audiences not served by US- or UK-anchored coverage.
The operational contradiction is structural. The network is tightly controlled by an authoritarian state that systematically and violently suppresses its own domestic dissenting voices. During the 2009 Green Movement protests, the 2017–18 nationwide unrest, the 2019 fuel-protest crackdown that killed hundreds, and the 2022–23 Woman, Life, Freedom uprising following the death of Mahsa Amini, Press TV did not function as the voice of the voiceless inside Iran. The voiceless inside Iran were silenced by the state operating Press TV. The network’s mandate is to project state narrative outward.
The trust language of liberation theology and independent investigative journalism is co-opted, in this instance, to serve the foreign-policy objectives and narrative defense of the Iranian state.
The mirror to the chronological chapters: Al Jazeera Arabic was launched on a similar premise - amplifying Arab and Global South voices excluded from Western coverage - and earned its standing through reporting that genuinely challenged regional autocrats, occasionally including its own host state. Press TV uses the same vocabulary. The work it does in that vocabulary is different.
Sources: www.tasnimnews.com ↗www.conspiracywatch.info ↗commons.wikimedia.org ↗www.youtube.com ↗