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Summary

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The Western press loves to present itself as a noble guardian of democracy. In reality, much of it is owned by billionaires who treat journalism as little more than a factory line for fear. Rupert Murdoch, the Daily Mail’s Lord Rothermere, GB News’s Paul Marshall, Robert Mercer and Breitbart, Sinclair Broadcasting, the Wilks brothers, and Vincent Bolloré all follow the same cynical formula: scare the public about immigrants, minorities, climate activists and “woke elites,” keep them hooked on outrage, and bend governments to protect their fortunes.

This is not journalism. It is corporate propaganda dressed up as news. It warps democracies, fuels extremism, and keeps billionaires rich. Let’s pull the curtain back.

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Fear Sells – and They Know It

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If news is the first draft of history, right-wing media moguls are writing horror stories. Fear is not a by-product of their coverage, it is the business model. Psychologists have long confirmed that frightened people are easier to manipulate, and media watchdog FAIR summed it up bluntly: “fear sells” (FAIR).

That is why immigration is always framed as a “flood” or an “invasion,” crime as an “epidemic,” and climate change as a “conspiracy.” The facts do not matter — the emotional punch does. The moguls know that scared citizens are easier to herd. Afraid voters beg for “strong leaders,” swallow scapegoating, and ignore who is actually robbing them blind. Fear becomes the perfect smokescreen. While people rage about migrants in dinghies, billionaires quietly rig tax codes, deregulate industries, and pocket the profits.

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Rupert Murdoch: The Godfather of Fear

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No one industrialised fear quite like Rupert Murdoch. His tabloids such as The Sun and New York Post thrived on racist hysteria and celebrity sleaze. His crowning jewel, Fox News, became the most powerful propaganda machine in modern history, an endless loop of outrage designed to terrify and mobilise white, older viewers (New Republic).

The 2023 Dominion lawsuit pulled the mask off Murdoch’s empire. Under oath, he admitted that Fox knowingly aired Trump’s election fraud lies to stop viewers defecting to even more extreme rivals. His defence was as shameless as it was simple: “It is not red or blue, it is green” (Guardian). Translation: truth does not matter; only money does.

Fox remains insanely profitable, a “license to print money” (Guardian) by pumping paranoia into living rooms night after night. Its nightly line-up keeps viewers hooked on migrant “caravans,” “radical leftists,” and “climate hoaxes.” Even when violent crime fell, Fox devoted hours to lurid crime stories to convince audiences America was collapsing.

Politicians fear Murdoch like medieval lords feared the Pope. Former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd described his empire as a “frightening beast” that politicians dare not cross (Guardian). In Britain, Murdoch’s papers pushed Brexit with relentless migrant hysteria. In the US, Fox effectively became Trump’s policy shop. The reward for this relentless scaremongering is deregulation, tax cuts, and governments too scared to touch Murdoch’s empire. Murdoch postures as a populist truth-teller but is the very elite he pretends to expose. He does not believe in democracy; he believes in control.

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Larry and David Ellison: Father, Son, and the Gospel of Billionaire Control

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Larry Ellison, long known for his swagger in tech and aggressive corporate tactics, is quietly positioning himself and his son David as new power brokers in the post-truth media age. According to Newsweek, Larry and David have already stitched themselves deep into the legacy media order: David led Skydance’s takeover of Paramount (and with it CBS) in a deal that critics say paves their way toward controlling CNN, HBO, and even TikTok. Newsweek The merger itself drew sharp political scrutiny: in approving it, the FCC required Skydance to promise it would avoid diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs in newsrooms — a concession widely interpreted as bending toward right-wing cultural warfare. Impakter+1 Moreover, prior to the merger, Paramount settled a $16 million lawsuit with Donald Trump over a 60 Minutes edit—at a moment suspiciously timed just before Skydance’s purchase—and reporters demanded to know whether that settlement included a de facto guarantee of $20 million in “free air time” favorable to Trump. Los Angeles Times+2Impakter+2 In Congress, senators led by Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are now investigating whether David Ellison struck side deals or leveraged political pressure to smooth the merger’s path. Yahoo+1 Meanwhile, insiders at CBS warn that the merger’s terms include installing an ombudsman overseeing newsroom "bias" and discarding DEI metrics—moves that many see not as reform, but as a Trojan horse for ideological control. Fox Business

On Larry’s side, the record includes legal findings that he destroyed or withheld emails and tapes in a shareholder lawsuit over false financial statements—evidence of willingness to bury inconvenient truths for profit. Los Angeles Times He has also been accused in tech media of disinformation tactics: for instance, when he launched a broad attack against Amazon’s AWS and Splunk during Oracle’s marketing pushes, some critics called his public claims hype or exaggeration masquerading as fact. Information Week The Ellisons might not yet have a Fox or Breitbart, but they are assembling the wiring for a new propaganda network—one built on opaque deals, regulatory favors, narrative control, and fear-friendly editorial concessions.

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Daily Mail & Lord Rothermere: Panic for Profit

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The Daily Mail has been Britain’s daily delivery of bile for a century, but under Paul Dacre it mutated into a weaponised rage machine. During the Brexit referendum, seventeen of twenty-three front pages in one month were anti-immigrant (Guardian). The paper framed refugees as invaders, Muslims as threats, and EU bureaucrats as tyrants.

The Mail has been caught printing misleading or false stories so often that Wikipedia banned it as a source for its “poor fact checking, sensationalism and flat-out fabrication” (Guardian). That ban sums up its reputation better than any critique could.

Its owner, Lord Rothermere, is the embodiment of hypocrisy. He is a billionaire tax exile who claimed “non-domiciled” status to dodge UK taxes while his paper screamed about “benefit scroungers” and “tax dodgers” (Guardian). That is like the arsonist writing op-eds about fire safety.

By whipping up anti-immigrant fury, the Mail helped deliver Brexit, a boon to deregulation-hungry elites. Rothermere profits twice: once from the clicks and once from the politics. His paper pretends to defend “ordinary Brits” while its billionaire boss hides his wealth offshore.

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GB News: Hedge Fund TV

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Britain apparently needed an even nastier Fox knockoff, and in 2021 GB News obliged. It has become Nigel Farage’s personal megaphone for anti-migrant rants, conspiracy theories, and climate denial.

Behind it is Sir Paul Marshall, a hedge fund billionaire worth £680 million, plus Dubai’s Legatum group. Marshall is not just ideological; he is deeply conflicted. His hedge fund holds £1.8 billion in fossil fuel investments (Guardian), while GB News rails against “net zero” policies. He also bankrolled climate-sceptic groups lobbying to criminalise protests (Guardian).

The station has blurred journalism and Tory PR to the point of absurdity, with sitting MPs interviewing ministers live on air (Guardian). GB News does not care about informing the public; it only cares about keeping Britain’s discourse toxically right-wing. Even if the channel never turns a profit, its backers are buying influence. Marshall already has his eyes on acquiring The Telegraph. This is not about news; it is about empire-building.

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Robert Mercer & Breitbart: Hedge Fund Propaganda

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In the United States, hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer built his own propaganda arm in the form of Breitbart News. Even conservatives described it as misogynistic, xenophobic and racist (Wikipedia). It became the digital command centre of Trumpism, blasting migrant panic and anti-Muslim hate into Facebook feeds.

Mercer also bankrolled Cambridge Analytica, which illegally harvested millions of Facebook profiles to micro-target voters with fearmongering ads. The result was a perfect storm of data and paranoia that helped swing the 2016 election.

The payoff was clear. Trump in office meant tax cuts, deregulation, and an administration crawling with Breitbart alumni like Steve Bannon. Mercer eventually sold his stake when the site became too toxic, but the playbook — weaponise outrage for power — lives on.

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Sinclair Broadcasting: Fear in Your Living Room

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Not all propaganda wears a Fox logo. The Smith family, owners of Sinclair Broadcasting, control around 185 local TV stations across the US. These are not niche cable outfits; they are local affiliates people trust.

In 2018, Sinclair forced anchors nationwide to read a scripted warning about “fake news,” parroting Trump almost word-for-word (Guardian). A viral video showed dozens of anchors reciting it in robotic unison, a dystopian scene straight from 1984.

Their national desk floods local broadcasts with cherry-picked crime stories and skewed immigration coverage, stoking fear with no context (Guardian). Viewers think they are getting neighbourhood news, but they are actually swallowing billionaire spin. Sinclair’s reward has been political favour. The Trump FCC tried to gut ownership rules so it could buy even more stations. Local news has become a Trojan horse: a smiling anchor on your TV secretly selling you a billionaire’s agenda.

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The Wilks Brothers & The Daily Wire: Fracking Meets Fundamentalism

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Texas fracking billionaires Farris and Dan Wilks cashed in on shale gas, then spent millions pushing their theocratic, climate-denying agenda.

They gifted $4.7 million to launch The Daily Wire (Guardian), now a Facebook powerhouse spewing anti-immigrant outrage and anti-LGBTQ bile. They have also funnelled millions into PragerU, a slick YouTube channel that downplays slavery, denies climate change, and packages right-wing propaganda as “education.”

The Wilks are evangelical fundamentalists who believe media should serve Christianity. Their investments conveniently protect their oil money by discrediting climate science. Faith and fossil fuels make a match made in billionaire heaven.

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Vincent Bolloré & CNews: France’s Fox Clone

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France’s Vincent Bolloré has built CNews into a far-right megaphone. Its formula is wall-to-wall coverage of immigration and crime, with a side order of Islamophobia (Guardian).

CNews gave far-right polemicist Éric Zemmour a nightly show where he called Muslim migrants “colonisers.” Regulators fined the channel for broadcasting hate speech, but the ratings were too good to care (Guardian).

Bolloré is a devout Catholic ultra-conservative who openly uses his empire to boost nationalist candidates like Marine Le Pen. His business interests — ports, logistics, and media — all benefit from governments hostile to unions, migrants, and climate policy. Like Murdoch, he is not a journalist. He is a kingmaker using fear to bend politics to his will.

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The Ripple Effects: Democracy on Fire

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This is not just about bad headlines. The fear factories reshape societies. Brexit was fuelled by tabloid hysteria about migrants. Trump’s election rode on Fox, Breitbart, and Sinclair pumping out fear. France’s far right surged thanks to CNews normalising hate. Climate policy is sabotaged by GB News, The Daily Wire, and PragerU insisting action will “destroy jobs.”

The result is a public sphere polluted by lies, elections warped by billionaires, and a political climate where voters fear neighbours more than oligarchs. It is not accidental; it is the point.

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Conclusion: Fear as a Business Model

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Murdoch, Rothermere, Marshall, Mercer, Sinclair, the Wilks and Bolloré may be different names, but they are running the same scam. They sell fear like a product, profit from division, and rig politics for the rich.

Murdoch himself admitted the truth: “It is not red or blue, it is green” (Guardian). These moguls do not care about ideology, only about control. Immigration “crises,” crime “waves,” climate “hoaxes” — all are deliberate manipulations to keep people angry at the wrong enemies.

The danger is real. Fear media corrodes trust, emboldens extremists, and leaves democracies hostage to billionaires. The next time you see a screaming headline about migrants “invading” or a pundit frothing about “woke tyranny,” remember this: you are not being informed; you are being played.

These men are not journalists. They are liars, profiteers, and manipulators. They do not defend democracy; they dismantle it for cash. And until billionaires are stripped of their stranglehold on media, fear will keep selling and democracy will keep shrinking.

Fear is not journalism. It is business. And business is booming.

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