I have to admit it straight up: I hate television. Whenever I have had any personal involvement with an issue that then appears on the news, I inevitably end-up nearly pulling my hair out at the mis-representation of what is going on.

In war time, the risk of confusion, indeed deliberate manipulation, multiplies the problem that any TV news watcher faces. And in this context, it is interesting - or should I say worrying - to compare the views that are coming across on European and on US Television channels.

One story, many versions told

As I flick from CNN (US - but the International edition which is not shown inside the US) to BBC (UK), to ZDF (D) to RTBF (B), I see the same story represented in very different ways. The humanitarian crisis is shown on CNN with American soldiers handing out bottles of water from a hand-cart to smiling Iraqi youths. Only one second worth of film belies the "Norman Rockwell" image of benevolent America, when a youth - overly-keen to get his bottle - is gently pushed back by one of the soldiers.

The same story is on BBC. Except this time a second humanitarian effort is also shown: the "chaos" surrounding the arrival and distribution of aid by the Kuwaiti Red Crescent. The film cameras capture how the orderly unloading rapidly degenerates into a near riot, as boxes and cans are grabbed from the backs of the trucks. The reporter gingerly comments that the British soldiers nearby stay at a distance "unsure how the crowd may react to them".

The same images of the Kuwaiti trucks are on ZDF. Except there is more footage shown. Unlike the BBC, they do not stop the film rolling with pictures of the stocks being ripped from the back of the vehicle. They show how suddenly, and seemingly spontaneously, a large part of the crowd starts chanting the bizarre pro-Saddam cry. And RTBF goes one step further. It shows a second's worth of footage, not translated into French, where (with the picture of the same trucks in the background) a group of youths starts shouting in English at the camera - "You are going to lose. You go home!"

The Gulf widens

The vast majority of our citizens inform themselves from the television, usually from their national TV channels. As Americans (and to a lesser, but not inconsiderable extent Brits) receive the comforting images of their being welcomed in Iraq, (and are spared many of the more grusome pictures of Iraqi civlian casualties appearing on continentental European screens), then naturally their view of the war - a benevolent act to free a people from a mad dictator possessing weapons of mass destruction - will be reinforced. In the same but opposite way, the more the Europeans see images of Iraqi's furious at the "invader" combined with blood-covered women and children screaming as they are wheeled into and Iraqi hospital, the more they will start to see this as an unnecessary war. The gap between our peoples will then grow.

Lets talk

As an out and out trans-modernist, I tend to believe it is impossible to take an objective stance in any matter - we are all subjective, no matter how we dress it up. However, the crucial thing must be to expose as many people as possible to what the others are thinking. If Europeans and Americans remain blinded purely by what their TV screens show them, the future will be bleak. The time has come for a major people to people dialogue - and the only place for that can be the Internet.

If the US can spend another $40bn on the war, who out there is prepared to sponsor this trans-atlantic peace building?