The "postmodern world" in Said's Introduction to Orientalism

One aspect of the electronic, postmodern world is that there has been a reinforcement of the stereotypes by which the Orient is viewed.  Television, the films, and all the media's resources have forced information into more and more standardized molds.  So far as the Orient is concerned, standardization and cultural stereotyping have intensified the hold of the nineteenth-century academic and imaginative demonology of "the mysterious Orient." (231)

In this passage, Edward Said outlines a critical "point of departure" or "problematic" (223-224) for his project: how the multimedia and informational possibilities of postmodernity have in fact 'reinforced' stereotypes rather than dispersed them.  In class Joe raised the idea of "cultural relativism," which some of you understood to be a symptom of postmodernity. According to Said, the Orient is not (merely) a place where relative values exist.  The "Orient is not an inert fact of nature.  It is not merely there"—rather, "the Orient is an idea that has a history and a tradition of thought, imagery, and vocabulary that have given it reality and presence in and for the West" (216).   

We could stress the 'relative' aspect of "cultural relativism" here and try to explain how cultures can only be grasped relative to one another and never in isolation, by themselves—but if this relative function were truly enhanced by 'postmodernism', then how is it that stereotypes can become intensified within the "postmodern world"?  Why wouldn't 'postmodern' forms of communication allow for a greater exposure to and expression of the intricacy of identities (which are as myriad and complex as the humans who embody them)?  How can a cultural condition that (allegedly) allows for great plurality result in "more and more standardized molds"?  This would seem to be a paradox.  

Said is interested in how "cultural domination" (232) can operate even in the midst of knowledge production: how when we think we are learning about other people and other places (and thereby increasing general acceptance) we can in fact be reaffirming modes of cultural domination.  Indeed, how we come to 'know' things reflects material investments in the world: this means thinking that we 'know' certain things about others has everything to do with how we position ourselves in relation to others, through power (which always has material consequences).  Said advocates what Raymond Williams calls "unlearning" the "inherent dominative mode" (232).  This suggests that when we actively, intelligently, and consciously eliminate categories such as "Orient" and "Occident" (or think 'terror' and 'freedom'), this can "stimulate a kind of dealing" with the world (232).  Said is calling for something like the opposite of apocalyptic thinking, because instead of a sudden 'revealing' of the truth about certain matters, we realize instead that the 'truth' of people and places is never clearly assimilable as such, not in any pure or spontaneous way.  Rather, we accept ourselves as an "inventory of traces" (230)—cultural, linguistic, historical, geographical—and it is only from this thoroughly enmeshed standpoint that we can begin the real (and really difficult) political work.