Reforming media
Reforming media
Posted 11:56pm (Mla time) Feb 05, 2005
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the February 6, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
OVER A HUNDRED journalists gathered in Tagaytay this weekend to discuss, yet again, the problems vexing the Philippine media. Should the public even care?
We all should, because as the "media summit" made clear all over again, journalists do not only mirror reality; they sometimes shape it.
To be sure, a recurring theme that echoed throughout the two days of the conference emphasized the opposite: Reality, it was said over and over again, is the main force that shapes both journalists and the journalism they practice. In particular, commercial reality, or the pursuit of ever higher ratings, was said to drive much of the thinking behind today's television programming.
As a network owner admitted, with conspicuous understatement, media organizations don't live in an ideal world. He meant that the profit imperative was an unavoidable part of the programming mix. He needn't have been so apologetic. In this day and age, a healthy bottom line may yet be the best guarantee of a free press, of editorial independence.
The necessary question, of course, is: What have media organizations done with their independence? The answers, even from those organizations who say that the news and public affairs department is the flagship of their fleet, are not uniformly satisfactory.
A quick and by-no-means-complete roundup of answers: A tsunami of entertainment programs racing to overtake the news flagship. Blood and gore stories swamping newspaper pages. Trivia swollen to ridiculous proportions. Politics mistaken for show business. Incidents of sound bite journalism on the rise. And so on and so forth.
Are these trends merely the reflection of reality? To a certain extent, yes. The coverage, for instance, of two immature government officials exchanging, and then retracting, heated words in public may strike some as trivial, but triviality and immaturity in high government office are in fact legitimate stories. It is in the public's interest to know.
But taken together, the trends go beyond mere mirroring. The very choice of stories, the decision to give one story larger play than another, the under-emphasis of other issues: All these are (and to borrow the evocative language of basketball) judgment calls. The sooner the media and the public come to terms with this truth, the better the chances that media organizations will in fact serve the public interest.
One development the conference gave voice to bodes well for the future of an engaged and financially viable media committed to serious journalism: the growing support for the idea of the media as a beat in itself.
Media organizations have become centers of both local and national power. Not only do more and more people see them as a substitute for government, especially in social welfare and in administration of justice issues. Media organizations also and all too often affect the climate of governance.
It is only right that the media be held accountable for the power it wields. One way to do that is to encourage coverage of media institutions and media issues-in other words, to treat media as a beat. The practice in other countries shows the way: reporters assigned to cover media, analysts and columnists dedicated to the critique of media.
To the public's benefit, government and big business drink the media's own tonic of close scrutiny and enlightened skepticism; the time has come for the media to drink from the same cup.
Posted 11:56pm (Mla time) Feb 05, 2005
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the February 6, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
OVER A HUNDRED journalists gathered in Tagaytay this weekend to discuss, yet again, the problems vexing the Philippine media. Should the public even care?
We all should, because as the "media summit" made clear all over again, journalists do not only mirror reality; they sometimes shape it.
To be sure, a recurring theme that echoed throughout the two days of the conference emphasized the opposite: Reality, it was said over and over again, is the main force that shapes both journalists and the journalism they practice. In particular, commercial reality, or the pursuit of ever higher ratings, was said to drive much of the thinking behind today's television programming.
As a network owner admitted, with conspicuous understatement, media organizations don't live in an ideal world. He meant that the profit imperative was an unavoidable part of the programming mix. He needn't have been so apologetic. In this day and age, a healthy bottom line may yet be the best guarantee of a free press, of editorial independence.
The necessary question, of course, is: What have media organizations done with their independence? The answers, even from those organizations who say that the news and public affairs department is the flagship of their fleet, are not uniformly satisfactory.
A quick and by-no-means-complete roundup of answers: A tsunami of entertainment programs racing to overtake the news flagship. Blood and gore stories swamping newspaper pages. Trivia swollen to ridiculous proportions. Politics mistaken for show business. Incidents of sound bite journalism on the rise. And so on and so forth.
Are these trends merely the reflection of reality? To a certain extent, yes. The coverage, for instance, of two immature government officials exchanging, and then retracting, heated words in public may strike some as trivial, but triviality and immaturity in high government office are in fact legitimate stories. It is in the public's interest to know.
But taken together, the trends go beyond mere mirroring. The very choice of stories, the decision to give one story larger play than another, the under-emphasis of other issues: All these are (and to borrow the evocative language of basketball) judgment calls. The sooner the media and the public come to terms with this truth, the better the chances that media organizations will in fact serve the public interest.
One development the conference gave voice to bodes well for the future of an engaged and financially viable media committed to serious journalism: the growing support for the idea of the media as a beat in itself.
Media organizations have become centers of both local and national power. Not only do more and more people see them as a substitute for government, especially in social welfare and in administration of justice issues. Media organizations also and all too often affect the climate of governance.
It is only right that the media be held accountable for the power it wields. One way to do that is to encourage coverage of media institutions and media issues-in other words, to treat media as a beat. The practice in other countries shows the way: reporters assigned to cover media, analysts and columnists dedicated to the critique of media.
To the public's benefit, government and big business drink the media's own tonic of close scrutiny and enlightened skepticism; the time has come for the media to drink from the same cup.
posted by Dante at 12:00 AM
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