Is Truth A Casualty In Media’s New Paradigm

By Moin Qazi

02 January, 2016
Countercurrents.org

While the media has traditionally been seen as the most significant of external influencers, in a globally connected age, defining “media” has now become a daunting proposition. While editors remain powerful, you can no longer discount the potential impact of a solitary blogger or a research house that is operating on the other side of the world. For example, when an unfounded rumour seeps onto the Internet, it is often impossible to prevent it from diffusing unless large numbers of online supporters spontaneously mobilise to counter it on your behalf. Such public support can’t be turned on like a tap—it can only be earned through a gradual process of stakeholder engagement. It is only by building a workable rapport with each of your corporate or brand audiences that you can call upon their support or understanding when needed.

But as media becomes more pervasive, it also opens eyes to what is happening in the rest of the world. What is ironic is that although media causes a lot of angst by revealing what is on the other side of the curtain, or creating desires that seem frivolous, it could also be the tool that empowers the poor the most, and ultimately inverts the pyramid! Newspapers can manipulate news by trying to put up a positive or negative spin.

The vocal pitch and tonal language of the newsreader also impart meanings and nuances to the content. What is ironic is that although media causes a lot of angst by revealing what is on the other side of the curtain, or creating desires that seem frivolous, it is rarely a tool that empowers the poor and ultimately helps them in inverting the pyramid the pyramid!

Media owners have always been interested in following the audience to make journalism a viable business, for which they want news, political, economic or business that would bring in advertisement. The crux of the problems there is a conflict between those who run media and those who run journalism.

There are a number of ways that a journalist can hold people and organizations accountable for their actions without taking a position. To start with, journalists working on a story must be determined to stay objective, throughout the period of research and investigation. To avoid taking a position, both or multiple sides of the story must be presented. If people or organizations are involved in wrongdoings, then their view as well as the views of those facing the repercussions of their actions must be made clear. It is not up to the journalist to help shape the reader's perspective, especially, while reporting a story or doing a feature, therefore, one should avoid taking a stand. In cases, where transgressions have been obviously committed, reliable sources could help make those clear and garner readers support for those suffering from them. Even then, the alleged perpetrator must be allowed to present their points of view. Sometimes, simply pursuing a story, because personal interests could be at stake, amounts to taking a position. In journalism, like in law, facts can be presented to support or disprove an incident, an action or a decision. Being aware of this, can help journalists understand that facts have to be presented not as one would like them to be read to fit a notion or a brief, but as they have occurred.

As a journalist one must always tread the path of breaking news carefully. In an attempt to break news or create exclusive stories, many journalists leave objectivity, professional ethics and personal integrity behind. Exaggerating facts, presenting just one side of the argument or sensationalizing stories is bad journalism and one must steer clear of the factors that lead to confusion and misrepresentation.

Readers and viewers are now immediately taking comments from their peers, seeing additional points of view on the blogosphere, and even hearing directly from companies and sources that may be the subject of a story. No longer do reader letters take days or weeks to publish--and that was only after they'd been edited down to bite-sized, consumable blip--after a story's news cycle has already passed.

Courage, in those innocent days, had a simpler definition. Usually, it meant making sure you got the story others wouldn’t bother to reach and telexing it back somehow in the days of poor communication. Or exposing a wrong and moving on to the next story, a heady hit-and-run that required courage, intellect, but did not demand that the story be taken to its logical conclusion, with redress for the victims, punishment to the guilty.

From merely fighting an authoritarian state, the journalism of courage was now exposing and taking on its many limbs and instruments that were autocratic and unaccountable anyway. It was with this journalism that that combined with the higher judiciary to empower some of the poorest and weakest sections of our society to seek justice.

Journalism of courage is no longer hit-and-run guerrilla warfare. It’s a medium of empowerment by bringing to light information that either somebody in the establishment is trying to hide or something that others may not have had the integrity, intellect or courage to discover, print and then follow up until other institutions, from the media to the judiciary, join in and take the idea to its logical conclusion

You've got to be a bulldog in the journalism business; you mustn't let go of a story once you've sunk your teeth into it. You shouldn’t allow yourself to be bullied. And don't allow yourself to be bought. In the pursuit of truth and fairness, no price is too high to pay. One should make that extra call, take that extra trip, visit that additional source - then do it all over again until one is truly convinced that the story is as accurate, as fair and as thorough as humanly possible. CP Scott the founder editor of The Guardian, one of the world’s oldest and most respected newspapers laid down a cardinal rule of journalists the world over:”Comment is free but facts are sacred.”

Moin Qazi is a well known banker, author and Islamic researcher .He holds doctorates in Economics and English. He was Visiting Fellow at the University of Manchester. He has authored several books on religion, rural finance, culture and handicrafts. He is author of the bestselling book Village Diary of a Development Banker. He is also a recipient of UNESCO World Politics Essay Gold Medal and Rotary International’s Vocational Excellence Award. He is based in Nagpur and can be reached at [email protected]