Essay About News Media And International Events

Democracy and the News Media
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Democracy and the News Media
“Nothing could be more irrational than to give the people power and to withhold from
them information, without which power is abused. A people who mean to be their own
governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. A popular government
without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to
a farce or a tragedy, or perhaps both.” James Madison
Democracy can be an effective form of government only to the
extent that the public (that rules it in theory) is well-informed about
national and international events and can think independently and
critically about those events. If the vast majority of citizens do not
recognize bias in their nations news; if they cannot detect ideology,
slant, and spin, if they cannot recognize propaganda when exposed
to it, they cannot reasonably determine what media messages have
to be supplemented, counter-balanced, or thrown out entirely.
On the one hand, world-wide news sources are increasingly sophisticated
in media logic (the art of “persuading” and manipulating
large masses of people). This enables them to create an aura of
objectivity and “truthfulness” in the news stories they construct. On
the other hand, only a small minority of citizens are skilled in recognizing
bias and propaganda in the news disseminated in their country.
Only a relatively few are able to detect one-sided portrayals of
events or seek out alternative sources of information and opinion to
compare to those of their mainstream news media. At present, the
overwhelming majority of people in the world, untrained in critical
thinking, are at the mercy of the news media in their own country.
Their view of the world, which countries they identify as friends and
which as enemies, is determined largely by those media (and the traditional
beliefs and conventions of their society).
This slanted information is not a “plot” or a “conspiracy.” It is simply
a matter of educational background and economic reality.
Journalists and news editors are themselves members of a culture
(German, French, Mexican, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Indonesian,
Russian,