Media Figures; Opinion Dictators
By Muskan Hina • Oct 19th, 2009 • Category: Politics • 6 CommentsWhatever the presidential spokesperson may say, what is said by the anchorpersons or the columnists elite gets listened, memorized, quoted, recalled and even followed by the masses. Masses see the talk shows, because that is readily available and the more spicey the talk show is, the more it remains in the memory. Masses don’t have access to the press releases of the president or prime minister house.
These days, the power of media in Pakistan has become the most supreme, that even the establishment is helpless to control or even direct it. Even the army establishment cannot stop media from covering the terror attacks on their installations. Media does what it wants and how it wants. They are not news breakers, they are opinion makers, and they are infact the opinion dictators.
The people now no more expect or hope from the politicians and they look towards the media figures like Hamid Mir, Talat Hussain, Kashif Abbasi, Javed Chaudhry, and some of others behind the pen and the mike for the leadership. This niche anchorpersons and the columnists have emerged as a fomidable force, and even the media owners are on the back foot. These media owners have to provide them the institutional prestige and unlimited salaries studded with perks and priviliges. The anchorperson who originally hailed from remote villages having not enough money to eat some years ago, now spend their summers in France and Italy, and their families reside in Dubai and London.
These are new kinds of power corridors with their own intricate politics, pains and gains. But these figures are lucky, very lucky. They don’t have any responsibility, and so they cannot disappoint.
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@Muskan.. Very rightly said.
Freedom always comes with responsibiliyt; our media got the “freedom” but they still need to learn what responsibility it comes with.
“Freedom of expression should never forsake the unwritten law of responsibility”
Media is finding its way on its own basis.
I am really surprise by the people who criticize our media.
Just tune and watch star news, Fox news, sky and other except govt controlled centers.
I really found no significant difference of display of media coverage between them and our channels.
This is our media which is showing the real picture on tense areas otherwise PTV and ISPR are still stick to their false policies of telling lies to people.They are still living in 1971 eras.
Freedom of expression is it self a path of taking responsibilities in front of public by these local media men.
Like in today’s article of Ansar abbassi he revealed the tax amounts of rischest politicians of Pakistan including zardari and shairf.Now his name is its self responsible of delivering that news.
Without the power of freedom of speech how can one dare to show it with its real name.
Media men are part of our system, living and facing the hardship of worst management like us ,If somehow they do wrong , then comes the job and responsibility of educated concerned citizens to guide them and come forward to share their responsibilities.
This is the way a leaderless nation finds its way out of darkness and we are trying to follow this path.
@Nazia..
I think you can justify our media’s so called “responsibility” by mentioning individual incidents but then it can be justified otherwise by some other individual incidents.
Its a common practice worldwide that violence, brutality, sadism, bloodshed and cruelty on TV screens is not shown without a warning as it impacts human emotions. It can create mental distress. Voilence on TV can make people gradually adopt what they are watching and become violent themselves. It also makes young children cultured to violence. Responsible media channels avoid showing disturbing video clips, pictures that they believe might disturb the viewers; young kids can be wrongly influenced from this as well. You quoted examples of Fox, Sky and Star news but even these channel do follow a code of conduct similar to aforementioned - if not the same.
Many people would argue that this is what happening around us and what media is showing is the truth. I don’t disagree with this but I also believe people do not want to see blood and deaths on their TV screens; they don’t expect flowers with news but wouldn’t mind if violence in the news in toned down without compromising news value. Media can use its creativity to present truth to its viewer without being too blunt.
I don’t mean to question our media’s intention to bringing truth to people and appreciate times when they showed responsibility, however, I believe our media can be more responsible in reporting news. I believe it can ensure that news are neither underreported to a level where it makes people quiet nor it’s sensationalize to such a degree that it doesn’t let people think and to make their intelligent choice.
No one is against the freedom of media but many are concerned about it being responsible.
@3
Media is reflection of events of a society so if we have 5 terrorism incidents in our city per dayso how you expect from them to go on other side and show us happy moments of ruling elite.
Media coverage is related to circumstantial episodes of surrounding.
We are in state of war for last 5 years and terrorism victims are common man.Hardly few VIPs have become victim of this wave otherwise harassment is mostly done on streets of Pakistan.
I think you have never seen the live coverage of tel aviv TV and Aljazeera which mostly cover such kind of sensitized incidents as this area is also affected by same kind of incidental events.
We people have already become desensitized due to our indulgence in war on terror and repetitive events occurred around us.
Responsibility comes with time and maturity and will surely come after doing some mistakes.When you do something there is always a margin of error in it.
Error free criticism is the only job of unpractical person .
@4
#3 still answers #4 - if you understand what i meant, but lets say we agree to disagree.
sounds so delicious!:D