Journalism’s role in maintaining the truth & how media theories affect culture

For the entire existence of the free press, the role of journalists has been extremely important. This is because journalists are what many consider one of the barriers against government corruption and autocratisation, at least in theory. A journalists job is of course to keep the general public informed about current events, both locally and abroad, and why these are important to the reader. A journalist cannot simply be a loudspeaker for politicians or corporate interests and must always place the truth above all else.

While many journalists claim to be free, they are instead simply mouthpieces for a powerful interest group and claim to be free simply because they show themselves to be independent of a certain party, but then actually simply follow the wishes of a corporate backer whose politics fall in line with such a party. It is therefore paramount to remember that all journalists should in fact reject stories or articles that could confuse their readers on a certain subject. Even presenting falsehoods can sometimes be problematic as this could still affect some members of the audience, which could lead to the propagation of this false information.

Before covering the examples of where journalists succeed and fail at this, first, the different forms of manipulation that journalists use, as well as media theories, should be covered, to have a decent background of information when broaching the articles themselves. Information is, of course, the key aspect of an article. There are multiple ways of decreasing the amount of information that reaches the viewer. A great example of this is lying by omission (Icard, 2019). Lying by omission is a tactic that a large number of newspapers use to confuse their readership about a certain subject. This may be through the omission of small details, the leaving out of important context, or even the entire exclusion of a story that the newspaper deems “unimportant” or contrary to the organisation’s views. If a news organisation does this, they are just as dangerous as newspapers that spout misinformation and disinformation, as omitting important segments of a story is detrimental to the general public and allows for actions to pass unchallenged by civil society.

A good local example of this is the case regarding an ectopic pregnancy and the wish for the woman suffering from this to have an abortion. While the major news English sites such as the Times of Malta and Maltatoday did report on the story, (with the notable absence of the Malta Independent), the news site LovinMalta (LovinMalta, 2020) was the only news site in the country that even bothered to report about the protest that was held by protestors in front of the Parliament to give their support to the victim. This omission is very clearly an agenda, and given the high rates of opposition to abortion in Malta, the exclusion of this news story from the cycle is not unexpected, but not any less worrying. This is a direct example of an agenda influencing the newsrooms of the media organisations. Another example of this, but in foreign media, is the near total exclusion of reporting about a 250 million person strike that occurred in India. None of the major news sites (such as the BBC, NBC, CBS, Al Jazeera and CNN, amongst others) have reported on the magnitude of these protests, simply referring to the protests as involving “thousands” or “tens of thousands”. While this is of course better than the local example, which involved total omission, these stories, (BBC News, 2020) (BBC News, 2020) (CNN, 2020) involve omission of important facts and context, neglecting to mention the political nature of these protests and of the protestors, and the scale of strikers involved. It is crucial, therefore, as a journalist, not only to avoid writing in such a manner, but also to point out and criticise any attempt by fellow journalists to do this.

From this, it is important to divert to discussing media theories, as these form the basis of how the media itself is presented and can have different effects based simply on the audience model that is being followed. There are five main theories, these being the hypodermic needle model, the two-step flow model, the uses and gratification model, the reception theory mode and the obstinate audience theory model.

The oldest audience model is the hypodermic needle model (Magic Bullet or hypodermic needle of communication, 2020). This audience theory was developed in the 1927 book by Harold Lasswell, titled Propaganda Technique in the World War. The main models in this theory are the magic bullet and the hypodermic needle, terms used to describe the manner of propaganda “beamed” at an audience, and how the audience would believe this wholeheartedly and without any resistance to the information. An oft-mentioned example of this is the radio broadcast of Orson Welles’s story “The War of the Worlds” and the alleged panic this caused, yet this has now been entirely disproven by newer research and studies (Emery, 2016). This method quickly fell out of use shortly after the 1940s when it was disproven by Lazarsfield and other researchers in an election study done in the 1940 US Presidential election, which Roosevelt won (Lazarsfield, 1948). An extreme theory is the two-step flow method, a method developed in the 1940s which states that people form their opinions thanks to opinion leaders that are directly influenced by the media. It is intensely interesting that in the modern day, such a method has seen a resurgence, not in regular news media, but in the form of the social media site Twitter, which is essentially a vehicle built perfectly for the two-step flow method (Hilbert et al., 2017).

This method is arguably one of the most relevant methods in the modern media landscape, especially following the election of one-term US President Donald Trump. His use of Twitter showed a massive shift in the manner news on Twitter was conducted, with many journalists and political commentators starting to write news and information fully out in tweets instead of directing readers to articles (Independent, 2018). Of course, bigger news stories are still covered on news sites, but often, they are still talked about on Twitter in tweet form. Another important method to talk about in the modern world is the uses and gratification theory. This theory essentially states that the audience uses the media to gratify their wants and needs (hence the name) (Vinney, 2019).

It is again interesting to note that while the theory was developed in the 1940s, the modern internet has given a new medium in which the theory can be noted. This is YouTube. YouTube is similar to Twitter in that it is a perfect vehicle for this method to be highlighted (Hanson and Haridakis, 2008). Even though this study is now over 12 years old, these patterns are even more evident now, with even a cursory glance at the front page of YouTube, and the wide range of traditional media that has migrated to the site, as well as the countless numbers of political and social commenters on the medium. The main reason for this is in the method YouTube works. YouTube’s algorithm works, which not only recommends videos to the viewer but then essentially takes this and recommends more videos on that topic. Due to the way in which YouTube is designed however, this can lead to disastrous consequences, as can be noted in what has recently come about in a new report about the 2019 Christchurch shooting that resulted in the deaths of 51 people and the injury of 40 by a far-right terrorist (Mic, 2020).

It is, therefore, paramount that journalists adapt to the immense changes brought about by these specific theories and use them in a way that educates their audience about the dangers of being misinformed by bad faith actors, liars and people beholden to corporate interests. It is of vital importance that journalists do everything in their power to cultivate larger and larger audiences, as this not only helps in educating a large amount of people, but, as stated earlier, they can use the two-step method to have their own influence on what their audience thinks and can then use their audience size to influence people outside the audience group. This kind of action is most likely the most effective method to not only protect the free press, but also to protect the truth.

Bibliography:

BBC News. 2020. Indian Farmers Clash With Police Over Reforms. [online] Available at: <https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-asia-india-55099485> [Accessed 4 December 2020].

Buncombe, A., 2018. How Donald Trump's Use Of Twitter Has Changed The US Presidency. [online] The Independent. Available at: <https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/the-twitter-president-how-potus-changed-social-media-and-the-presidency-a8164161.html> [Accessed 5 December 2020].

Communication Theory. 2016. MAGIC BULLET OR HYPODERMIC NEEDLE THEORY OF COMMUNICATION. [online] Available at: <https://www.communicationtheory.org/magic-bullet-or-hypodermic-needle-theory-of-communication/> [Accessed 4 December 2020].

Dellinger, A., 2020. Youtube And Its Algorithm Radicalized The Christchurch Shooter, Investigators Find. [online] Mic. Available at: <https://www.mic.com/p/youtube-its-algorithm-radicalized-the-christchurch-shooter-investigators-find-48540761> [Accessed 4 December 2020].

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Hanson, G. and Haridakis, P., 2008. YouTube Users Watching and Sharing the News: A Uses and Gratifications Approach. JEP, [online] 11(3). Available at: <https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jep/3336451.0011.305?view=text;rgn=main> [Accessed 4 December 2020].

Hilbert, M., Vasquez, J., Halpern, D., Valenzuela, S. and Arriagada, E., 2017. One-step, two-step, network-step? Complementary perspectives on communication flows in Twittered citizen protests. UC Davis, [online] Available at: <https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0nn4p7mv> [Accessed 4 December 2020].

Hollingsworth, J., 2020. Thousands Of Farmers Swarm India's Capital To Protest Deregulation Rules. [online] CNN. Available at: <https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/01/asia/delhi-farmers-india-protests-intl-hnk/index.html> [Accessed 6 December 2020].

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Vassallo, S., 2020. Maltese Pro-Choice Activists Decry Tough Abortion Laws That Forced A Woman To Wait To End Her Unviable Pregnancy. [online] Lovin Malta. Available at: <https://lovinmalta.com/news/local/maltese-pro-choice-activists-decry-tough-abortion-laws-that-forced-a-woman-to-wait-to-end-her-unviable-pregnancy> [Accessed 1 December 2020].

Vinney, C., 2019. What Is Uses And Gratifications Theory? Definition And Examples. [online] ThoughtCo. Available at: <https://www.thoughtco.com/uses-and-gratifications-theory-4628333> [Accessed 4 December 2020].