Looking back over the decades, people didn’t have the privilege of mass media communication and journalism. They usually didn’t have much information regarding world news and status quos; they were aware of their immediate surroundings.
But, as the world progressed and advancement took place in almost all fields, people felt the need for media and the fourth estate, the journalism. Journalism is all about letting the world know about their current circumstances. Be it Arts, business, sports, education, politics, movie trailers, religion, books, research, medicine, and health, almost every other forte. Journalists are considered watchdogs of society.
They are on duty every second of the day because the world can go without any other thing but not the daily bulletin. This is how worthy journalism is.
But like all the other things have their pros and cons, journalism too falls into this category.
As far as our mass media communication benefits are concerned, one can never hear the end of it. Journalism isn’t just about reporting the headlines and dispatching articles. For people, it’s more than that. According to afteronline.com, journalists provide reliable content about various aspects of the news.
Their subject matter helps the common public grasp the real issues and how they can be catered to. As their contents aren’t redacted by the government officials, people can get real disclosure.
That’s the beauty of it. They are letting people know the truth behind all the fabricated statements. Without it, the world will be oblivious to all the malpractices and mishaps happening around the globe. It is hope for the despair and vision for the blind.
Through the press, we realize the needs of our society and how their necessities can be taken care of. How can this world push forward towards the benefit of a whole than the individual? Besides this, it also keeps us all entertained with other sectors of interest too. Such as sports.
Through this, athletes and their admirers can know about their latest sports, knowing about Olympics, cricket, football, tennis, etc. Articles related to investments and the business world help entrepreneurs and others to know about it, and they can all benefit from it. Hence, the media holds the power to change the opinions of this arena.
But, it is a two-edged sword. A sword that has the potency of bringing the good out of everyone, and also a sword that can stab us right in our backs too. Even though journalism is considered the voiceless voice, it also holds power to shut the voices of those who speak up.
Because this is the era we have been living in, where people are being instigated against each other, where democracy is being threatened, corruption and nepotism are ruling the offices of those who hold authority. If journalism can hold the wrong person accountable, it also holds the ability to frame an innocent for someone else’s transgression too.
Because of an almost daily paparazzi, renowned artists who wish to live a private life for once can’t get it. Because the media thinks it is their job to showcase their personal life in front of everyone, and one wrong move can turn their lives upside down.
They can have their careers ruined over false allegations, and gaining people’s trust from scratch becomes next to impossible. This is why every reporter and newsmaker needs to choose their words wisely. In addition to this, social media trolling over certain people can become depressing for someone.
Although they can be posted up for awareness, certain stories can also trigger bad aspects of someone’s past. As a media analyst, Thomas Baekdal wrote an article about how journalism unintentionally harmed society, and one can never really grasp it. In the opinion of Baekdal, certain important problems have been causing more desecration than others.
These include,
1- Revealing victims of harassment publicly
2- Media doxing
3- Being fooled into covering the wrong focus
4- Giving voice to people who already had one.
Even though we must know about extreme harassment incidents so that appropriate actions can be taken and responsible for it are held accountable. But, this doesn’t necessarily mean to reveal the victim in front of the world because this can destroy the mental wellbeing of many others who have gone through it too.
When media doxing is concerned, it is more likely linked with targeting the wrong person out because no one really knows who is responsible for the incident. For the sake of getting the brilliant stories and names, often wrong and innocent people are pinpointed in the witch hunt. And the other two aforementioned problems are quite very self-explanatory.
Journalism is a great platform for millions of others like us, to let people know how important it is to be informed about the global village they have been living in, to get out of ignorance this world has been dwelling in for the past many decades, not to get fooled by the one’s who are in dominance and to get to the brink of the issue.
This is what journalism should be used for. But, we’re far from it. We live in that point of the present, where we do nothing other than belittling people, where the press can go to any extent and do anything to get the story published, where the one in power can’t be held liable for their crime.
Our press and media need to do better because even if a few of them are fighting and advocating for the truth, the bigger picture will still be tainted.
