World Press Freedom Day

Sanjana Hattotuwa-May 5, 2018, 6:51 pm 

What is it about World Press Freedom Day that makes those who have in the past been part of governments violently suppressing the rights of journalists tweet their vociferous support of a free media? Or those in power, responsible for blocking or banning websites arbitrarily, use a baseline of media freedom under authoritarianism as the yardstick to suggest things are much better now? On May 3, what makes us flag or recall the impunity around the murder, abduction, torture or exile of journalists, that for the rest of the year, we choose to ignore? What gives rise to the promises made on this day to never forget the sacrifices made by journalists who have been killed, when in fact, why those voices are no longer around goes unacknowledged even by colleagues? World Press Freedom Day reflects a great deal, but does it really respond to the challenges of what media freedom means in a post-truth world?

So much of what is written on May 3 every year looks back at how bad things were in a country or context. Little to no time is spent interrogating how media freedom is defined in a world where news, produced by journalists, is ranked by algorithms outside their control. And while the pushback against Silicon Valley’s global capture of social media networks came to a head this year, less now is talked about how these platforms are invaluable networks of resistance and dissent under authoritarianism. What is the ‘press’ really, for a demographic that has never bought, and will never buy, a newspaper? Sri Lanka is not at risk of losing its share of consumers who will pay to read the news anytime soon, but the model of writing for print continues unchanged even as the vectors of news and information have changed dramatically. What risks does this entail, and what potential is there for capture by news and media entrepreneurs?

These are hard questions. The output on this day is now more theatre and scripted, than any genuine introspect and interrogation. The situation is not getting any better. But perhaps we do not have the language to fully capture how broken the system is, here in Sri Lanka and elsewhere. The easy targets are an older generation of journalists, government, the patriarchy in the system, the resistance to innovation, the dependence on advertising, the lack of talent, job insecurity, the lack of independence, peer support and personal safety. But in projecting outwards and to usual suspects the many ills of media, the scrutiny is never on reader, citizen or consumer. The vociferous private complaints, the karmic resignation, the canapé fueled outrage, the heated discussion over family gatherings – these and other forms of pushback against the kind of media we have in Sri Lanka never really sets out to change anything. Complaining is never out of fashion. So instead of demanding better, more publicly, or setting up initiatives that demonstrate by doing how media can be more inclusive and incisive, it is easier to bemoan the state of affairs whilst continuing to consume precisely that which gives rise to the grief. There’s an element of hypocrisy in all this that comes to a head on May 3, as the world collectively cries out to secure everything good and great about journalism, without at the same time promoting or seeking to strengthen the means through which good journalism is actually brought to life.

It starts with us. When sexist tripe and outright gossip is published on the front page of a newspaper, readers must demand better. When a TV station vilifies an individual because of personal vendetta over and above the necessary oversight of and scrutiny around public affairs and policymaking, viewers must call out its bias. When DJs on air embrace a false accent and project the worst sort of giddy ignorance as fashionable, listeners must ask them to be replaced. When someone shares an article on Facebook visibly false, friends must call it out as such. After encountering a tweet that clearly aims to foment violence, followers or those who encounter it have the responsibility to flag, frame and report. The new, nay already well-established information and media ecosystem requires of us to be more than passive consumers. It requires of us to critically question and intelligently respond. Few do. Which makes World Press Freedom Day’s framing of problems as much a problem of a passive citizenry and consumer base, as it is about official censorship and repression or corporate bias. The story though is never around personal culpability, because blame is easier to project instead of inwardly reflect.

So instead of reading about what everyone says is what ails the media, on May 3 each year for the past couple of years, I watch Good Night, and Good Luck, a film nominated for six Oscars about American journalist Edward Murrow’s journalism at a time when the US was under the terribly violent influence of Senator McCarthy, in the 1950s. It’s a lovely movie, and not just for the acting. More recently, The Post brings to light the terrible parallels between media control under a former President and the incumbent in the US, and more broadly, the close connections those in power enjoy with those who own and publish mainstream media. These films resonate globally because the context, culture and challenges they frame, with the journalist as hero, is familiar to us. But it is in fact an outmoded and outdated model of journalism. Press freedom today, at its core, is inextricably pegged to the quality and nature of the investments we will make – that’s you and I – around conversations and content that interest us the most. If all we value is free access, we then have to countenance the fact that quality journalism which needs financial investment will suffer and die. If all we value is partisan information, then we have to acknowledge a world intolerant of difference diminishes everyone. If all we do is to wait for the media to miraculously change somehow, we must recognize the role we play in sustaining precisely what ails it, print to pixel, broadcast to blog. If all we do is to consume passively, then we must embrace the fact that content geared for the broadest possible appeal will invariably overwhelm investigative journalism of the sort we seem to only relish seeing in films.

World Press Freedom Day is anchored to journalism and journalists. It is time this day, and every day in between, goes beyond this and flags the inescapable fact that in order to truly address what is still so wrong with media as it stands, we cannot expect solutions from those who made the industry, culture and context the way it is. The thing about press freedom is that it is at the end of the day a reflection of who we are. Until we unchain ourselves, the press will never be free.