Reality not enough for 'better U.S. journalism'<\/p>\n
Santi W.E. Soekanto, Journalist, Jakarta<\/p>\n
A group of American broadcast journalists descended on
\nSurakarta, Central Java last April to interview Abu Bakar
\nBaasyir, the man accused as an "Indonesian terrorist". They
\nwanted to see the madrasah (Islamic school) that they believed
\nwas the launching pad for Baasyir's militant Islamic teaching.<\/p>\n
Among the first shots of the school they filmed was,
\npredictably, the graffiti on a bamboo curtain outside Bassyir's
\ndwelling that read: "Islam is our faith, Jihad is our way".<\/p>\n
Despite Baasyir's insistence that his madrasah teaches only
\nthe Koran and aqidah (core beliefs of Islam), the journalist's
\ncommentary depicted the school as a breeding ground for
\nIndonesian Muslim militants. "This school is called Al Mukminun,
\nthe Believers, but here students ... are taught to believe that
\nthe only future for Indonesia is in an Islamic state," he told
\nthe camera.<\/p>\n
These journalists flew in and out of Indonesia within three
\ndays, arriving with preconceived ideas of "Indonesian terrorists"
\nand leaving with the same prejudices.<\/p>\n
A few years earlier, when Soeharto announced his resignation,
\nanother American team of journalists came belatedly to the
\nPeople's Consultative Assembly compound. After midnight thousands
\nof students decided to remain in the compound they had been
\noccupying for days because they wanted to press for Soeharto's
\ntrial.<\/p>\n
Dozens of trucks carrying Marines tried to force their way
\ninto the compound to flush out the students. Like the world
\nfamous photo of a Chinese man standing before a tank shortly
\nbefore the Tiananmen Massacre, a handful of students lay down in
\nfront of the first truck before it could advance into the
\ncompound. A good photo scene -- but eventually, it was the
\nMarines' negotiators that convinced the students to leave the
\nlegislature building.<\/p>\n
The TV reporter from the American crew breathlessly told the
\ncamera outside how disillusioned the students were because even
\nafter forcing Soeharto out, violence was still being used against
\nthem. A local journalist told her, "There's no violence inside
\nthe compound at this moment, the negotiations are peaceful."<\/p>\n
The reporter tossed her hair, and continued with her
\ncommentary. True, the Indonesian Military up until that
\nhistorical moment of May 21 had not given the public much reason
\nto believe that it would not suddenly swing its way toward
\nSoeharto and crush the student-led reform movement. What the
\nreporter did, however, was force her prejudice into her reports.<\/p>\n
Granted, these two separate incidents might be way too
\ninsignificant to ever portray the quality of the American media
\naccurately or even proportionately. But Ati Nurbaiti's article on
\nU.S. journalists' pegging of Sept. 11 (The Jakarta Post, June 24)
\nas the "turning point" for the U.S. media to develop into
\n"serious" and better journalism is open to discussion.<\/p>\n
U.S. senior journalists have reportedly lamented the
\n"shrinking diversity" of views of the U.S. media, a trend
\nattributable to the concentration of media ownership by tightly
\nknit families or financial groups. This meant media coverage on
\nalmost any issue is dominated by the few media giants such as
\nABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, Time, Newsweek, US News & World Report, The
\nNew York Times and The Washington Post.<\/p>\n
But "better" journalism in a country whose Attorney General
\nrecently killed its "freedom to information" and where owners
\ncontrol pretty much what the media report?<\/p>\n
Recent policies that in effect police the flow of information
\ninclude, according to international press freedom watchdog
\nReporters without Borders (RSF), those regarding Internet
\nprivacy.<\/p>\n
Under the Patriot Act passed in October, the Federal Bureau of
\nInvestigation has been authorized to install its "Carnivore"
\nprogram on several service providers to track the e-mails of
\nsuspects possibly linked to Sept. 11. "...the confidentiality of
\njournalists' sources is threatened by this blank check given to
\nthe FBI," RSF wrote.<\/p>\n
RSF urged leaders in France, Germany and Italy to remind Bush
\nof media freedom. Bush "must ensure that respect for human rights
\nis once more at the heart of U.S. foreign policy," RSF concluded.<\/p>\n
The U.S. media has been said to largely ignore the changes
\naffecting press freedom; and it indeed seems prone to tune out
\n"non-events". One incident was when U.S. Representative Dick
\nArmey of Texas on May 3 in a MSNBC program called for the ethnic
\ncleansing of the Muslim and Christian Palestinian population.<\/p>\n
Yet, no American media organization picked it up. Not one
\neditorial was written criticizing the leader of the House of
\nRepresentatives of the U.S. Congress for advocating, on the
\nrecord, unapologetically, the perpetration of a war crime.
\n"Editors were simply not aware of Armey's statements -- it is a
\nnon-event ..," the Council on American-Islamic Relations stated.<\/p>\n
Last April, the American Free Press found a media gag when Ira
\nHansen, a talk show host at KKOH 780 Radio in Reno, Nevada,
\nlearned that he was fired because he had been criticizing U.S.
\npolicy toward Israel. Hansen, a devout Christian and a "pro-
\nAmerica" American, charged that powerful pro-Israel supporters
\nhad forced the owners of his radio station to fire him.<\/p>\n
Hansen said his boss had previously tried to stop him talking
\nabout the Middle East. However, "after Sept. 11, I just couldn't
\nstop ... I got on air and said, 'The reason these Muslims are mad
\nat America is ... the absolute blind allegiance of the U.S. to
\nIsrael and how we give Israel carte blanche treatment'".<\/p>\n
Hansen said he had been monitoring the U.S. media since Sept.
\n11, and was amazed at the "virtual blackout" of any discussion of
\nIsrael's role in the Middle East.<\/p>\n
Last June 19, the media wrote how the Ohio State University's
\ncommencement, with President Bush as speaker, had become a
\nrallying cry for free-speech protection.<\/p>\n
A university official had threatened to arrest anyone who
\ndisrupted the commencement. Student activists then asked whether
\nthey had the right to boo their own president.<\/p>\n
Again, these incidents might have been too disparate for us to
\nconclude that there's no such thing as press freedom and freedom
\nof speech in the U.S. There are cases to support the impression
\nthat some of the journalists are finding themselves being burned
\nfrom both ends.<\/p>\n
Last May an intense pressure campaign by several pro-Israel
\ngroups reportedly sought to influence U.S. coverage of the Middle
\nEast, including boycotts of several top media outlets and massive
\nphone, e-mail and letter-writing campaigns. These are on top of
\nsubscription boycotts against the New York Times, Los Angeles
\nTimes, San Francisco Chronicle and the Chicago Tribune.<\/p>\n
The pressure was unprecendented, says Jeffrey Dvorkin, the
\nombudsman for the Washington DC-based National Public Radio, a
\nU.S.-wide radio network. "In the last three months I've received
\n14,000 e-mails and 9,000 of them deal with the Middle East," he
\nsaid, as quoted by Islam Online. "E-mail traffic in the last
\nmonth has overwhelmingly been accused of having a pro-Palestinian
\nbias."<\/p>\n
"It's a little bit like 'you're with us or against us'," said
\nJames Naughton, president of the Florida-based Poynter Institute
\nfor Media Studies. "... the more insightful and human the stories
\nwere, if they portrayed Arabs positively or Israelis negatively,
\nthen there was hell to pay," Naughton said.<\/p>\n
Claims of better journalism are simply not enough to describe
\nthe state of the media in the U.S. or Indonesia.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/reality-not-enough-for-better-us-journalism-1447893297",
"image": ""
},
"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
}