The Guardian came over all self-pitying and masochistic today.
On Comment is Free, Martin Bell believes that newspapers and TV networks are "retreating into a comfort zone of celebrity stories, consumer news, sport, health-scares and crime...the coverage is mawkish, exploitative and highly speculative."
In MediaGuardian, Nick Davies goes one better, suggesting that the media is involved in the "mass production of falsehood, distortion and propaganda." Journalists have become "passive processors of unchecked, second-hand material, much of it contrived by PR to serve some political or commercial interest," he says. "Not journalists, but churnalists."
While it is frustratingly true that much of a journalist's work nowadays involves wading through a sea of PR guff, most of the reporters I have met over the past year seem to be in it because they care about issues and want to tell the truth. If the Murdoch empire and increasingly media-savvy press departments block the way occassionally, then we'll just have to find another way around.
S
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