Media S Role In Democracy
Misbah Shoaib
What is the role of media in a democracy?
Media plays a crucial role in shaping a healthy democracy. It is the backbone of a democracy. Media makes us aware of various social, political and economical activities happening around the world. It is like a mirror, which shows us or strives to show us the bare truth and harsh realities of life. But that is only the case if money isn’t involved.
Media plays a huge role in forming and giving characters and specific traits to a country’s politicians. Hence I feel that it has a great role in a democracy as well. The elections are particularly based on what the media chooses to show the people. If the media decides to be bias and only show the good side of one particular political party whereas the bad side of the other political party, then it is quite clear the audience will vote for the ‘better’ political party. And therefore essentially during election time it all comes down to how censored the media is and how much propaganda has been going on.
However if a country’s news channels and newspapers are highly censored then media isn’t to blame. But if a country’s media is completely free to broadcast any news it wishes to then media is greatly to be blamed or appreciated. Since media has complete independence then naturally it should opt to show the true sides of politicians so the common citizens know whom they should vote for and be well aware of the true personalities of these officials. But that is not always the case. The media’s argument here would be that it gives the audience what sells. And that may partially be right but often it is when money is involved news reports are adjusted. That is when media plays an important role in democracy where it is meant to do the right thing and report the news as it is but sadly that is where it fails, and it fails quite too often. Nonetheless complaining about it won’t change the fact that journalists do what they do to earn money, this is their way of
What is the role of media in a democracy?
Media plays a crucial role in shaping a healthy democracy. It is the backbone of a democracy. Media makes us aware of various social, political and economical activities happening around the world. It is like a mirror, which shows us or strives to show us the bare truth and harsh realities of life. But that is only the case if money isn’t involved.
Media plays a huge role in forming and giving characters and specific traits to a country’s politicians. Hence I feel that it has a great role in a democracy as well. The elections are particularly based on what the media chooses to show the people. If the media decides to be bias and only show the good side of one particular political party whereas the bad side of the other political party, then it is quite clear the audience will vote for the ‘better’ political party. And therefore essentially during election time it all comes down to how censored the media is and how much propaganda has been going on.
However if a country’s news channels and newspapers are highly censored then media isn’t to blame. But if a country’s media is completely free to broadcast any news it wishes to then media is greatly to be blamed or appreciated. Since media has complete independence then naturally it should opt to show the true sides of politicians so the common citizens know whom they should vote for and be well aware of the true personalities of these officials. But that is not always the case. The media’s argument here would be that it gives the audience what sells. And that may partially be right but often it is when money is involved news reports are adjusted. That is when media plays an important role in democracy where it is meant to do the right thing and report the news as it is but sadly that is where it fails, and it fails quite too often. Nonetheless complaining about it won’t change the fact that journalists do what they do to earn money, this is their way of