Editorial: Journalists: Peddlers of lies?

Fifty-eight percent of the recent Pulse Asia survey respondents who acknowledged that fake news is a problem in the Philippines see social media influencers (bloggers and vloggers) as the top culprits in spreading false information.

The salutatorians in the Sept. 17-21 survey are journalists, with 40 percent of the 1,200 respondents believing they are also responsible for distributing lies to the public.

Journalists even beat national politicians and local politicians in the poll, with 37 percent and 30 percent of the respondents believing them fake news distributors. Leaders of civic or nongovernmental organizations (15 percent), businessmen (11 percent) and academics (four percent) occupy the last three spots in the list of fake news peddlers.

In the field of journalism, the Pulse Asia survey is a clear message that getting the public’s trust is part of a journalist’s job. University of the Philippines communications professor Danilo Arao is correct when he said in an interview with Inquirer.net that the Philippine media has “trust issues and credibility issues” because the public believes that it is serving as the elite’s mouthpiece.

Earning the public’s trust is not served on a silver platter. Journalists must work for it.

A journalist’s relationship with his public is never easy; it’s not always calm.

The disgruntled would always find ways to discredit an honest media person’s work. No matter how truthful a scathing report is, it will always be labeled as fake or a lie by the subject if the person has so much to lose.

Majority, if not all, of independent media organizations in the Philippines are privately owned, and these are not entirely independent newsrooms as some of these are owned by big businessmen and political families or families who are politically affiliated.

This is easy to say: Editorial independence is a must in every newsroom. But in the real world, some newsrooms have to deal with compromises for them to survive. These compromises could lead to biased reporting or muting certain stories that affect news company’s bosses—or the company’s bosses’ political family or its bosses’ well-connected friends.

In an ideal world, journalism is a form of activism–an activism for truth.

It needs scribes who are brave enough to expose lies, but objective at the same time as journalism is not a kangaroo court.

Truths and lies could make or break a community, even a whole nation.

A journalist’s piece of work has power. If it is honest enough, a shadowy government must tremble in fear. That is why authoritarian regimes employ their own media: So they can control the narrative, and maintain the status quo.

To strive for the truth is journalism’s continuing quest.

Going after the truth is not quixotic, and to continue working to earn the public’s trust is not quixotic either.