How I see it:
Freedom
of Press in media today is tied greatly in three ways, restrictions to the
internet, the obligation of society, and the perceived view upon controversy.
This can be shown in how the media purports issues today.
In the
“freedom of the internet” issue, today we face a growing idea of how things
should be limited. What is meant by this with the freedom of the internet is,
who should control it. The world governments are still trying to limit the way
that we use the internet, and whether or not the companies that provide us with
the service should have the final say in what is restricted and what is saved.
In March 2014, the EU passed a new cyber-security law, that in essence. Jennifer Baker states that “It will be up to
members of state how they write the directive into national law” (Baker, 2014).
This brings up the issue however, why should a single government be able to
control how we post our idea. Perhaps there should be some kind of intervention
against our use of free media, however, letting a company control how we use it
based on their business is highly debatable.
An
obligation to society that media today presents is through the “whistleblowers”
that are shown. Julian Assange, the founder of wiki leaks, showed just how
deceptive the world is by publishing many things that were considered “secrets”
of the United States government. More recently is Edward Snowden and the NSA
scandal. The National Security Agency spies on US citizens. That alone is scary
enough. What is worse was later on when Snowden testified that the US
government was spying on far more than its own people. Governments throughout
the world were working together to better “police” their country through
monitoring the actions and conversations of citizens through various online
means. This brings the need for journalist willing to talk about the issue, and
research what it is that is happening behind the scenes. “The role of the media
to scrutinize decisions made by government officials is a particular crucial
connection” (Hyklova, 2010) Hyklova’s statement in her thesis is directed
towards how it is that governments make decisions relating to war. Her paper
continues to talk about the role of media exposing the start of wars. Perhaps
today we should focus the same thing on governments, but instead of looking for
war, we should observe how it is we are being restricted. A pseudo war even,
the war against our free press. We must continue our demand of free speech,
press, emotion, and more importantly, to express it how we wish upon any
medium.
Controversy
is the adversary to our idea of free speech, however. In today’s society, being
able to instantly send messages across the world can create plethora of issues,
whether they are based upon the actual content of the messages, or reflection
of what is being discussed. One such example of controversy within the media is
with the case of Trayvon Martin. Trayvon
was a young black male staying with his father in Sanford Florida for a
vacation. Upon leaving a convenience store, he was fatally shot by George
Zimmerman, a man that was doing a “community watch” for his neighborhood. This
sparked a nationwide controversy. Media’s reports of the issue varied. This
issue quickly sparked into a world-wide story. What was purported was different
within every station, depending entirely on what agenda the news station wished
to push. This idea is best stated by with Graeff’s statement “The
vicious/virtuous cycle creates opportunities for power shifts around agenda setting”
(Graeff, 2014). This horrible tragedy sparked an outcry for change, and with
it, we as a society were able to better understand the problems and issues in
even today’s world. Change must happen, and through a series of extreme media
reports, awareness to the issue came forward. This is the biggest concern for
positive change. Awareness of the problem, and the ability to have a group that
is on the same page.
Without
free press and media, we lose the chance to connect our problems within
society. The price of free speech is high and constantly changing. We must
unite together to truly have a chance to keep our ideas spoken, otherwise we
risk the chance of being forced quiet.
Bibliography:
Hyklova, M. (2010, January
1). The Image of War: The Changing Role of the Media. Retrieved January 8,
2015, from is.muni.cz/th/224955/ff_m/Thesis.doc
Baker, J. (2014, March
13). PCWorld - News, tips and reviews from the experts on PCs, Windows, and
more. Retrieved January 8, 2015.