The media bruhaha*

Things are a bit cloudy, what with "the media" being the ones informing us about the "attack on the media" and how we are reverting to nationalist regime censorship, on the way to becoming Zimbabwe, on the way to totalitarian rule, on the path to shameless corruption and cronyism and what not...

Up till yesterday, all I could find was journalists and editors and media experts and so on telling us that the end is nigh. It has been a bit tough to find some diversity of opinion** in the media. What with the media having a massive vested interest in this subject.

But anyway, yesterday and today I found a few great articles providing some alternative view points on this topic. Here they are! I'll add more if I find more.

• Burning Paper: Does the ANC have a point about the media?
  
• Blogging with Bayanda: “…we ask for no favours from the media and we expect none”
• SA Good News: Freedom of Expression and Freedom of the Media - are they the same thing?
• 6000: If you want media freedom
• Afro-I-Can: Protection of Information Bill and the Media Tribunal; much ado about everything

* I have no idea how to spell bruhaha, I poached it from elsewhere!
** Diversity of opinion... haven't I heard that somewhere before? Oh, wait, it was here: Media Diversity and Ownership ;)

Attack on media freedom!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, seriously, lets take a few deep breaths here. Lets think on the words of Tokyo Sexwale:

A perception has slowly emerged within our society that there is some war between the government -- or perhaps the ruling party -- and the media in general."

Such perceptions tended to become reality if not countered, explained or dealt with, the minister said.

"I want to state without equivocation that from where I sit and stand, from where I come from, such a fight should not have a basis.

from here.

What he is NOT saying here is: "There is a war on the media by the ANC!!! And I am taking a brave stand against the ANC, supporting media freedom!"
What he is saying here is: "People think the ANC is waging some kind of war on media freedom. Thats just not true. I am in the ANC leadership, I speak with authority. I, and the ANC, support media freedom."

Really, we are getting a bit hysterical about a problem that doesn't exist.

I do not think that we should be apathetic about media freedom. Where media freedom is threatened we should stand up for media freedom. The protection of information bill, for example, really does sound like a disaster. It sounds like it can easily be used to hide corruption or other problems in government and it can be used to jail journalists for reasonable investigations. That should not be the case, we must stand up to the bill.

And the media tribunal, my opinion is that it is probably too heavy handed. And also too open to abuse.

But having said that, there are big problems with our print media. The ANC's grievances are real. Even if I don't agree with their methods of trying to fix the problem.

As Sexwale says, there is a perception that there is some war between the ANC and the media. Which just isn't true.
And actually, the fact that the media are plugging this idea that this war is real is pretty telling of the problems with our media.