A Negative Aspect of the Media

     Generally speaking, the mass media are nervous about their audience rating and circulation.
They have a tendency to give commercially useful information without considering its social influence.
Also, they intend to give extreme and inflammatory information so that they can achieve a high
audience rating and sell a lot of newspapers and magazines. In the same way, both audience and
readers are fond of such stimulating information. Those who cause trouble find a chance to presume
 on their weakness. In other words, criminals may want to make themselves famous and heroic through
this negative aspect of the media.
     For example, Shoko Asahara, the founder of Aum Shinri Kyo (a Japanese cult), became better
known than some members of the then Cabinet. Leading members of the religious order were also
heroes of the times through the media, although all of them were foolish, dangerous and mere
murderers. Unfortunately, the mass media passed them off as heroes. Similarly, Osama bin Laden
 has become as famous as President Bush or more famous than him by a suspicion that he plotted
the World Trade Center attacks. Another similar incident occurred on January 5, 2002; a 15-year-old
 student pilot crashed into a skyscraper in Florida. According to the media he possessed a letter
implying that he had respected Osama bin Laden. Unexpectedly, Charles Bishop, the name of the
 offender, has become widely known even in Far East Japan. These examples show that cunning,
wicked persons make use of the media and pass themselves off as heroes.
     The media should work out countermeasures in order not to be made use of by evil people.
They should extremely be careful in their bad influence. In particular, this negative aspect should
be considered; that is, the media should be careful in a risk that they may make an offender a hero.
 A proposal for preventing the risk can be offered here; the media should select news according to
three standards. They are whether the information is really necessary to people, whether it is
possible for offenders to have made use of the media for the purpose of making themselves heroes,
and whether it is possible for the report to confuse society. To take an instance, the name of a high
school student, who stole a small plane and crashed it into s skyscraper in Florida, should have been
withheld from the public because his incident was not as important as the media had to announce it.
 His name was not useful at all in reporting that incident. Making his name public just made him known
 all over the world. Although it simply does not matter whether or not the media announce an
offender�fs name, they should try to reduce their negative aspect as much as possible by questioning
 whether these three standards are giving full play to their ability.

Copyright (c) 2002 by Edmond N. Beard