The campaign period will begin shortly, and I’m already eagerly wondering which newspaper will serve us advertisements as “news”… The experience we had during the LTB elections is what fueled this curiosity. You may remember that nearly half of the newspapers in our country made room in what we call the banner headline (the area above the newspapers’ own logos) for advertisements passed off to us as news. Things got so ridiculous that those newspapers published stories with the same color schemes, the same headlines, and the same pictures. We wouldn’t say anything if they were advertisements, but when they’re presented as news, that changes things. Because that area is one of the newspapers’ most important and eye-catching spaces… Readers see it as a place for important news, but instead they’re reading an advertisement for a political party; what you read as news is nothing but an advertisement…
I hope neither our political parties nor our media make this mistake again…
On the other hand…
There are, of course, certain reasons for this…
There is no doubt that the weakness of the media, which is responsible for holding power to account on behalf of the public, works in politicians’ favor. Consequently, politicians ensure that this situation continues by taking no steps to strengthen the media.
After all, no one other than the public benefits from any force that could carry out oversight on its behalf and be stronger even than the best opposition party. Given this situation, in our country, where the advertising market is small, the media have limited options for staying afloat. They are forced to become partisan outlets, or wait for elections…
Elections are valuable in this respect. But whatever the case, even if items presented as news in banner headlines have an impact at the time, over time they undermine the media’s credibility…
I hope that, despite these shortcomings, our media will fulfill its primary duty during this election period instead of simply trying to get through the day…
Regards…
Note: Once the official campaign period begins, I will once again announce in this column which newspapers and which political parties are engaging in this kind of news-advertising.