Published: 03/31/2011
The mainstream media is more black and white than most of us think it is, a Washington State University professor said Tuesday. WSU English professor Susan Ross spoke to a crowd of about 100 students in Todd Hall 216 regarding Peace Journalism.
“What Peace Journalism suggests is that without upsetting our basic notion of what news is and how it’s supposed to function in society, we can re-configurate news to actually serve the public and serve the globe better,” Ross said.
Ross was critical of the current mainstream media and said how the news media packages the world has an effect on perceptions of self and others around the world.
She used examples from the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, India, Israel and Palestine and the contemporary problems surrounding those areas to illustrate how the news media plays a role in framing perceptions.
Ross said while pictures from media in Lybia show the people being affected by war, many of the photos from the U.S. show “firework shots” of huge explosions from a distance or missiles launching from a boat in the ocean. This type of framing is nothing new, Ross said. After doing this kind of research for a couple of decades, Ross said she and other journalists find repeatedly that news is not exactly what we think it is. “We see violence as kind of a natural state of the world," she said. "We see military intervention as a reasonable, logical and natural response.” However, Ross said there is not any one person to blame for this. “I was a reporter for years, this is not intentional, this is not bias, it’s just the way things work,” she said. Peace Journalism encompasses the idea of broadening sources of information, allowing citizens and government officials to comment and give their viewpoints on issues that matter to and affect them, she said. These multiple viewpoints help to eliminate the narrow perspective in media today.
Ross said credibility should not be defined by status or income level.
“The fact that I may make more money than you do today does not mean that I’m more truthful than you are,” Ross said. “In fact, it might mean quite the opposite.” Peace Journalism also moves away from the strong identification with the nation at the center of how news is understood and reported, she said.
“What we do when we think about nations is our interests become contained within the geographic boundaries of our nation state,” Ross said. “And then we see everyone else as a friend or a foe.” Ross said if the mainstream’s news audience was changed to that of the globe instead of a select few nations, it would bring significant changes to the way news is reported and presented. Two other facets of Peace Journalism include evaluating all costs of war – casualties, economic, environmental and infrastructural costs as well as consolidating multiple viewpoints to decide the truth, Ross said. While Peace Journalism is not necessarily popular and does not seem to be growing anywhere but Europe and in conflict regions, it can still make an impact. One example Ross presented was a collaboration project between CNN and the Indian Broadcast Network called "Citizen Journalist," whose tagline is "stand up, speak out, fight back." This program allows anyone in India the chance to call and provide their own stories or have reporters come out and report them if they need some filtering. “It’s great to get the average citizens into the news,” Ross said.
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