Political maturity

PUNCHLINE

Ike Seneres

As the saying goes, “art is the reflection of society”. But what if the actual reality is the other way around? What if our society now is now the reflection of our art? What if we could find clues to this reversal of roles in the way that our mass media is now reporting the news?

As it is supposed to be, responsible media outlets are not supposed to mix news with opinions. News are what actually happen, opinions do not happen that is why these should not be reported as news. That is how it is supposed to be, but that is not what is happening now.

As it is supposed to be, news belongs to the front pages, while opinions belong to the inside pages. In the broadcast media, news belongs to the newscasts, while opinions belong to the talk shows. As it is actually happening now, many newspapers are printing opinions in the front pages, interspersed with the news. In a similar manner, many broadcast outlets are mixing news and opinions in the same program, even during newscasts.

As it is supposed to be, the difference between broadsheets and tabloids was a function of content, and not really a function of size. Broadsheets carried straight news, while tabloids carried exaggerated news or yellow journalism, if you please. Nowadays however, some broadsheets are reporting tabloid style, while some tabloids are reporting broadsheets style. Is this another reversal of roles?

If a reporter or news anchor says that the President of the Philippines is not in the scene of an event, is that news? It may be factual to say that the President is not there, but is his absence really a “happening” that should be reported as news? As I remember it, CNN news anchor Anderson Cooper reported that there seems to be no one “in charge”, but he did not say that the President was not there.

As I see it, “who is there” is news, but “who is not there” is not news. To say that firemen are on the scene of a fire is news, but to say that the Fire Chief is not there is not news. For all we know, the Fire Chief may be at the Command Post directing the operation, and in that case, that could be reported as news. Assuming that the Fire Chief is not there in the scene of the fire, we could always be sure that one of his Lieutenants would be there taking charge, and that subordinate does not even have to take orders from him, because the chain of command is already in place.

As it actually happened in Tacloban, Secretary of Interior and Local Government Mar Roxas was already there, who is in effect the ultimate Fire Chief, since the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP) is under him. The Philippine National Police (PNP) is also under him, thus also making him the ultimate Police Chief. It seems however that that was not enough official presence for some reporters who were there, and they had to report that the President “was not there”.

What will happen if we would always want the President to behave like a “Fire Chief”, and thus always expecting him to be on the scene of a “fire”? What will happen to all of his other functions and duties that he has to do on the national level as the Chief Executive and as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces? Shall we expect him to set aside foreign affairs and national defense so that he could put out a “fire” somewhere in some local scene?

In all fairness to Secretary of Social Work and Development Dinky Soliman, she is doing a good job, but she is really exhausting herself by going from one local scene to another. Of course, she may be doing that because the mass media is always expecting her to “be there” and we could not fault her for that. Just like the President however, she has other official functions to do, such as making long term policy recommendations and managing medium term national social work development programs.

If we are to mature politically as a society, we have to go back to the norm of being an “objective” society, a society that could be “subjectively” reflected by art, so to speak. And mass media has to go back to reporting news as “objective” facts, and not as “subjective” opinions that are full of conjectures. To add to that, the mass media should balance the reporting of negative stories with positive stories that would tell the truth that not everything happening in this country is bad.

Just to give you an idea about how balanced reporting could happen, the mass media could report the actual socio-economic reforms that are already in place, instead of reporting only about corruption all the time. Of course, corruption should still be reported as news as it actually happens, but to balance that, successful reforms should also be reported as it also happens. It could be said that media reporting should always be hot to “sell the paper”, but that should not be done at the expense of dousing cold water on the heat of good reforms.

All told, it is unfair to say that the President is “not doing anything”, because the chain of command is always in operation. What that means is that the government is always presumed to be doing something by way of the Cabinet Secretaries who are functioning as his alter egos. It is bad enough that we are always expecting the President to function like a Municipal Mayor when in fact he is a Head of State. What is even worst is to expect him to function like a Fire Chief, when in fact he already has his deputies who are functioning in the field.

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