THE JULY 11 naval base blast and its aftermath has been keeping journalists busy.
Newspapers and TV stations have been talking among other things of criminal negligence, the loss of heroes, the energy crisis, our dire finances, a government reshuffle and calls for President Demetris Christofias to resign, but to what effect?
“We have become parrots and transmission vehicles for the goals of others,” said the Chief Editor of Astra radio station, George Pavlides, during his morning show on Wednesday.
“In almost all mass media right now there is a lack of alternative views,” said Pavlides.
This for him shows a lack of pluralism and an unwillingness to say anything that might offend.
Take the 13 soldiers and fire fighters who died in the Mari blast.
Their loss was pointless and tragic: authorities knew that the 98 containers which exploded on July 11 were dangerous and the government ignored repeated international requests for assistance.
But daring to call them anything but heroes is unthinkable for the majority of journalists.
“Unfortunately, they were not heroes. They were victims,” Pavlides told the Mail repeating an opinion of his, which has angered and dissatisfied some quarters.
Pavlides was not trying to belittle the deaths or persuade people to change their minds.
He was making a distinction between the death of the innocent and the death of an individual who knowing what is to come still goes ahead with it.
“Why should I be afraid of saying this?” he asked.
Perhaps because Pavlides thinks that currently in mass media there are only two polarised ways of seeing things.
Right now there are two newspapers in Cyprus, Pavlides said.
On the one side there is Haravghi, which as AKEL’s mouthpiece and is supporting the government, and on the other side are all the rest, which have been completely transformed into the mouthpiece of a unified opposition.
“We have become identified with our bosses, political parties, call it whatever you want,” Pavlides told the Mail.
“You can’t have newspapers all expressing the same view,” Pavlides said.
Pavlides’ opinions are not going to make him popular – he is telling his own that they have a herd mentality “and are afraid of saying something different.”
For example: “even if Christofias were not President, the tragedy might still have taken place.”
That is not to say Christofias does not carry responsibility, Pavlides added.
But it seems that many are either blindly supporting Christofias or else blindly relaying the view that he should quit.
And this, for journalists who “shape common opinion,” is unethical.
“We have a duty to follow the code of practice,” Pavlides said, admitting that very few do.
The code says: “The Media, while they have the right make news analysis and to support concrete positions, should make a clear differentiation between fact and interpretation, comment or conjecture.”
That “we have completely conflated”, Pavlides said.
In addition to failing to clearly mark when a fact is put down rather than expressing an opinion, Pavlides added that we are cherry-picking our facts to serve specific purposes (of the journalists and the media).
“By the time the message gets to its recipient it receives so many changes, mostly subjective, that in some cases the fact itself is completely altered.”
Is this a recent problem and one limited to journalism at that?
“Of course not,” Pavlides said.
But journalists have “a great responsibility” acting as intermediaries between the public and the politicians and government. They have an ethical duty to present information objectively.
“It was a chance for us to become better,” Pavlides said adding that only in retrospect will some of us come to realise our mistakes.
“The problem is enduring and it has to do with our institutions and cultures.”
The crisis (this one and previous ones) have simply brought this to the surface, he added.
But “we haven’t consolidated democracy yet.”
So what can be done – how do you bring about change?
I linger on this point for a while and keep returning to it but Pavlides refused to give a sweeping generalised proposal to solve all of our problems.
For journalists at least, “the most important thing is to gain dignity.”
“Journalists should be able to self-regulate themselves,”he said.
“Give your reader a chance to choose.”
For Pavlides at least, his profession has let him down.
“The crisis will pass… spirits will settle. But the stigma on our TV screens and radio receivers will stay.”
