By Ranjona Banerji
I had the privilege of judging an inter-school debating competition last week. As ever, it is invigorating and enlightening to listen to the young sharpening their wits against each other, using knowledge and formulating arguments.
As they negotiated their rather tough topics, they touched upon women’s rights, menstruation, geopolitics, misinformation and social restrictions and obligations.
Invariably, the role of the media in all this, from spreading misinformation to forming opinions, enters the argument.
An additional bonus to listening to these debates is reading school magazines. Topics discussed included free speech and social media, how algorithms affect the mainstream media and can polarise society, the consequences of bias in the media and the effects of corporate ownership.
Young people are not unaware of what is going on in the media. We cannot pretend that we exist in some impregnable bubble where our weaknesses are not inherent.
There is a small video doing the rounds of a student questioning journalists or at least TV anchors about their lack of objectivity and the fact that important matters are not covered by the mainstream media which concentrates on spreading political division. The answer given to the student is tragically honest and despicable at the same time: that the control of money makes journalists helpless.
I know many members of the general public believe this, and I get informed constantly that journalists can’t help it because their owners need money and they need their salaries.
There is a certain naïve cynicism to this argument. And ignorance. As ignorant and naïve as those who rant and rave that journalists work for money.
Let’s be clear on Point 2: journalists get paid, columnists get paid and so on. That is how they make a living. No one works for free.
As for Point 1, greed is no excuse for bad journalism. Rather the threat of being stopped or silenced should make journalists braver. Speaking truth to power: we all know that is our primary responsibility. Whether we work in glamour or sport or business or politics.
This is not the first government which has threatened the media and it won’t be the last. Yes, the scale is frightening and unprecedented. And so are the abysmal levels of cowardice shown by both media owners and newsrooms. Journalists are not compelled to be cowards. Some of us choose to be cowards and worse. We choose to be bootlickers. If we seek rewards, it is outside the reparations we get for doing our jobs. Then, yes, we work for bribes.
Though, what we see in the Indian mainstream media today is even worse than cowardice and greed. It is open bigotry, clear commitment to destroying democracy, and unabashed worship of a particular political party or its members. The deification of a politician is not the job of the media. That the media chooses to do so raises a number of questions. To believe that money alone makes journalists irresponsible is as ignorant a thought as the belief that only reporters are journalists.
That out of the way, let us get back to today’s thinking and aware students. They understand the way the world is changing, with technology, with AI, with populist thought better than most arrogant journalists. They can see where they are being taken for a ride.
Maybe we can fool ourselves, endlessly.
Maybe not everyone is as stupid as us.
Ranjona Banerji is a senior journalist and commentator. She writes on MxMIndia on Tuesdays and Fridays. Her views here are personal.