Purely –Business

The media in the Philippines seem to be business –oriented.
After reading the articles (Lords of the Press by Sheila S. Coronel, We Love Lucio by Luz Rimban, The Empire Strikes Back by Luz Rimban, and Media Conglomerates, Merger, Concentration of Ownership by Anup Shah) for my Media Ethics class, I realized that media nowadays are indeed business –oriented. Being business –oriented only means that every news that will come out from each of the television networks, newspaper publications, and radio stations on our country is already manipulated by the owners of these media stations. The owners of these stations always see to it that their own set of mediamen would not inflict harm to any of their other businesses or to anyone who seems to be friends or allies with them.
Citing the situation given in the article of Sheila S. Coronel entitled the Lords of the Press, she mentioned on the said article that during the reign of former RP President Joseph Estrada, there is an incident about the elementary schools’ textbooks scandal. A kin of the president was allegedly to have an involvement in the said scandal, and it was fiercely exposed on Philippine Daily Inquirer (PDI), a daily circulated broadsheet in the Philippines. With this deed by the PDI, the president was enraged and left him no seconds to give an outstanding financial dilemma to the broadsheet publication itself. What did he do? He just simply ordered a grand pullout of the advertisements by businessmen (who happened to side or friends with the former president) in PDI, plus the order of a tax audit in the said newspaper publication. This event strongly shows how the media was suppressed by the ‘business authority’. Of course, without advertisements, a daily newspaper will not be able to obtain financial stability, or it will not be able to obtain financial support. Without advertisements, also, would cause severe damage to the pockets of the publishers, and even more, can lead to a miserable downfall. This scenery happened exactly to PDI. They suffered exactly what the former president wished for. But the point here is that, the PDI newspaper did only what they believe is right and will be beneficial to their wide vast of readers. And this is what you call, “the truth shall prevail for all”. However, their advertisers didn’t see it. What they (the advertisers) have seen was the bond that ties between the former president Estrada and also the stability of their businesses. Businessmen only think of what they believe is beneficial to their businesses, therefore, the truth shall not prevail.
Frustratingly, this is contrary to what the journalists had studied for more than four years in college. The functions of Journalism are the following: first, to inform the public through the news coverage with utmost truth; second, to influence and mold public opinion; third, to amuse or to entertain the public; and lastly, to serve and promote public welfare as a whole. But with the kind of media being promulgated by the so –called gods of media as according to Coronel’s article Lords of the Press, not all those functions are being exercised. To conclude, the real purpose of journalism is not served. Just look at this another situation from the article We Love Lucio written by Luz Rimban. This article also supports the idea presented above about our media nowadays. The Lucio that Rimban is referring to is none other than the tobacco magnate and one of the richest personalities in the Philippines, Lucio Tan. He is said to be a secret shareholder in some newspaper publications, radio stations, and also in ABS CBN. How does it happen? Well, again, according to the article, these companies might have borrowed money from Lucio Tan and some of those whom he lent money were not able to repay their debts. With this, it is concluded that Lucio Tan might have asked something for return, this might be suppression of bad news and commentaries or a news blackout if there is a news outbreak on his companies, especially on PAL (Philippine Air Lines).
Another thing that strongly supports the idea of media being business –oriented is the television network company namely ABS CBN. According to the article entitled The Empire Strikes Back written by Luz Rimban, the ABS CBN re –engineered the concept of news and repackaged it to bring entertainment to their audiences. In fact, they even pioneered the concept of tabloid journalism in the Philippine media. What did they do? They shifted from serious news reporting into a way that most tabloid writers do. In short, it seems like they sensationalized their news in order to gain more audiences. Historically speaking, as according to the article of Rimban, ABS CBN went this way because during the Mari Mar (a Mexican drama) phenomenon (which is being aired before in RPN 9), the news ratings of ABS CBN stoop low, and their management especially the Lopez (who owns the ABS CBN) were very much alarmed about it. That time, only ABS CBN is the one who is very much concerned with the ratings, GMA 7 isn’t like that before. If we are going to study the ‘reasons’ very carefully, one thing only comes into our mind: ABS CBN cares not for the principle of Journalism may it be print or broadcast but only for the growth of their income.
That claim may be libelous for the part of ABS CBN and I may be sued for libel if they read this article, but this is true, right? They don’t have to change the identity of the news programs that they have if they weren’t caring for their money. Well, anyone cares for money, even the common people. But sacrificing the quality of news reporting is something that is to be considered. What is very dismal in this issue is that after ABS CBN went to this kind of change, other TV networks followed their footsteps, like GMA 7. And mostly, the people’s understanding about proper news reporting became shallow. What else they want now is something that can give them entertainment may it be a news program or not. Thanks to ABS CBN.
Really, the principles of Journalism are not being practiced anymore. When money starts to talk already, everything will have to undergo on a change, may it be for the better of the profession or for the worse of it. Remember, what is important for the publishers and TV network owners nowadays are just income and popularity.



References:

Lords of the Press by Sheila S. Coronel,
We Love Lucio by Luz Rimban,
The Empire Strikes Back by Luz Rimban,
Media Conglomerates, Merger, Concentration of Ownership by Anup Shah