By Van Meguerditchian
BEIRUT: When Turkish businessman
Aydin Tufan traveled to Beirut Wednesday, he must have had no idea his face
would be on national television hours later. Local television channels LBCI and
Al-Jadeed interviewed Tufan under duress in an apartment in the Beirut
neighborhood of Roueiss hours after masked gunmen snatched him shortly after his
arrival in the country.
Tufan is the lone Turk among a group
of Syrians kidnapped Wednesday and is currently being held by the Meqdad family
in a move the family describes as retaliation for the kidnapping of a relative
in Syria earlier this week.
During a news conference at the
Meqdad residence in Roueiss, Tufan’s passport was passed around the journalists
present and displayed live on LBCI and Al-Jadeed.
Given the opportunity, journalists
raced to interview Tufan in the room where he is held captive against his will
and under the threat of arms.
The first footage of the Meqdads’
kidnap victims was aired by the newly opened Al-Mayadeen satellite channel.
While the media’s “exclusive
scoops,” as they are described, attracted large audiences both in Lebanon and
abroad, academics and press freedom organizations have denounced the media’s
attitude over the past several days, saying the behavior is unethical and
demonstrates a profound lack of professionalism.
“This is a big scandal,” said Nabil
Dajani, professor of media studies and sociology at the American University of
Beirut.
“It is clear by all standards that
the media lacks ethics and professionalism,” Dajani told The Daily Star Friday.
He described the media as “rabble rousers,” and issued a reminder that
journalists have social responsibilities.
“In times of crisis, a journalist
has a social responsibility, but what they were doing was simply agitation,” he
said.
Such agitation was evident in the
case of the 11 Lebanese pilgrims kidnapped in Syria back in May.
An unconfirmed report of the
pilgrims’ deaths as a result of military strikes in Azaz near the Syrian city
of Aleppo left many families mourning until another unconfirmed report refuted
their deaths.
Alongside the interviews with the
kidnapped foreigners in Lebanon, almost all local media outlets were reporting
unverified information on the fate of the pilgrims in Syria, with no official
to confirm any of the accounts.
Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hasan
Nasrallah also criticized the media’s attitude in a speech Thursday.
“The attitude of some reporters was
tragic and disastrous,” said Nasrallah.
Media analyst Sarah Richani said
that the media is sometimes giving a platform to those who are inciting
sectarian hatred in the country.
As former British Prime Minister
Margaret Thatcher once said, publicity acts as oxygen for terrorism, and
Richani echoed this sentiment, saying that the strong media coverage of the
kidnappings in Beirut quickly resulted in the evacuation of many foreigners,
mainly from the Gulf, from Lebanon.
Richani said that reporting mistakes
resulted in spreading fear among many tourists visiting the country.
“Some media outlets reported that
there will be kidnappings of tourists from the Gulf and then the next day they
refuted their own report ... But it was too late, everyone was leaving
already,” she added.
According to Richani, recent media
behavior has lacked credibility because many have failed to run adequate fact
checks before broadcasting a story.
Yellow journalism has advanced many
armies’ interests throughout history, but in everyday news, it has faced
criticism for its sensationalism and exaggerating of news events.
The Information Ministry and
National Audiovisual Media Council called for a meeting with all media outlets
next Friday to stress the need for the media to play a positive and
professional role in reporting the news.
“Freedom of the Press is a sacred
freedom ... but we have realized that there was no reporting of news
[Wednesday] but fabrication and the making of news,” Information Minister Walid
Daouk said Thursday.
Richani said that many journalists
do not have the freedom to report in a professional way because media outlets
are subject to the whims of their owners.
Richani added that there was very
little for journalists to carry out their social responsibility and bypass
their organizations’ political directors while remaining within the media
outlet.
“We hope they can exercise some
restraint in coverage and report professionally because we are at a time when
Lebanon is at the brink,” Richani said.
Samir Kassir Eyes Foundation and
Media Against Violence called on journalists and media outlets to differentiate
between reporting and inciting sectarian strife.
SKeyes executive director Ayman
Mehanna denounced the interviewing of kidnapped individuals in Lebanon.
“People in custody of the armed men
are not free to say what they want to say ... You have to inform the police and
contribute to their release instead of interviewing them,” said Mehanna.
Mehanna said that the amount of
unconfirmed reports that local media outlets aired in the past several days was
outrageous.
“It has been so casual to report on
a ‘possible’ shooting incident ... the media cannot be casual in reporting that
someone was shot without confirming the report,” he said.
The developments of the past few
days have also pushed MTV television reporters back to broadcasting on
roadblocks, particularly on the Airport Road.
After almost two months of
boycotting roadblocks and burning tires by protesters, sources at MTV said that
the news team covered the incidents Wednesday due to the emergency nature of
the situation.
“But we are not going back on our policy, we
will refuse to cover any such scenarios again, but what happened Wednesday was
important for the viewers to see,” the source said.http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Politics/2012/Aug-18/184999-medias-questionable-professionalism.ashx#axzz245GhTCxA
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