“Mass Media and Democracy”

Marielle Khate Garcia

 

When a country is under a democratic law, everyone has a free will. Every people has the right to own a property, right to go to school and be educated, right to enjoy a healthy living, right to vote and right to have a fair judgment. In order for the government to accommodate all these needs, there is a department assigned for each of them, but how about the right of people to be informed about the latest and most significant news and events? Of course, this is the reason why media exists.

As a Mass Communication student, I am still in the process of familiarizing the rules and regulations in our field but I’m glad that the years spent in this course have taught us a lot.

From the time that we are freed from the dictatorship of the Marcos regime, that’s also the time when media people were released from shackles and grief. And when the late former President Corazon Aquino ousted Marcos from his throne, the Philippine journalists celebrated as they attained the freedom of the press in the 1987 Constitution.

Since we are given this press freedom privilege, great responsibilities arise. Its role as a watchdog in the society must be justified. Just because we have the power to be transparent and opinionated, it doesn’t mean that we should be rude to the government or to its officials. Naturally, we are bound by limitations.

From our lesson in our Media Management class, these limitations (libel, anti-obscenity law, invasion of privacy law, law on national security, contempt of court and copyright law) teach the journalists to be more careful on every step that they’re going to make.

But because of the power that the media have, some politicians take advantage of their weakness. We are all aware that money is very hard to earn especially nowadays, so in order to make money fast, they agree to receive money from some officials which is called “envelopmental press”.

This kind of give-and-take process is a widespread issue among the journalists. Many are saying that there’s nothing wrong with this kind of activity but the problem is that once they give in, they are no longer playing the part of an adversarial press.

Without any doubt, living in a democratic country gives us the power to choose and it is up to us on where we’ll go--- to the road less travelled or to the other side of the road. As a future media practitioner, I am now aware of my duties and responsibilities and I am challenging my self as early as now to be loyal and honest as I can be.