Demonstrating an Understanding of the Complexity of Conflict and Terrorism Coverage in Media - Research Paper Example

TERRORISM COVERAGE IN THE MEDIA Demonstrating an understanding of the complexity of conflict and terrorism coverage in broader cultural, political and military contexts. Analysis of media coverage of the major events relating to the ‘war on terrorism and the Iraq invasion in a selected country. 1. Introduction After the 9/11 attacks, the Western countries such as USA and Europe realised that terrorism had come to their soil and acts of horrendous terror in their neighbourhood, were a harsh reality. All these years, acts of terror were perpetrated in other countries and seen only on the TV or read in the newspapers. The media, made up of the TV, print and online types have played a very important role in quickly spreading ‘live’ movies and shots of such events and the multitude of news channels, each with their own anchors, relaying crews connected to news broadcasting vans, capture, the dust, dirt, bullets, bombs and blood from the terror hit sites. There is a sense of voyeurisms as media crews seek out the blood and gore and rely the gory images to their audiences who are safe in their homes. The manner or framing of the news reports has undergone a change and news coverage has become very complex and requires a broader view of cultural, political and military contexts (Norris, 2003). This paper discusses the manner in which news is framed by the media and presents the criticality and complexity of the process of news reporting. A number of primary and secondary sources such as reputed Internet sources, newspaper reports, TV stations, archives from news records, books, peer reviewed journals and others have been used as references for research. The focus country for the paper is UK. 2. Theoretical understanding Media Framing is a technique that has been used since organised news reporting began a few centuries ago. Media frame can be called as the manner in which news story items are made by selecting bits and pieces of information and organising them to create stories that convey meaning to the audience and the writers. In a typical TV coverage of an event, the crew and the anchor that has actually shot the footage would probably have sufficient footage to run the program for hours. However, the actual air time given is in many cases, less than a few minutes and the news editing team and to pick and select the best and most impactful footage and images and create a program. This is called process media framing and it has to be done by all TV stations and even print media (Thussu, 2003). Media Framing follows a model that would include steps such as: sizing, agency, identification, categorisation and generalisation. Sizing is the importance that in a TV media, the story gets and the space or promotion it gets. So an event would keep appearing in the 'Breakin News' or 'Hot News' section and be carried over for a few more hours and then be announced on the main news. In the print media, the item would appear on the front page as headlines. This is the first important step in media framing and pushes the event to the publics consciousness. Agency refers to the person or organisation who has created the event and until the facts are clear, the news persons are free to voice their own views and interpretations and it is a this stage that media framing and distortion is maximum. Gore, sleaze, greed, sex, and other such elements are frequently distorted and highlighted. Identification step occurs when the audience attempts to identify with the events that are happening and people would involuntarily try to associate the events with what they are seeing or reading about. Categorisation is again a placement of the event as per its genre and it may relate to sex, sleaze, crime, rape, corruption and so on. Generalisation is related to the comments and interpretations that the news editor makes and what he wants the audience to believe in (Zelizer, 2002)). Standard news channel such as BBC, CNN and others are aware of their responsibility and try to keep media framing distortion to a minimum and generally toe the line of the western governments philosophy and the public outlook. Other TV channels that are not very popular resort to sensationalism and extreme distortion and interpretation that often is illegal and the victims end up suing such channels (Tumber, 2004). The problem occurs when the news editing team attempts to intentionally distort the story due to political or personal reason. News editors then attempt to select piece of the footage and then confuse the readers into accepting a different view than what is actually happening. This process is called media framing and the news events being relayed are subjected to distortion so that an event is given a very different interpretation from the facts, by suppressing some bits of information and highlighting others. Till recently, the media was biased against Blacks or African Americans as they are called. Hence, all violent crimes involving Blacks were highlighted and distorted to show that the aggressor was a violent Black criminal; the victim was a helpless white and further that Blacks are inherently violent and have a latent criminal streak. The image of Blacks as violent criminals who are murderers, rapists and drug dealers has been created to some extent by media distortion (Buckley, 2006). Since the early 1990’s the world has increasingly been subjected to violent, terror acts by Muslim terrorists and this has created a certain amount of racial stereotyping. Muslims across the globe are regarded with suspicion and it is true that almost all known terror strikes in the past decade are the work of Muslim terrorists. However, it does not mean that all Muslim citizens across the world are potential terrorists or that they tacitly support them. The media framing unfortunately tends to portray just this image and a mass hysteria has been created against Muslim speaking people in the West and in Asia. Part of the problem has been caused my Arab leaders such as Saddam Hussein and the Iran leader Ahemdijenad, very vociferous and militant opponents of Christian countries such as US, UK, France, Australia and even India. The media framing has worked overtime here and has followed the alignments of politics, power and oil money. The middle East has rich Oil states such as the UAE, Iran, Egypt, Algeria, Libya and Iraq and the Western world simply cannot do without this oil and hence the media has worked very hard to paint a picture of disinformation about weapons of mass destruction being hoarded by the dictators of some countries and the repeated threat issued by these dictators to use the weapons (Buckley, 2006). Media Framing tends to follow what the public wants to hear and see and this is true for terrorises or celebrity scandals. The goal of a media company is to sell copies, increase the ‘eyeballs’ or the viewers so that the maximum people read the copies or view the channels and this increased the advertising revenues. 3. The context of media coverage An important aspect of the media distortion is the power of representation and control that they have over opinions and views of the government and the audience. The audience would tend to believe everything that is shown while government and the political class is often forced to react as per the media representation. The rich and powerful, as in other fields, tend to dominate the media and political actors use different framing strategies to further their cause. The actors can select framing that would move the media attention to their own cause and point of view and away from that of the opponent. The actors may also decide on the extent of attention that they want to divert to the opposing frames in comparison to their own frames and the actor can use the opponent’s frame either as an offence or as defence (Norris, 2003). Extent and type of framing allowed in a country depends on the political system and the amount of liberty allowed. Democracies such as US, UK, India and others allow unrestrained liberty to the press and the distortion follows the public interests and policies. Nations such as China, Iran, North Korea and other communist or dictatorship countries have very strict control over the media. Media distortion here is extreme and strictly follows the guidelines and policies as laid down by the regime. A lot also depends on the channels available in the country and almost all countries have TV and newspaper channels in addition to Internet and the radio. In nations such as China and Iran, along with other media channels, even the Internet is blocked and people rarely get to see the real news (Buckley, 2003). There is an intense commercial pressure on media channels and it is reported that in many cases if print media, the sale price of the newspaper is artificially kept so low that it is not enough to buy even the newsprint. However, owners of the paper can earn good revenues only through advertisements and advertisement come in when more copies sell. The case is similar even in TV channels and channel media managers can ensure good revenues only through high TRP ratings. These ratings come in when there is sufficient media framing and distortion so that customers repeatedly view the programs. While it would be wrong to say that TV and other channels are only after revenues, the fact remains that commercial pressures often drive and create the programming strategy. It costs money to send a crew with an anchor and equipment to an event or a site and the team has to deliver sufficient content that can be framed (Tumber, 2004). The terror attacks of 9/11 forced the western world to realise that terror acts would not happen in India, Israel, Sri Lanka or other Asian countries but these acts would happen very well in their own country also. Therefore, when the 9/11 acts shook US out of its compliancy and security, the media stirred up emotions among the people to a high pitch. Unending streams of the jets crashing into the twin towers, human tragedy of the victims, thousands of deaths, were vividly framed on the TV, forcing the government into defensive measures of invading Afghanistan and Iraq in a bid to oust the Taliban and Saddam. There was an intense media framing of the evils of the Taliban and the imperative to send troops to destroy them. The media and the government forced the people to accept that all Muslims were possible terrorists and created a huge paranoia in which the government successfully ousted Saddam and the Taliban from control of their respective nations (Zelizer, 2002). While US, UK and other developed nations do have a sizeable Muslim population, these people were forced into hiding and had to back down when faced with intense media framing that showed the terrorist as Muslims. The relation of hostile nations such as Iran, Libya with US is commercially alive since US needs oil from these countries and they in turn require food items. Defence equipment and US dollars. When there are extreme provocations, the US places and embargo on them and this cuts off all trade, thus forcing great economic hardship on the people. The relation of the US with countries such as Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan is that of a protector and friend while Iran views the US as a hostile country that supports Israel (Hewitt, 2003). In the initial months after the 9/11 attacks when feelings of revenge were the highest, the public supported the US views on attacking Iraq and Afghanistan through the UN. However, the public opinion has changed after a few years with no end of the war in sight and US soldiers being killed in the war and the huge drain on the economy with rising expenses for war funding (Hewitt, 2003). The Middle East is a volatile area with oil and terror very much mixed and US wants to preserve its superiority in this region. The 9/11 attacks allowed US to build up its presence in the areas with large number of troops and armament and thus establish its bases in the region. Certain political and commercial interests of the western world are this protected. The case is similar in Pakistan and even in India where US is attempting to counter the Chinese superiority in Asia (Zelizer, 2002). 4. Analysis of media coverage Media channels such as BBC, CNN, Fox, ABC and many others operate on a 24x7 basis and hence they have an immense appetite for news items. While suggesting that these media houses foster or encourage events and disasters would be very much wrong, these media houses certainly look forward to events and rush in to any corner of the world and since this paper is about terror and media outlets in US, the section would concentrate on the UK markets (Buckley, 2006). In UK, there are reportedly 534 independent TV channels, 824 radio stations along with 1606 different types of newspapers and 1952 individual magazines. Many of the media have alternate online Internet sites that also provide some amount of features and news that are carried by the printed versions. The Internet websites also receive sizeable number of hits. Media houses such as BBC television channel and radio station, The Guardian and the London Times are renowned the world over for the accuracy and depth of reporting. Many of these media have eminent and award winning authors and journalists working for them (Mediauk, 2009). Since it is not possible to have a news anchor or a reporter in all possible places across the world, the media outlets operate through stringers and news reporting agencies that send reports of events from across the world. These stringers and news reporting services file their reports through tele-printer, email and other media. News agencies, both print and TV then select the items to understand if any of the leads can be developed into a story. Once a promising lead is noticed, the news editors would try to get more information and use media framing methods to make the item more interesting. If the news item catches public attention, then there is an immediate rush to cover the event but the original media company and the news editor get the credit for breaking the story first (Buckley, 2006). Home Office (2009) reports that news media houses assume the role of defending the public morals and go to great extents to expose instances of corruption and bribery, financial irregularities, scams or cover ups by the government and commercial organisations. However, the UK media is also susceptible to the fallacies, rumours and fears that gripped the world during the terror attacks of 9/11 and the 2005 London terror attacks in which 57 people were killed and a number of Muslim terrorists were arrested. UK has been subjected to external threats rights from the IRA movement that terrorised large parts of UK. UK citizens realised that the people arrested in the attacks or those involved in the planning were UK born youths who had spent their whole lives in UK. All the media reports and focus on terror has been to isolate and paint Islam as a fomenter of terrorists. Madarasas, the religious schools that teach Islam were quickly regarded as schools for terrorists and the Islam clerics as ideological heads who brainwashed misguided British youth into becoming terrorists. Hence, the media framing followed these lines and the fact that there were a few schools and clerics that spread terrorism helped the media framing. Countries such as Pakistan, Iran and other Arab countries were already the villains and the media framing ensured that the notoriety continued to be escalated (Buckley, 2006). A few authors have attempted to trace how Islamic terror grew and caught up with the rest of the world. The US and USSR cold war during the 1970’s and 1980s has been found to be responsible for starting the Islamic insurgency and terrorists activity in Afghanistan and other areas of the middle east and this has spread to other regions of Asia, threatening Western interests. What started as the US attack against Soviet Russia through Afghan resistance fighters with Osama Bin Laden as one of the important US fighters, soon turned into full-blown militancy against the US. The region where militancy has taken root is one of the most poor, deprived and inhospitable regions. People have no recourse to healthcare, jobs and food and it is only militancy that allows them to earn a living. Western media have tragically framed out these facts and only portray the terrorists as killers and the media framing is ‘a good terrorist is a dead terrorist’ (Thussu, 2003). The Arab areas, Indian peninsula, Pakistan, South East Asia are lucrative revenue earners for western companies. If the region is stable, then it gives oil, minerals, cheap labour and a compliant government helps in ensuring Western capitalism succeeds. Islamic terrorists do not want this to happen and hence the massive propaganda warfare. Western media attempts to frame the situation so that oil keeps flowing and commerce continues. The unfortunate hidden face of the terror, the maimed victims, the widows and orphans are never mentioned by the western media when a suicide bomber blows himself in protest against perceived wrongs of the western world. The media has also realised that the public has become inured to scenes of such horror and hence the framing moves to other aspects (Buckley, 2003) 5. Conclusion The paper has examined the concept of media framing in the modern world, with particular reference to terrorism and the 9/11 attacks. Media framing includes deliberate distortion, misinterpretation and selecting specific instances of media footage and news reports that would enforce a certain view of the media house. It has been noted that news agencies, either to increase the viewer ratings or because of vested commercial interests take up overt media framing of terror activities. Partly because of Islamic origins of terror groups and the fact that almost all terror attacks in UK and US have been perpetrated by Islamic militants, Muslims, Islamic clerics and Islamic schools are regarded as terrorists. All types of media houses, including TV channels, print media and online sites are known to use these tactics to enforce their commercial interests. This has become a sad fact of the media business and they need advertisement revenue to stay in business and advertisements do not come unless thy increase their TRP ratings. The ratings do no increase unless they manufacture news and use innovative methods to bring their channel and media to the forefront. References Allan, Stuart &Zelizer, Barbie (eds.) 2004. Reporting War. Routledge Publications. Buckley, Mary & Fawn, Rick (eds.) 2003. Global Responses to Terrorism: 9/11, Afghanistan and Beyond. Routledge Publications. Buckley, Mary & Singh, Robert (eds.) 2006. The Bush Doctrine and the War on Terrorism: Global Responses, Global Consequences. Routledge Publications. Hewitt, C. 2003. Understanding Terrorism in America: From the Klan to al Qaeda (electronic book). Routledge Publications. Heymann, P.B. 2003. Terrorism, Freedom and Security: Winning Without War. MIT Press. Home Office, 2009. Current threat level in UK. [Online] Home Office. Available at http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/counter-terrorism/current-threat-level/ [Accessed 10 August 2009] Norris, Pippa, Kern, Montague & Just, Marion (eds.). 2003. Framing Terrorism: The News Media, the Government and the Public. Routledge Publications. Mediauk, 2009. The British media industry is here. [Online] Media UK.com. Available at http://www.mediauk.com/ [Accessed 10 August 2009] Robinson, Piers. 2002. The CNN Effect: The Myth of News Foreign Policy and Intervention. Routledge Publications. Thussu, Daya K. & Freedman, Des (eds.). 2003. War and the Media: Reporting Conflict 24/7. Sage Publications. Tumber, Howard & Palmer, Jerry. 2004. Media at War: The Iraq Crisis. Sage Publications. Zelizer, Barbie & Allan, Stuart (eds.) 2002. Journalism after September 11. Routledge Publications. Read More