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The media is only as lazy as we allow it to beIt can be intensely frustrating when the media dumbs down news stories for us. Do they doubt our ability to understand complex foreign affairs issues? – Or is it that the journalists themselves haven’t taken the time to properly get their heads around the issues?I am thinking in particular of news reports this week concerning the referendum in Italy and the presidential election in Austria. Watching the cable networks, it is perhaps a surprise to find that both of these different countries get lumped together for us within the same report. It’s even odder that news channels discuss these developments entirely in terms of Donald Trump and the British exit from the EU.What is going on here?The media loves to deal in trends and patterns. This year the media has decided that the current trend is the rise of the populist right. We are told that Britain decided to leave the EU because of “the rise of the populist right”. So when Trump (who ahead of the elections the media told us was an unelectable buffoon) actually won, the next day we have various commentators wheeled out onto CNN and the BBC, wisely scratching their chins and explaining the result in terms of “the rise of the populist right”.We had been told for the last couple of weeks that a “populist right” candidate would probably win the Austrian elections, because… You guessed it! And when this didn’t happen; the media goes ahead and talks about the rise of the populist right anyway.Of course the ascendance of extreme-right racist individuals in democratic elections is a major issue of concern, which I myself have discussed in previous articles.However, firstly there is a danger of trying to apply this model to everything that happens, everywhere around the world; and secondly the media risks creating a self-fulfilling prophecy by giving massive amounts of coverage to these crazed individuals who normally would be sensibly ignored.After the US elections it was estimated by one statistician that major TV networks like CNN and NBC gave Donald Trump nearly $3bn dollars of free advertising by giving sensationalist coverage to his every controversial comment or tweet. I may loathe everything he says, but I have to admit that this man is a genius at self-promotion.In 2011 we saw a similar phenomenon with the media’s lazy reliance on trends and ready-made categories concerning the so-called Arab Spring.In Tunisia, people took to the streets and threw out their president. So a few weeks later in Egypt when similar mass demonstrations erupted, the media already had a narrative to use “the people are peacefully calling for democracy and freedom…”Before we knew it, the media was reporting identical developments in Libya, Syria, Yemen and to a lesser degree Sudan, Oman, Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait and elsewhere. We were treated to a succession of commentators on Fox News, Press TV, France 24 and Russia today, stroking their chins and explaining that Arabs are all oppressed by ruthless dictators who spent decades in power… and now the people want to be free and live in democracies…. and this is why they are protesting peacefully.Even after rebels were firing off missiles and automatic weapons at each other in Libya and Syria; and militants with big beards were coming out and declaring their allegiance to Al-Qaeda or Iran; we were told about peaceful rallies and smooth transitions towards democracy.When I travelled abroad that year and mentioned that I based my business in Bahrain, I lost count of the number of people who asked me about tank battles in the streets; or being ruled by a military dictatorship; or peaceful protestors longing for democracy. I - like many Bahrainis abroad - had to spend countless hours explaining what life was really like in Bahrain – and no, it’s not exactly like what’s happening in Syria!In the social media age when the Internet is awash with fake news, it worries me that standards of truth and impartial journalism are dropping lower than ever. It sounds like a good thing that news sites can instantly know how many clicks all their articles are getting, but the result is a race to the lowest common denominator of stories about kittens, sexual scandals, mindless trivia and graphic violence.Consequently, the temptation towards lazy journalism, dumbed-down reporting and meaningless clichés like “Arab Spring” “Muslim extremists” and “peaceful rioters” is usually irresistible – but only if it is not seriously challenged.The media simply responds to consumer demands. So we as consumers have to get smarter. We all (and I include myself in this) have to make more of an effort to understand the world around us on its own terms – not in terms of our pre-existing prejudices and simplistic narratives; and when the media gets it wrong we should complain and provide evidence to show why the reality is very different.I know many people who have complained bitterly about the way that media outlets like the Guardian and New York Times reported on Bahrain over the last few years. Fine, but did they lodge a complaint about this unfair reporting? Of course not. We live in an age when it takes 30 seconds to add a comment on a news site. Doing this won’t change the world, but just imagine if ten thousand Bahrainis complained every time such an unfair report was filed.This sounds like fantasy, but what do you think happens every time a major global news outlet writes a report which is seen as being a little more favourable to the Palestinians than the Israelis? Israel lobby groups mobilize thousands of supporters to embark on a campaign of vilification, with accusations of anti-Semitism and bias flying in all directions. Mighty news organizations like the BBC have been forced to fire staff, conduct investigations and publish groveling apologies. As a result, the media thinks twice and then re-edits its reporting before publishing anything about Israel at all.In the Arab world, we spend much of our time moaning about how unfairly the world treats us, but because of our failure to do anything about this in an organized way, we will continue to hear the global media reporting that we are all crazy fundamentalists and that our leaders are all dictators because we’re not ready for democracy.The media will always be as lazy as it’s allowed to be. The clichés and lazy categorizations will continue to go on - as long as they go unchallenged.When we have sufficient self-respect to challenge these tendencies in the media; then maybe we will find that the media starts to treat us with the respect we deserve. ................
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