The program featured some of the few American reporters who got the story right about the Bush administration's charges against Iraq and Saddam Husein prior to our invasion of that country. Even these reporters do their job in the face of sanctions, but at least they are not in peril of their lives, as are reporters in Russia and other countries who expose the abuse of power.
In the case of the Bush administration, the reporters cited the success of the administration in setting the agenda. The other side of that coin is the failure of the editors of so many American papers to set their own agenda and to do so in ways that hold those in power to public responsibility for their actions and the effects of those actions.
Haaretz, the Israeli newspaper came off very well on the program due to their coverage of the impact of Israeli policies on the Palestinians. It was stated that the circulation of Haaretz has been reduced as readers unwilling to face the hard truth about Palestinian suffering desert the paper.
Which brings me to the moral of this posting. If reporters are willing to put their lives on the line, and editors and publishers are willing to risk circulation and even the lives of their papers to put the facts before us, we the people have the responsibility to read the truth that they provide, no matter how painful.
Information literacy, the ability to judge the quality of information we receive from various sources, should be accompanied by information responsibility -- the duty to attend to the important credible information no matter how distasteful or disturbing and to act upon that information.
No comments:
Post a Comment