Reviewed Date: September 20th, 2021
As many had reviewed the book before me, and the contents are widely known, I want to add my few thoughts to chapter 4, The Fear Instinct, Journalism.
Recently, two incidents happened in my state, Telangana (India). A 6-year-old child was raped and strangled to death by a 30-year-old man. The killer was on the run (in a week he committed suicide). Another incident was a celebrity falling off his bike and being slightly injured. Any sane person would know what needs to be covered in news channels.
Ironically, news channels aired show after show regarding the celebrity’s bike accident, what bike he used, the speed he was driving the bike (one news channel went on to say 300 kmph, the speed of a bullet train), whether was he drunk while driving, what the features of the bike he was driving were, and on and on. These so-called news channels turned a deaf ear to the little girl’s scream for justice.
As humanity still persists, social media pages took the matter into their hands and made national coverage pertaining to the poor little girl incident. Information was conveyed quickly, further putting pressure on the police department to bring justice. Immediately, the government responded and declared a 10 lakh reward to the person who catches the killer (as I mentioned earlier, he committed suicide).
When all know how journalists and news channels would exaggerate a bland news item for their viewership and television ratings. From the events above, they could also be blind to important and attention-needed incidents. When these channels fail to do their jobs (informing about the incidents and inspiring people to take action), how could we trust them? How can we be sure they are airing important incidents?
The majority of Indian news channels are bootlickers of politicians. They spread political parties’ manifestos to receive favors and funds. Everybody knew that, but no one talks about it.
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