COMMENTARY
SANITSUDA EKACHAI
How will this end? Will there be blood? If you did not go to sleep with these questions the day the People's Alliance for Democracy plunged the country into political turmoil, then you are blessed with a steely spirit.
Or you must be an avid fan of TV Channels 3, 5 and 7.
Unperturbed by the real drama on Bangkok streets, they faithfully aired their scheduled programmes - soap operas, game shows and all. The political lethargy of commercial television.
The premier's demand that the media take his side or be judged as pro-PAD; the PAD's belief that its seizure of NBT was a justified lesson against the government's TV mouthpiece; the bouncing back of NBT, thanks to communications technology, to continue their anti-PAD coverage - all this is challenging the press' principle of neutrality.
The biggest challenge is perhaps the PAD's rise to power through media tycoon Sondhi Limthongkul's use of his Manager newspaper and ASTV, the news website and satellite TV station.
If you want neutrality from the PAD, forget it. If you want rational discussion, forget it.
But if you want ideological legitimacy and a sense of pride and empowerment, that ordinary people like you can "save" the country - and most importantly the revered monarchy - from the evils of Thaksin Shinawatra's rule, then the Manager Group, which has broken all neutrality rules, fits the bill.
Is it because media neutrality has become an outdated notion now that society has become too fragmented?
Or is it because the news organisations have failed in their duty to make the public believe that neutrality exists, thus forcing people to turn to those who understand their anxieties and fears, as well as their yearning for ideology and change?
It is too easy just to pin the blame on the Manager Group's political motives.
It would also be ungrateful not to recognise the PAD's many achievements in exposing the Thaksin regime's fishy businesses - something which mainstream media largely failed to do.
Admit it, the mainstream news media has been no match for Mr Thaksin, given his popularity, media savvy, total control of state media and wide-reaching power over advertising money.
That changed when media tycoon Sondhi Limthongkul and his Manager Group became a match for Thaksin.
How Mr Sondhi and the PAD have misused popular support to whip up hatred and danger of violence through racist and royal nationalism, is another matter, however.
One privilege of my having grey hair has been the chance to watch changes in journalism over the years.
The early generation of journalists were primarily intellectuals and free-spirited fighters against military dictatorship.
Despite the poor income and unstable career, journalists enjoyed public respect because their dream for justice and democracy struck a chord with the populace.
As politics and the economy opened up, the mass media grew to become big business.
Ironically, the more stable journalism became as a profession, the more was the media's tendency to play safe to protect business interests at the cost of the ideology of old.
Reporting anger from the ground against state and business power, for example, is seen as one-sided. Giving meaning to the news is seen as losing neutrality.
Most newsrooms are happy with ping-pong journalism, unable to tell readers what is really going on. Media neutrality is reduced to mean merely quoting both supporters and opponents.
With the public's hunger for truth, ideology and change unmet by the watchdogs, is it people's fault if they turned to the PAD's rousing rhetoric?
What is happening boils down to a clash of elite interests which won't lead to any structural changes for a just society. And no matter how the conflict ends, the challenge for media will continue.
With the internet revolution and explosion of blogs, there will be little room for facts and neutrality. If the media do not understand their role and public expectations, remain stuck in business interests and overlook the anxieties and fears of ordinary people, they will have no power to counter such demagogues as Thaksin Shinawatra and Sondhi Limthongkul.
Sanitsuda Ekachai is Assistant Editor
(Outlook), Bangkok Post.
Email: sanitsudae@bangkokpost.co.th
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