AXFORD | ‘Impending doom’ tarnishes credibility

The fear-mongering from the media needs to stop.

Turn on the television, click away on the Internet or open up a newspaper, and you’ll be bombarded with prospects of the new apocalypse. Another Wall Street giant goes belly up and the next depression is looming over us. A new war in the Middle East breaks out, paving the way for World War III. Unemployment is soaring while houses are constantly being foreclosed.

Really? The state of the world is that bad? At a time when information flows so readily and there are smart, ambitious young people determined to make a difference? Apparently the end has already come and gone but I was too ignorant to acknowledge it.

Looking through one of my roommate’s textbooks, I came across a poll that listed professionals that the public trusted the least. Journalists were second on the list, beaten only by lawyers. I started to think of how absurd the statistics were: that no one trusts those who are trained to gather information and tell the rest of the world.

Then I turned on the television and was reminded why the current mindset toward journalism and the media exists. There’s hardly anything positive. I’m sick of hearing about Wall Street executives and how their downfall will destroy my life. Or about the holy wars in the Middle East that no one seems to have a solution for. Or that car companies are begging Congress for money after years of shipping jobs overseas.

While all these problems are certainly worth our attention, I doubt that any of them are a direct threat to our survival. These problems are so blown out of proportion, having the tag line, “This is it! This is the downfall of planet Earth!” Please.

But when the media portrays each new story as if it may be the last, it shakes the morale of the citizens and has them believing in the absurd. Suddenly, everyone is expecting the end now instead of living their lives.

The media needs to start reporting on the people who deserve to be praised and recognized. It needs to be diversified and rebuild its reputation as something positive, not as the bearer of bad news. Instead of the latest pop star destroying his or her life with drugs, people doing volunteer work and trying to make the world a better place should be dominating the front page.

I know the news isn’t supposed to be pretty. Everyone wants to know about awful things and rightly so. But information needs to be presented in a more objective way, in a more fair and just way. The media should be presenting itself in a more journalistic way, like it used to do.

Of course, I could be all wrong and tomorrow really could be the end for us all. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?