#5
gazeta.ru
November 5, 2002
Government cuts the branch it's sitting on
By Avtandil Tsuladze, Natalia Rostova

The emergence of the Press Ministry’s draft media guidelines containing ''the rules of conduct'' for media in crisis situations is evidence of the authorities’ poor understanding of what a vital role the Russian media played in the relatively successful conclusion of the Moscow hostage crisis.

In the aftermath of the Moscow hostage drama, Russian authorities announced new guidelines for journalists covering terrorist attacks. The Press Ministry issued the draft guidelines 10 days after the storming of a theatre held by Chechen terrorists. The draft, which is to be reviewed shortly by the Media Industrial Committee (a body comprised of representative from media businesses, formed earlier this year as a lobby group for the industry), emerged a few days after the State Duma endorsed controversial amendments to the law on mass media and on combating terrorism.

While independent media observers and leading journalists argued that the media community itself should draw up the ethical principles for journalists covering terror attacks (especially because the Union of Journalists of Russia elaborated such principles over a year ago), the state authorities apparently decided that such rules should be imposed on it from above.

Thus, in defiance of its earlier promises – to draw up a code of ethical conduct for the press in cooperation with the media community – the Ministry has drafted and presented the Media Industrial Committee with its own vision of how journalists should act, what they should and what they should not do when covering terror attacks. At the same time the Press Ministry officials promise that any amendments to the document from the media community will be welcomed.

In his Friday interview to Gazeta.Ru the First Deputy Press Minister Mikhail Seslavinsky said that the Ministry planned to address the Media Industrial Committee with a request ''to review the issue of ethical norms of conduct for journalists in emergency situations at its session'', adding that such a session was due to be held within 10 days.

However, without waiting for the Committee’s decision, the Ministry published its guidelines on Monday. On the face of it, the provisions of the Ministry’s draft sound quite reasonable, especially in the light of the tragic events at the Nord-Ost musical theatre. Journalists should abide by the laws and remember that their reports are accessible to everyone, including terrorists and their accomplices, whose aim is usually to get access to the public through the media.

They must be prepared to suspend live broadcasting from the site of events, and must keep in mind that saving lives is more important than the public’s right to information. Furthermore, they must not allow a montage of documentary materials that could warp or invert the meaning of what is happening.

At the same time, the draft is not as harmless, as it first seems. Take, for instance, the section stipulating that when covering emergency situations journalists should not act on their own and decide for themselves whom to interview. But the document says nothing about with whom the reporters must consult before interviewing participants of events. This may give the Press Ministry an opportunity to interpret that provision and to apply it arbitrarily. The same ambiguities arise with another rule whereby media should be prepared to suspend live broadcasts – nothing is said about the circumstances in which such orders may be issued, and who can issue them.

Within the first few hours following the seizure of the Moscow theatre by the rebels, Russian media came under fire from the state authorities for ''kindling passions'' and ''abetting terrorists''. After the hostages were freed, the criticism grew even harsher and subsequently materialized in the form of amendments to the law on mass media. Eventually those amendments were broadened with the draft media guidelines, presented by the Press Ministry on Monday. Thus, the state clearly displayed its dissatisfaction with the media coverage of its activities and its determination to prevent such behaviour in the future.

But then, did the media really do their job that badly? Did they really hinder the authorities, or, on the contrary, help them? If we cast aside the stock phrases that have long become common, it transpires that the mass media have done the authorities a good turn, having prevented a surge of violence in society.

Permanent on-site broadcasts literally transfixed the whole nation to their TV screens. A TV viewer is a passive observer of the events. He is not capable of taking an active part in the events and his aggression and anger is given vent watching TV. This meant many refrained from hitting out at specific sections of the community (such as those of Caucasian origin, or Muslims).

Let us just imagine for a second, that at the moment of the hostage taking the television channels were closed down, just like when the Ostankino Tower caught fire (August 2000). Let’s imagine that there were no papers and no radio. Moscow would start living on rumours.

Numerous crowds would throng to the scene of the event. No amount of police would have bnen able to restrain the violent crowd. The passive viewers would have turned into active participants of the events. Instead of the ''brilliant special operation'' we would have had carnage, a massacre of St. Bartholomew proportions. However paradoxical it may sound, but the media may have saved many lives (including the hostages’ lives). They have saved the prestige of the authorities, although, now they are being accused of the opposite.

The media did the authorities a good turn by confusing the audience, by not allowing it to concentrate on one common idea. The media carried every idea that could occur to the common viewer. The most various ideas, arguments and counter arguments were being proposed and the extreme viewpoints stifled each other.

In the long run the most nonsensical and explosive schemes were rendered harmless because the entire country perceived their inconsistency. A person who watched all the news bulletins and TV programs inevitably arrived at the conclusion that there was no simple solution and took the actions of the authorities as something inevitable.

Censorship and media restrictions, once they are imposed, give rise to rumours. People will cease seeking information in the media and will begin to interact on a lower level. Each home has its own ''leaders'' who will quickly explain to their neighbours the ''realistic'' political situation. There will be many proponents of decisive action. And then spontaneous riots will begin, which it would be impossible to stop with any calls for tolerance.

The media have helped the authorities because they ''thought'' for their audience. Most people are not inclined to independent analysis of the information coming from the outside, but absorb the ideas of others, passing them off as their own. German philosopher Eich Fromm described that phenomenon as ''pseudo-thinking''. As long as ''pseudo-thoughts'' are supplied to the public by the media, the processes in society can be controlled.

But if censorship is introduced and the trust in the media subsides (as happened in the USSR during the stagnation period – people realized that the media only reported what they were allowed to and assumed that official reports were false), then the media will lose their power over human minds.

''Pseudo-thoughts'' will emerge on the level of inter-personal and inter-group communication, people will have more trust in rumours, than in news bulletins. Thus, as long as the media ''think'' for the people, they are passive and under control. Resulting from media restrictions people will start to ''think'' for themselves. In truth, however, thinking will be the prerogative of ''lower level'' leaders, spontaneous processes will be launched, which it would be much more difficult for the authorities to control, than some TV channel or newspaper.

Immediately after the beginning of the terror attack, many people waited for a statement from Putin. But it never came. The silence of the supreme authority at that critical moment was taken rather painfully. It was necessary to recompense it somehow, in order to reduce the public’s anxiety.

The media, too, fulfilled this task. They described what was happening in the minutest details, directing so many opinions, theories and conjectures at the public, that the president’s silence did not seem so dramatic. The attention of the TV audience was focused on the events. In this sense, the on-site broadcasting proved indispensable. Even if nothing happened on the screen, the audience continued watching.

The media also did the authorities a favour by preventing the growth of opposition sentiments in society. During the crisis a lot of criticism was aimed at the Kremlin and personally at the president. But that criticism by no means undermined the prestige of the authorities. On the contrary, against the backdrop of universal censure of the terrorists, that criticism sounded unconvincing.

Had that criticism been carried through unofficial channels, as it was in the Soviet Union (rumours, samizdat books), it would have been effective. But in an open battle with those who backed the special operation in the theatre centre, that criticism was never going to sound credible.

Many present the introduction of censorship in mass media as a necessary protective measure. But the TV is not to blame for the continuing war in Chechnya. And if the problem was only in the media, it could be solved easily. But censorship cannot take the place of a political solution to the Chechen problem. And since there is so far no solution, a scapegoat needs to be found. Now this role is being assigned to the media. It seems the authorities do not care in the slightest about who will come to their aid next time a similar tragedy occurs.

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