THE session titled ‘Words and Images of the Day’ sought to tell audiences about the process of news and image selection. The panel comprising journalists Barkha Dutt, Olivier Truc and Farhan Bokhari was moderated by Ghazi Salahuddin.

Salahuddin introduced the session by bringing up the issue of neutrality and questioning how accurately reality on the ground is conveyed through media outlets. Seeing the problem within the media in Pakistan and India that trivialises and sensationalises news, he deferred to French journalist Truc as possibly having a different outlook, to which Truc jokingly responded: “So you mean European newspapers don’t trivialise, don’t scandalise?” Explaining how even though they try to be as neutral as possible at the Le Monde, a French daily newspaper, Truc pointed out that inevitably social media becomes a deterrent.

Indian journalist Dutt reiterated a position she took in an earlier session that day and stated how social media has created a “reductionist narrative” and how people today are asked to take sides, either ideologically or politically. “People feel the pressure to take [a] position with the thing that will make them popular,” she said. She added that “a journalist’s job is not to be popular” and that “too many journalists today … are seeking popularity”, bolstered only by “instant feedback” on social media that gives into the human instinct of being “liked”.

Describing India’s media environment, she explained how the Indian media is increasingly “manufacturing dissent”. Television channels, Dutt said, are creating “artificial confrontation” by placing two extreme voices deliberately against each other. She stated that those journalists who are more “complex” and “nuanced” are termed “boring” positing “a real challenge for those of us who want to be serious — we don’t want to be theatrical, we don’t want to be entertainers”. Noting this trend also in Pakistan, she cited a “crisis” in journalism today, where “news has become theatre” and how there is pressure on all mediums today to be inflammatory and provocative.

Dutt blamed ratings for this phenomenon, the deflection to viewers in keeping ratings of shows up and letting the brand of journalism define the market it persists in. Speaking of Pakistani media, journalist Bokhari, too, blamed commercialism for the decline in the quality of journalism, noting that very few news outlets in Pakistan are committed to practicing quality, bipartisan journalism, while Truc suggested that deadlines and the need for quick turnover is affecting the quality of journalism.

On external factors influencing media, Dutt explained that “the market determines the content much more than any pressure from politicians”. She pointed out that political news persists because of genuine interest and stated that “there is an abiding interest in all things political [in India and Pakistan]”.That said, she continued to emphasise that there is a “lack of genuine public broadcasters” [because they are] prohibitively expensive”, and can only be financed by the state, or corporate entities. A solution to this problem would be a state-financed entity that does not influence content, but even then there are problems.

Salahuddin put forth a question that challenged Canadian philosopher of communication theory Marshall McLuhan’s decree of the “medium being the message”, and asked whether the medium is the problem. Dutt stated, “mediums do not dumb down content, people do,” and that “mediums are not shallow, people are”. In response to an audience member’s question on the part played by the media in shaping the narrative of Pakistan, and normalising relations between the two neighbours, she cited sharp intolerance in the media, “What disturbs me in the media is the inability to speak without labels,” and stated that both nations need to keep away from dogma and populism in order to evolve past their current states.