[The Editors' Verdict] Examining the Media in the COVID-19 Era

Jae-Won Kang, Dean of the Graduate School of Media and Communication, Dongguk University

#1. Quoting Mining in Broadcast News. When unsure about professional (especially medical) issues, the media usually approaches cautiously. However, Broadcast Station A was different. Consider a report on COVID-19 news regarding frontline doctors' concerns about the decreasing number of people getting tested ahead of the general election. Broadcast Station A covered this issue in the afternoon on the 주OO news briefing, and later at 8 PM in the main news, through a report by specialist reporter 조OO, aired an interview with the president of the Korean Medical Association stating, "There seems to be no political intent behind the reduction in the number of tests, but the need for active testing is emphasized..." In contrast, Broadcast Station B omitted the mention of the need for active testing in its related coverage. Did they find insufficient reasonable grounds to suspect intentional reduction of COVID-19 testing numbers? They only highlighted the interview that suggested no political intent, focusing on the fact that the government did not deliberately reduce the number of tests. Even if the government did not intentionally reduce the number of tests ahead of the general election, the fact remains that the number of tests decreased, which could be influenced by government policy?this was reported by Broadcast Station A. Meanwhile, the public broadcaster, Broadcast Station B, did not report this. Subsequent reports still included the same interview with the president of the Korean Medical Association, using the interview without its context as the basis for their claims. This is a representative case of broadcast news mining quotes.

#2. Ignoring in Broadcast News. The media's reporting behavior regarding the economic crisis caused by COVID-19 is suspicious. Recently, the credit crunch in the short-term money market and the Bank of Korea's measures were not covered in depth by broadcast news. Why? Because the news value was relatively low? This is a very unusual phenomenon and could be interpreted as a market signal gauging the crisis, yet the broadcasts did not give it significant coverage. Rather, it is suspected they ignored it. There is a positive evaluation that refraining from reports that cause public anxiety during the COVID-19 crisis is desirable. However, wouldn't it be better to report market signals that could be read as a crisis as they are, without inciting anxiety? By not covering newsworthy topics like this, the media allowed the economic crisis frame ahead of the general election to be perceived as a government judgment issue. Since this frame is unfavorable to the ruling party, it led to misunderstandings that the media deliberately avoided it. Of course, the media should not get caught up in political frame wars. But the media, especially broadcast news, should expose the true nature of parties engaged in frame wars and reveal their intentions that could not be seen when trapped in frames. Isn't the media a group that should wield truth as its weapon instead of frames?

#3. Media Errors. The media can make mistakes. Candidate 김OO, running in the general election, said, "Everyone becomes disabled as they age." The media criticized this as a disparaging remark against 'disabled people (or people with disabilities).' They say that remarks about "disabled people" are expressions that disregard minorities and the vulnerable, and that even if the majority group with biases has no bad intentions, they unconsciously utter such words. They scold that the statement hides a message belittling disabled people. They say this expression contains subtle bias or a negative perspective. Finding it hard to agree with the criticism, if one even expresses concern about it, they are accused of being unable to deny it and are suspected of unprovability, thus rebutted. In any case, it concludes that the candidate did something worthy of criticism. This is a representative error the media does not admit. A person's expressions or actions may or may not stem from their perspective, values, or beliefs. Depending on context, it could mean that humans tend to develop many disabilities as they age, but the media criticizes it as a subtle attack on disabled people. Ignoring context, the media labels the person as biased against disabled people. The truth is unknown, but couldn't there be another interpretation?that it refers to a basic human characteristic?

Jae-won Kang, Dean of the Graduate School of Media and Communication, Dongguk University

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.