Increasing quantity of non-critical/populist media

Description:

In the recent years there has been an increase in quantity of non-critical/populist media. Within the Lowlands this is related to the discussion about freedom of speech. Ever since Pim Fortuyn many people have the opinion that they should be allowed to say anything, because of freedom of speech. On of the results of this is the decrease in respect and tolerance towards each other.

Another trend is the increase of quantity of media. In the last ten years the number of television channels has more than tripled. And the increasing use of the internet is also part of this. One of the recent trends, web-logs, gives everybody the feeling they are a journalist. Many of these people enjoy ventilating their ideas without knowing all the details. This often leads to more non-critical or populist media.

With the increase of quantity of media it has become important who brings news first. Because of this speed of brining news to the public, this sometimes results in less research and verification of quality of the news.

All together it can be said that the critical media has become a much smaller part of the total of media brought to the people in the Lowlands. Also many people don’t admire the critical media anymore. They think that (almost) everybody can have an opinion about everything. And with this the quantity of non-critical/populist media has increased tremendously.

Enablers:

- Media techniques like web-logs make in easier to spread peoples individual ideas

- Increase of media channels

- More convinced about the freedom of speech

Inhibitors:

- Tolerance and respect

- Critical reasoning

- Admiration of the wise and critical opinion makers