Audiences On The Truth example essay topic

Truth is an ideal that is sought and will continue to be sought by people, but truth is subject to a variety of influences. These influences can add to the truth, hide some of the truth, or corrupt it all together. That is why in a court of law, witnesses are asked to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. If we consider the ABC Frontline episode entitled 'The Siege', the media reports on 'The Children Overboard' affair from October 2001 to February 2002, and the Sydney Morning Herald Spectrum Article 'Gotcha' by Kevin MacKenzie, April 2002. We can see how people, personalities and events are represented in ways which are not always connected with telling the truth. 'Frontline's atirizes television twistings of the truth in current affair type programs.

They sensationalize and in order to gain audience ratings, they 'wont spoil a good story with the facts'. In the episode 'The Siege' a great insight in to the techniques used to distort the truth is given. This particular episode demonstrates the lack of investigation carried out before a story is broadcast and how there is an obvious failure to check the facts, however there is reason for this lack and that is the aim of a current affairs programs to shock, startle and entertain their audiences rather than inform. When one of the reporters, Marty is giving his report on the low key siege taking place, he is in a squatting position which creates for the viewer a sense that danger lurks and that Marty may be in grave danger. The truth is that he is many meters away from the farm house where the siege is been held, due to the police blocking off the area, this is just one of the techniques used to make a rather plain story interesting and news worthy. Marty also use phrases like 'live from the firing line' which is a classic example of an event being represented in a way which is not giving the whole truth.

When Brook, another one of 'Frontlines' reporters, is interviewing the mother of the man who is holding the siege. She is obviously trying to create a heartfelt interview. When she asks the mother questions she keeps saying to her 'feel free to express you feelings'. Every thing in the interview is going well until the cameras battery runs out whilst the mother is expressing a tearful pledge to her son, Brook then goes on to ask the mother whilst she is obviously still upset if she has any batteries for the camera. The tone of Brooks voice and her fake expressions of concern make the scene humorous as she is hiding her true personality so that a fake message of the truth can be produced. 'Frontline' is humorous but reveals to the audience how they are duped and deceived by a current affair programs time after time.

Here they add to the truth till the final product is nothing like reality at all. In the 'Children overboard' media reports in the Sydney Morning Herald from October 2001 the initial claims were that asylum seekers threw their children over board as a form of protest in order to be allowed entrance into Australian waters. These claims were supported by government released photographs of the children in the water. But in this incident the truth was hidden from the public. The photographs released to the media were not of original format and had been cropped so that the whole truth was not told. As well as this other photos which proved the truth about the Tampa's sinking where not released.

As a result of the reports, the public started to side with the Australia Liberal Parties policy of stricter immigration laws especially in relation to asylum seekers, and because the reports sided with the policy. This may have been one of the major driving forces for the re-election of the Liberal Party in 2001. This event was used in a way that was untruthful in order to gain public popularity by the Liberal National Coalition. The public was easily fooled by the photographs because it is human nature to believe what they see and the saying 'a picture tells a thousand words' its what they believed but they were wrong because a picture may tell a thousand words but not when it has been cropped to hide the truth or the only ones shown are those which don't tell the whole story and the evidence is manipulated in a way which is not telling the truth. Here personalities of political leaders came into play and their agenda was to win votes.

By February 2002 Patrick Walters in a news item in 'The Australian' uses the heading PM's Credibility Is Blown Out Of The Water however by this time the election has been won and the truth comes too late. In 'Gotcha!' in the Sydney Morning Herald Spectrum 27th April 2002, we see how truth is distorted to sell newspapers. Rupert Murdock's 'News Of The World' accepted on going libel cases as 'costs of sale' i.e. 'whatever the whopper costs, its worth it because they make it back in circulation revenue and notoriety' page 6. The distortion of the truth shown as an example in this article is the lead story on the pop singer Sting, entitled 'Sting: Why I Have Taken Drugs' here the reported use a tape recording of an interview with Sting, where Sting said 'No!' when asked if he had ever taken drugs. The reporter then defended his story by remarking "but it was the way that he said 'No!'". here the young reporter fed the readers' insatiable appetite for 'Pop Gossip'. MacKenzie quotes Crone, a liable lawyers comment that, "Sometimes journalists deliberately mislead people; sometimes journalists get it plain wrong; sometimes people lie, and keep on lying, financial or image reasons".

From the above examples of 'The Siege', 'The Children Overboard' reports and 'Gotcha!', we see the influence of viewing and reading audiences on the truth, the influence of newspaper and television station owners for circulation and ratings and profit on the truth and the influence which politicians can bring to bear for election advantages. Frontline exposes how viewers are fooled by the techniques use to cover up the truth or make it more appealing, and investigative reporters try to uncover the real facts. But truth in the Media is elusive.