“The real world media continues to loose it’s grounding lug, and it is our responsibility to represent and protect our broadcasters by continuing to have a level of competency that is ‘professional’ in nature and working in mass media is a privilege not a right.”
For Immediate Release
(Copenhagen, Minibrick) 28 May 2025 – The Minibrick State Association of Broadcasters or MISAB occasionally likes to remind it’s hundreds of member stations that local media serves the community. What does that really mean? Some local media operations may claim to “serve” or “represent” a community. Media operations may claim they are “representing” certain types of community. Some media outlets have in the past will represent authority members (heads of state agencies, some critical non profits) by giving them a voice; while often in news reports will degrade the average citizen.
We have noticed not here with our MISAB members, but in other markets where local media outlets are acting like a private social media group, allowing reckless commentary by consumers, and media operations selective of being “the voice”. We remind our members to ensure you’re broadcasting to all, and not to “lifers” “instaters”, etc.
While free-speech protections allow radio and TV operations broadcast to what they want, it shouldn’t be an entitlement to selectively use their resources to attract and retain the worse members of the consuming public and by encouraging the level of freedom without responsibility enables local broadcasters the level of representing the worse voice.
If you’re in executive management, and come with extreme prejudices like a local, you’re not representing, you’re not a professional. Your job is to be a representation of the better versions of the people you serve, not implicit endorsing xenophobia, racism, etc. The MISAB serves a democratic system; and giving authority the priority whether it’s on newsgathering or just on social media reposts and not everquestioning said authority members, is anti-democratic and is something that a more Eastern society would tolerate.
As International Women’s Day passed in March, we saw some other broadcasters platform women for the sake of platforming women, and some would consider that to be benevolent sexism – the plan English definition for that would mean to platform a group without being seen as sexist.
The real world media continues to loose it’s grounding lug, and it is our responsibility to represent and protect our broadcasters by continuing to have a level of competency that is “professional” in nature and working in mass media is a privilege not a right.