Responsibility of Media

In every atom there are positive and negative ions that exist together. Matter is composed of atoms and ultimately this world is made up of matter. So, this world is a combination of positive and negative things. When good people exist in a place, no doubt there will always be the bad people there. If there is no such two types, we would not be able to differentiate among good and bad, people would do whatever they wanted without the knowledge of good and bad, without any fear and punishment of doing bad and without knowing the reward for good. Allah has created this difference for us to be able to select among the two by using our minds and abilities.

We know a picture has two sides, positive and negative, a concept can be perceived positively or negatively by the people. If we divide the people of the world in two categories, there will be mainly two types positive minded people i.e. optimists and negative minded people i.e. pessimists. When we put a positive thing before a pessimist, he will always say the negative about that thing and if we put a negative thing before an optimist, he will surely say something positive. You can say that, this world is like the way you look at it.

Our society is the combination of optimists and pessimists. As said previously in the first issue of our magazine, media has power to influence the society and their way of thinking. So it must involve in the projects to affect the society positively from every angle. There are different types of programs on television now-a-days including funny cartoons, cooking programs, interior decors, IT programs, serious and funny drama serials, movie channel, Islamic programs, infotainment, real life stories of different families and girls, current issues, reality shows, talk shows, walk shows, and much more. Each of these programs has its effect on the people, positive and negative; depending upon what people perceive from them and learn from them.

Many T.V channels for the sake of their publicity telecast every type of program and show with ignorance of the ultimate outcome of that show on people, their lives and our society. And I feel sorry for our society that we always take the negative side of every thing. There are 2 out of 100 people who are optimists. And the other 98 are pessimist, in fact this is not the sin for them to be pessimist, perhaps there might be many reasons for them to be like that e.g. unawareness, less knowledgeable, illiteracy, resistance for change, financial problems, etc. But I think Allah has created every human being equally and without any flaw. He granted us equal powers of understanding. It’s now up to us that when we realize our powers and how we utilize our strengths.

If I won’t stop here, it will take many pages to convey my message to you, but let’s come towards the main issue i.e. “crime shows”

Media and specially T.V is influencing our thoughts, way of living, and almost every thing about our lives. Telecasting of Crime stories different channels are now at their peak. T.V channels for their publicity focus and highlight even the petty matters between the families. These programs are now-a-days the subject matter of every news channel and some entertainment channels, too. They are given free hand to telecast day-to-day street crimes and petty crimes of our society in the way they want to.

These crime stories and show are being watched by every citizen, every element of our society including kids, youngsters, elders, old ones, educated class as well as illiterate class and are affecting the society positively and negatively. As mentioned earlier, pessimists are more than optimists so these programs are affecting the people with the same ratio.

Positively, in a way this type of programs serves as an awareness tool for the society. Many of the people can get information about what type of crimes are going on around us, what is the crime rate in our country and the reason behind the happening of such crimes, to make people know the hypocrisy and intrigues of strangers, organizations, and known ones too.

Looking at the negative effects of such crime shows, these programs are the source of acquiring techniques and tactics for the people who are in search of an opportunity to learn the ways of doing a particular crime. Moreover these programs are spreading feeling of fear, injustice and doubts in the society. People are getting afraid of trusting one another. These programs have lower downed the feelings of humanity. Pakistan has one of the highest crime rates in the world. This is due to economic steep dive, crime and especially petty crimes have skyrocketed. Already the satisfaction level among people is decreasing day-by-day due to different issues like political instability, inflation rates, downfall of our currency rates against standard currency, unemployment, expensive education, corrupt government machinery, insufficient income level, deficit in balance of payments, power shortages, etc. in addition, these type of programs increase disappointment, hopelessness, terror and threats in the society.

In such a condition, media especially television should show some sense of social responsibility. They must know which programs to show and which not, which type of programs will affect the society positively from every angle and from every side. Those type of programs must be telecast that will help in the reforming of people’s mind, betterment of society and will increase the educational level of the people. By doing so, I can expect being an optimist, that these remedies will lowers the negativity up to a great extent and one day there will be THE END of such poor issues. IN SHA ALLAH!

Tamania Daud

Quaid-e-Azam College of Commerce, University of Peshawar