Social Media Lowers Fear, Not Loathing

Michael Hedges July 8, 2013 - Follow on Twitter

When events of major importance are met with a dearth of credible information people most affected will search high and low for news that satisfies basic needs. People verify information sources very lightly, something marketing people fully understand. Family and friends are most trusted, followed by familiar names, then, sometimes, institutions.

Media watchers rounded forcefully on local media in Turkey for failing to give immediate and sufficient attention to popular demonstrations in Istanbul’s Gezi Park, which attenuated in all parts of the country. CNN Türk famously broadcast a documentary about penguins while police tear gassed demonstrators. The stately bird now symbolizes a complicit and increasingly unpopular news media. Facebook pages of CNN Türk and NTV have been “penguinated,” reported bianet.org (July 5), “fans” voting on a news item’s lack of the credibility by adding penguin symbols.

More than a month after people arrived at Taksim Square and Gezi Park to protest an unpopular construction project the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has exerted pressure on local media outlets hoping to keep control of the talking points. A monthly magazine, NTV History (NTV Tarih), was closed last week (July 1) because, reported Hurriyet Daily News (July 4), the latest edition as delivered to the printer featured a cover story on the Gezi Park protests. It was never printed. Editor-in-chief Gürsel Göncü said he was “sad” and then resigned.

Whenever mass protests attract young people social media is credited for democratizing information or criticized for disrupting public order, depending on point of view. Evidence is robust that Facebook, Twitter and local equivalents fill a void left gasping by timid or complicit traditional news media. Twitter traffic in Turkey on June 1st, at the height of the protests, reached 25 million messages, reported insightradar.com (June 26). On an average day the social media portal moves between 6 and 8 million messages in Turkey.

PM Erdogan called social media a “scourge.”  Authorities asked Twitter to open an office in Turkey, reported Reuters (June 26). “If you operate in Turkey you must comply with Turkish law,” said Communications Minister Binali Yildirim. “When information is requested, we want to see someone in Turkey who can provide this. There needs to be an interlocutor we can put our grievance to and who can correct an error if there is one.”  Facebook has a representative in Turkey and seems more compliant. In 2010 YouTube, owned by Google, agreed to host its Turkish site in Turkey, giving authorities more opportunities for oversight and, of course, taxation.

Having sufficiently intimidated local news media, PM Erdogan’s attention has turned to international media. “CNN, Reuters, remain isolated with your lies,” he railed at a supporter’s rally, quoted by Deutsche Welle. “Those who work against Turkey will have cause to tremble with fear.” Hotel owners housing the dastardly devils of international media will “also have to pay the reckoning.”

Ankara mayor Melih Gökçek turned to Twitter to round on BBC Turkish service anchor Selin Gerit as a “British agent… using national and international agents to destroy our economy.” PM Erdogan followed up, calling Ms Gerit a “traitor” in a speech to the Turkish Parliament, after the BBC suggested Mayor Gökçek was being irrational.

After ousting Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, army generals took charge of state media and closed several pro-Islamist TV channels. Social media in Egypt has erupted, as in Turkey and just about every other country where popular protest meets ambivalent local media. But before hubris completely overtakes social media idolizers DW Academy researcher Eira Martens says a “Facebook revolution” in Egypt somewhat exaggerates the impact.

Social media has lowered the “fear threshold,” she said, quoted by Deutsche Welle (July 4). “In the Egyptian context, Facebook in particular helped accelerate the protests. “Social media users of all kinds, be it individual Egyptians, political parties, governmental actors, NGOs, have learned to use the tools more efficiently for whatever their aims are. People, and not social media, remain the drivers of social change.”

See also in ftm Knowledge

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