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Citizens for Media Reform — an introduction
Tabitha Justice is a student at Marshall University in West Virginia, studying Online Journalism and International Affairs. She is the founder of Coffee Party 2.0's pilot project Citizens for Media Reform. by Tabitha Justice I have heard it argued that the quality of a democracy is only as good as its legal framework, the participation of its citizens and the strength of their education and civic knowledge. If we consider these three elements as the balancing legs of a democracy, it only takes one wobbly leg to overturn it. While education can come from many different sources, historically, there has been no source more effective than the media. This is something our founding fathers intimately understood. That’s why the press is specifically mentioned for constitutional protection. However, it is important to note the continued existence of a free press is not guaranteed. There are no laws requiring citizens to seek out or provide journalism. There are no laws that guarantee the quality of that journalism. And there are few laws that protect the press from being purchased by powerful special interests and transformed into something else entirely. Quality journalism must be recognized, desired and demanded. And there is only one special interest who can do that: We the People. Media, like any other product, is consumer driven. It is the consumer who decides what they read, what they listen to and what they watch. It is the consumer who decides whether to select media that educates, media that entertains, or media that distorts. As consumers, we can and we must make informed choices if we expect the standard of political journalism to change. Perhaps most importantly, we must understand that we are responsible and accountable for our own individual level of civic knowledge. We must take the initiative to seek out truth and understanding and actively disregard false and misleading information. Where did we go wrong? Why did the media begin commercializing news and highlighting extreme points of view rather than seeking the truth? There is a common misconception that the news media had always strived to present an accurate depiction of affairs, and that partisan media empires are a relatively new enterprise. But the truth is America’s early newspapers were devoutly partisan. They were expensive to produce and almost exclusively engineered to fit the agenda of the affluent party leaders who paid for them.
The standard of journalistic objectivity wasn’t introduced until 1835 whenJames Gordon Bennett’s New York Herald became the first newspaper to separate itself from a political party and report from an independent perspective for middle and working class Americans. He was successful, and other papers soon followed in his footsteps. This helped to make possible the Progressive Movement of the late 19th century, which ushered in a complete transformation of how political parties were covered by the media. The Progressive Party began to expose the political machines that dominated our society, aiming to rid our government of corruption and increase the People’s voice in making policy. The Progressives wanted the general public to be able to base their civic engagement on educated choices rather than party loyalty. They worked to inform the public through literacy and education campaigns. Gradually, voters began to approach civic engagement in a way that sought out the facts independent of party politics. More and more newspapers embraced the standard of approaching journalism with objectivity because that is what the people wanted. Then things changed. At the end of the 20th century, media holdings became concentrated in the hands of a handful of mega-corporations, and very expensive mediums like television networks began to dominate political discourse and public perceptions. Journalism has once again been overtaken by exaggeration, animosity, misleading claims and adversarial attacks. Television producers have learned how to package and market this kind of content in a way that is entertaining, and even addictive.
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But in the late 1820s, the Industrial Revolution made it possible for publishers to reduce costs by using cheaper paper and replacing mechanical presses with steam presses. The affordable penny-press was born, and this made it possible for ordinary folks like you and me to have a voice in the media arena. (Today, the advent of the Internet, and specifically social media, provides a
The giant powerful corporations, the very ones that the middle class helped build into successful juggernauts, have turned their backs on their hardest and most loyal workers responsible for such amazing success. They have also turned their backs on our nation, our economy and our families as though they have no responsibility or sense of national loyalty. My fellow countrymen on the "right" view our government as corrupt and broken, and they are correct. However, what most of us forget is that it is the corporations and their extremely well-funded special interest groups that are controlling our government, not we the people. The only thing that matters is more profit to satisfy their greed. The cards are pretty well stacked against us and in overwhelming odds. I repeat, we the people are all we have.
In a recent news conference, President Obama was asked why polls suggest that 60% of Americans do not want the debt ceiling raised. His answer was the correct one. That's the wrong question to ask. If Americans understand that a failure to raise the debt ceiling will lead to a total economic collapse, higher interest rates that 
