Political Communication and Journalism

Essay[pic 1][pic 2]

Emma van Dijk

10548378        

University Of Amsterdam

College of Communication

Political Communication and Journalism

MSc. J. Lefere

Word count: 1184

Introduction

The Netherlands has a specific form of broadcasting with a mission, which includes allocating scare sources throughout the society. The public television broadcasters are bounded by rules. The public television broadcasters should “… provide a varied and high quality range of program services for general broadcasting national, regional, local level in the field of information...” (Section 13c; subsection (a) Media Act). According to this rule, public television should not have commercial intentions. Sensationalism is nowadays defined as content that provokes senses and emotions of audience members (Grabe, Zhou & Barnet, 2001). Examples of sensational subjects are crime, war, accidents and scandals. Public television broadcasters should not only focus on this sensational news and content. Public television broadcasters should form an independent source of information for Dutch citizens. According to this information the following statement has been formulated:

Dutch public television broadcasters should not use elements of sensationalism in their news. I agree with this statement. In my opinion, the public television broadcasters should inform Dutch citizens about relevant national and worldly news and pursue high quality of news.

A recent example of public broadcasters using sensational element is a critical view of Vliegenthart (2014) on the NOS paying attention to a specific news item last year. The NOS stands for Nationale Omroep Stichting, which means the National Foundation of Public Broadcasters. Last year, the mayor of Maastricht Onno Hoes, who was married with a famous Dutch talk show presenter Albert Verlinden, was signalled intimately with a young unknown man in a hotel in Maastricht. Someone took photos from Onno Hoes and this young man and the photos were posted on social media and subsequently the photos were shown on television. The NOS paid a lot of attention to this item, according to Vliegenthart. The director of the NOS, Marcel Gelauff, gave arguments for paying this much attention to this item. The arguments were: it caused a lot of commotion throughout the Dutch population and it has a political relevance. It is hard to prove that this happening really caused that much commotion. The relationship of the media and the public could be the opposite, the public follows the media and than see a high importance to this subject. Vliegenthart also discusses the political relevance. The question is why this love affair influences the political capacities and activities of Onno Hoes. This critical view emphasizes that public television broadcasters use sensational elements in public television.