Media: A Road Map to Peace
“
If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other.”
Mother Teresa
Let me start my abstract with a small thought provoking question: - What is common among most of the world’s oldest and greatest civilizations? The answer is a
greeting for the word “Peace”.
“Kyuui” is the peace greeting of one of the oldest civilizations in world, the Japanese
civilization.
“Kopiwosian” is the peace greeting in Malaysian civilization.
“Om Shanti” is the peace greeting of the believers in Hinduism;
“Ping An” in Chinese civilization;
“Shalom” in Judaism
“Salam” and later “Pax Tecum” in Christianity, and
“Assalamu’alaikum” is the Islamic greeting of peace.
Peace or non violence is one of the key values shared by almost every religion, belief, civilization on the Earth. Not only Homo sapiens but even animals have a natural drive to search for peace to live. But the history of humankind speaks a different story. Looking back into the history of mankind, we have been more at conflict and war with each other than living in peace together. Even today we are in a constant race to beat other nations in collecting and developing weapons of mass destruction. Nations feels proud if they have more number of hi tech weapons than what other have. The scenario seems to get worse with the introduction of the dreadful face of terrorism. Let me state very bluntly that this matter is for the welfare and related to every human being living in any corner of the world, so we need to
bring the most powerful and widest reached medium of communication “Media”. Media armed with information and technology be do wonder and it could be the most effective moderator in building a
peaceful world. I called media a moderator because in the end it is only we with a different mindset can actually bring out the change.
There can be no doubt about the fact that media can play a very important
role in promoting ethical standards, moral values and accountability in society which would eventually lead to a peaceful world. There are efforts to promote the use of media to facilitate conflict resolution, and ‘peace media’. Peace media can be defined as the use of "radio, television, and printed journalism, to promote peace, to disseminate truthful information or alternate viewpoints that could turn public sentiment toward peaceful resolution of conflict". The media can emphasize the benefits that peace can bring, they can highlight the work of people working for global peace, and they can act as a bridge to initiate the peace talks. Media can play a major role in peace
process. They can provide a stage to create the political atmosphere in which peace process take place; it can actively influence the behavior and rigid mentality.
Comparing the older days with the present, one difference we can easily figure out is that now media is much more powerful and influential with the boon of information and technology. Information technology has made the reach of media global, and that is in a flash of second. Media can be a peace bringing agent in intrinsic peace within a country, individual, organization as well as extrinsic peace.
However, the actual role of the media in this regards depends heavily on the political will of those in power and on the political system in place. For example, if there is no true press freedom it will be difficult or even impossible for the media to investigate corruption and to promote the fight against it.
There is other side of the coin too, the media can also serve as destructive agents in a peace process, and can choose to negatively report on the risks and dangers associated with compromise, and reinforce negative stereotypes of the enemy. As the case with a coin these two cases are not mutually exclusive or in separable. So here the responsibility of media increases many fold.
Some Cases:- Whole of the world is well aware of the terrorist activities of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LITTE) in Sri Lanka. The media there played a very significant role in the famous Ceasefire Agreement in February 2002.
Another example in Asian continent is indo-pak peace talks. Here also media is playing a very significant role to establish and maintaining the peace talks between two countries.
In nut shell we can say that there is no doubt that media plays a great role in building peace but in the end it only we, the people who have to bring the change. Peace making is a continuous process and requires a constant efforts from we all.
Last but not the least,
“That’s all nonviolence is – organized love.” Joan Baez
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