In this blog post, we want to unfold the facts in the media industry about the diversity in the Thai media. We will focus on the problems in Thai media society in both the angle of the news anchor and the consumers. As everyone knows, Journalists in democratic society have the freedom of press to do a role as a watchdog who has to monitor the work and transparency of the government and report to the public. But the reality is opposite, the work of a journalist is not that simple.The information that the journalists publish acts as the knowledge that people will receive so most of the mainstream media agencies were disrupted by the authoritarian or politician because they want to create a good image and make people remember them in a positive way. Also, the content can influence people’s mindset, thinking, and believe  which makes them skeptic with the government about the boundaries of reporting news.This makes more difficulty in controlling people especially in online platform where every user can post anything to the public. Therefore, we will talk about the downside of the media industry that affects the audiences whether by sensationalism, the biased news perspective, the censorship, and the pressure the journalists have to cope with.

Clickbait

Starting with click-bait topics . In the digital and Information age, there are more competitions in the news industry. So, every company has to find a way to appeal audience’s interest and click-bait is one choice that journalists use.In term of news’ business, the journalists will focus only on the engagement and sometimes neglect the other main point in writing news including related information, significance, timeliness, proximity,and controversy. This issue align to agenda-setting theory in the way that media want to focus on the certain issue instead of information that audience should receive.In the online world, the audience can give feedback to the news company on how they report the news and the information such as newsworthy, fact, other angle of the story. However, the journalists have a lot of pressure to balance the demand of news agencies and the audience because of the high engagement, audiences’ interest, and benefit to society. When they do something that does not satisfy some side, they will get heavy complaints from both sides ,which makes the journalist have more pressure to write and report the news. Therefore, Click-bait seems to be a double edged sword because it can grab the audiences’ attention to the news that is important or relevant to the audience, for example, economic and environment. But if they use it in the wrong way , it will create a negative impact on society and their own company which are distortion,fake news, miscommunication to people who read only the headline.

Manipulation and bias

Moving on to the next topic that will reflect on the Thai media problem, which is “reporting news in bias perception” This Thai media problem has been a controversial story for a long time, and it can easily be seen through the case of “protest” Where the conflict between the protestors and the police, defining how biased the Thai media is. Whenever there is a protest news broadcast on television, Thai media often report that the protestors always create chaos, so the police’s job to end this dramatic problem is to disperse the gathering, whether the use of tear gas or water cannon. Yet, this is not all what they do to the protestors. Taking a look on social media platforms like “X” will make everyone realize that the police use violence to disperse the protest, there are clips and pictures showing the police’s brutality on the protestors, who have weapons to fight for their rights at all . It is totally different from what other people see on television because Thai media avoid reporting this and make it easy to see the injustice. So, this problem questions everyone out there that “Why do Thai journalists have to report information in biased perception?” This question can be asked to the media industry around the world and many journalists as well. How are they feeling, seeing this problem as a normal thing even though they are the one who produces news, and their job is to inform people about everything that happened?

Censorship

Censorship is one of the obstacles for Thai journalists to officiate their duty to report the facts to the public. In democratic society, the media has a role to examine the transparency of government and balance the power in society because the government is the most powerful organization in the country which makes them do anything they want. So, the media is an important duty being a watchdog to report the information and facts to citizens within the media ethics, including accuracy,and truthfulness. Censorship refers to journalists being restricted in the content they can publish due to many reasons such as legal regulations, government enforcement, and self-censorship practices. The media agency is such a business structure which means these agencies, especially mainstream media must have the owners who are large capitalists, most of whom are related to politicians or government. Therefore, the journalists will be pressured by the authorities about which information can be published or not. So, information that was reported will not be all the facts that happened in the society or any events or the information may be distorted or hidden by publication restrictions. For example, the journalist can’t report the news about the royal family other than mentioning royal duties in royal news programs which is under section112, As a result, the young generation doesn’t feel reliance to the mainstream media in Thailand so the will find other independent media in social media that can tell them the truth instead.

Pressure on journalists

Journalists often face substantial pressure that can hinder their ability to perform their duties effectively. The pressures are so immense as the media is one of the first to face. The media companies’ financial issues are the problems that are the presence not only for the media companies, but also for the journalists. Digital media applications have only increased the competition for advertisers and consequently, local TV stations and traditional magazines are finding it difficult to retain their profitability in the on-going digital world. Thereby journalists will be more likely to turn to actual doings and limited scope of sources, which can lead to poor standard of reporting and total absence of details. Mainly, as media companies are directed to recruit more viewers to raise revenue; this could be a way to escalate sensationalism and clickbait. Censorship is an issue, and it is the key challenge for many journalists, which are prevalent as much as countries with autocratic governments or that restrict freedom of speech like Thailand. The government block media outlets or demand that information resources are subject to pre-approval, and therefore, revealing information via the media may not always be possible, and as a result, the public will remain enslaved in a state of relative ignorance and burdened with stereotypes. Journalists are quite often subjected to threats, harassment and even abuse of words, when they write about sensitive subjects. Whilst the fear of direct attacks makes it difficult to cover certain subjects or to encounter power directly, journalists may censor themselves in order to protect their own and their families’ well-being. On the other hand, the development of online platforms and sponsored anonymity has given the impetus for cyberbullying among journalists. Like the rest of the reporters, especially when coming from female and minority reporters, the frequent bullying and threats they experience online when they report on divisive or controversial issues could make them fear the consequences, thus shrink them from reporting, engage in the public discourse, and therefore reduce the diversity of media voices.

In conclusion, the subject of this passage was to give both an idea of media trends and their problematic side. Censorship prevents journalists from questioning the whole truth and a clickbait glorifies the number of views leaving the accuracy behind. TV circles, especially in the course of demonstrators, ignite media mistrust toward mainstream media. The tendency of satisfying deadlines of media reports in a competitive digital period and calling for audiences might result in the sensationalism of news and the decline of investigative journalism. Supplementing that, media personalities stand threats from offensive online attacks and harassment, particularly if the topics for coverage are controversial. Therefore, consumers find it difficult to know what is correct. In the era of social media, youth are becoming very reliant on alternative community sources that carry their own set of problems through the spread of misinformation. Media literacy education is extremely important with regards to consumers’ ability to be critical in the analysis of information as well as help them identify credible sources. To wind up, having a diverse and impartial media is a condition of a community that is supposed to be knowledgeable and therefore also actively involved. Nevertheless, this article aims to create understanding and to initiate some dialogues which then may result in revaluation of these problems and the position and the role of the media in not just Thailand but also in general.