The need for press standards

Title

Creator

Roces, Alejandro R.

Language

English

Source

Panorama Volume XXI (No. 2) February 1969

Year

1969

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

THE NEED FOR PRESS STANDARDS The first paragraph of the first chapter of The Manila Times Journalism Manual by Jose Luna Castro says: “In 1937, the .Jettiers of New England had nothing more impressive in the way of spreading the news than the lung power of a civicminded town crier. The burghers of Boston and Cam bridge now and then received news pamphlets and London corantos’ — single-sheet, twopage newsletters — from, slow boats from Britain, but they were old and dog-eared back issues. The first printing press to be installed in New England was still in London and it was not to arrive un til next year. Printing, in England as well as in the American colonies, was re garded as an occupation for mischief makers. Free speech had no legal standing. Pub lishers were yet to assert themselves as men of stature on the community. “In England itself, the publication of corantos had been suspended, and the li censed press suppressed. The Germans meanwhile were is suing their Messrelationen, which were semi-annual ac counts of not very news worthy events. “It is a remarkable thing, but it was in 1637 when To mas Pinpin, the Filipino printer, issued a newsletter in Manila.’’ The above clearly shows that we have an older press tradition than even the United States. It is the res ponsibility of publishers to make this old tradition great. Unfortunately, most of the publishers in our news journals not only cannot lead the press world to greatness but cannot even follow basic journalistic principles. In his The Revolt of the Masses, Jose Ortega y Gasset laid down what he called “the characteristic of our time” as the following: “Not that’ February 1868 37 the vulgar believes itself su per-excellent and not vulgar but that the vulgar proclaims and imposes the rights of vulgarity, or vulgarity as a right.” This perfectly de scribes the situation in our press today. Again from Ortega y Gas set; "To have an idea means believing one is in possession of the reasons for having it, and consequently means be lieving that there is such a thing as reason, a world of intelligible truths. To have ideas, to form opinions, is identical with appealing to such an authority, submit ting oneself to it, accepting its code and its decisions, and therefore believing that the highest form of inter communion is the dialogue in which the reasons for our ideas are discussed... An idea is putting truth in checkmate. Whoever wishes to have ideas must first pre pare himsrzif to desire truth and to accept the rules of the game imposed by it. It is no use speaking of ideas when there is no acceptance of a higher authority to re gulate them, a series of stan dards in which it is possible to appeal in a discussion. These standards are the prin ciples pn which culture rests. 1 am not concerned with the form they take. What I af firm is that there is no cul ture where there are no stan dards to which our fellow men can have recourse. There is no culture where there are no principles of legality to which to appeal. There is no culture where there is no acceptance of cer tain final intellectual posi tions to which a dispute may be referred. There is no culture where economic rela tions are not subject to a regulating principle to pro tect interests involved. There is no culture where aesthetic controversy does not recognize the necessity of jus tifying the work of art. . . When all these things are lacking there is no culture; there is in the strictest sense of the word, barbarism. . . Properly speaking, there are no barbarian standards. Bar barism is the absence of stan dards to which appeal can be made.” — Alejandro R. Roces, In Manila Chronicle, Feb. 9, 1969. 38 Panorama

pages

37+

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