Media\'s Coverage of Terrorism

Media and Terrorism

The role of the media and its impact in reporting terrorist cases has attracted significant concern in the recent past given the increase in terrorist activities across the globe. The increased concern has contributed to controversy and debates on whether the media helps in advancing the agenda of terrorists. Actually, some scholars argue that too often the media assists in advancing terrorists' agenda while others disagree. However, the determination of whether the media promotes terrorists' agenda requires an evaluation of the intentions of terrorists and the goals of the media during coverage of terrorist attacks.

While terrorists carry out their activities for various reasons including ideological, religious and nationalist objectives, some terrorist groups and organizations utilize the media as a means of obtaining recognition or publicity for the causes and goals of their groups. In contrast, media's role in coverage of terror attacks is to providing information and knowledge of events that are taking place in the world. This implies that the media does not necessary promote terrorists' agenda through it coverage of terror attacks. Even though some of the coverage may play into terrorists' agenda, especially those that want to gain publicity, the media does not promote terrorists' agenda.

The media usually serves acts as a tool for soliciting the support of citizens toward action or initiatives that fight terrorism. Moreover, the media coverage of such attacks focuses on reporting unbiased information in a manner that does not persuade or contribute to dramatic representation of events. Mahan & Griset (2008) argues that journalists have the responsibility of present accurate information only while the audience analyzes and draws conclusions from the information (p.243). This contributes to the assumption that media can act as one of the most effective tools for protection of the public from acts of terrorism.