Media Coverage of Terrorism: Effects on Public Opinion and Policy

Introduction

Acts of anti-American terrorism are becoming increasingly common, and more are occurring on American soil, according to Columbia political scientist Brigitte L. Nacos (Nacos, 1995). According to Nacos, the rise in terrorism is not primarily a matter of flawed national security. It has more to do with the success that terrorists have enjoyed in exploiting the relationships among the media, public opinion, and political decision-making (Nacos, 1994).

Nacos believes that the media is "the crucial link in the terrorist's 'calculus of violence,' particularly terrorist spectaculars — large actions aimed at Americans, like the Iran hostage crisis, the bombing of Pan Am Flight 103, and the hanging of hostage Lt. Colonel William Higgins in Lebanon (Nacos, 1994)." In these cases, she argues, the terrorists "exploited the free American media. They got an extraordinary amount of attention — up to two-thirds of the network evening news devoted to the events. Newspapers were similarly devoted." This manipulation of public opinion can be very harmful, she says.

According to Nacos (1995), government policy is often shaped by terrorist action, even in cases where a conflict of interest exists between the safety of hostages and the broader interests of the nation. In these cases, the media presents political leaders with a genuine dilemma.

Public opinion polls reveal that a majority of Americans agree that the government should never negotiate with terrorists, but in a time of crisis public opinion tends to flip-flop. The media's efforts usually enhance public sympathy for victims. As this demonstrates, terrorists have achieved their objective — they have coerced government officials indirectly through the media (Nacos, 1995).

This paper examines the media's influence on terrorism to determine whether the media should provide less coverage of terrorism or continue to report the news as it occurs.

In order to understand how terrorists use and manipulate the media to further their cause, it is important to consider how the media operates (Morgan, 2002). For the television industry, the most important business factor is ratings. News stations rely on rating points, which are determined by how many people watch their programs. News stations earn revenue through advertisers, so maintaining high ratings is essential to attracting high-paying advertising contracts.

How the Media Works

In the television industry, news stations experience "sweep" months, which occur during February, May, July, and November (Morgan, 2002). During these months, news stations broadcast many special reports as they compete for viewers. If news stations are unable to score enough rating points, they may replace their news departments with fresh talent.

It is ultimately up to news stations to show the public what it wants to see. Many people complain that there is too much sex and violence in the news, but the media argues that it is simply reflecting audience demand — if people did not watch it, the news stations would not show it. In many cases, even when people feel that something is offensive, some part of them still wants to see it.

News stations understand human nature and recognize that without gruesome or provocative material, ratings suffer. The success of programs like Hard Copy and Inside Edition demonstrates that a significant segment of the public wants hard-edged, dramatic news (Morgan, 2002).

Many observers have debated whether terrorists are interested in publicity. The evidence suggests the answer is largely yes. In 1974, scholar Brian Jenkins famously stated that "terrorism is theatre," and terrorists themselves tend to see it in that light (CFR, 2003). Narodnaya Volya, the late-19th-century Russian anarchist group, described its violent activities as "propaganda by deed." Over the past several decades, terrorists have planned their attacks specifically to generate maximum publicity, enabling them to broadcast their messages through all available channels.

Many experts believe that the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were planned so that billions of television viewers around the world would witness that the United States is a vulnerable nation (CFR, 2003). These attacks prompted extensive global reporting on al-Qaeda and its Islamist agenda, making these groups internationally known.

On the other hand, many experts note that the nature of terrorism is transforming. According to CFR (2003), "Jenkins has famously said that terrorists want a lot of people watching, not a lot of people dead. But the emergence of religious terror groups with apocalyptic outlooks and the availability of weapons of mass destruction may indicate that inflicting mass casualties has supplanted publicity as the primary goal of some terrorist campaigns."

Terrorists and Publicity

Terrorists need the media because it is an effective way to capture the attention of governments and the public. Most terrorist activities are calculated acts of violence designed to deliver a political or religious message. Terrorists aim to win popular support and often seek to prompt the attacked country to act rashly — thereby attracting recruits, polarizing public opinion, demonstrating their capacity to cause pain, or undermining governments.

For these reasons, many terrorists plan their attacks to attract media attention. Timothy McVeigh, convicted of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people, publicly stated that he chose the Murrah Federal Building as a target because it had "plenty of open space around it, to allow for the best possible news photos and television footage (CFR, 2003)."

The Italian leftist Red Brigades launched attacks on Saturdays so that they would make the Sunday newspapers, which were read by larger audiences (CFR, 2003). The Palestinian group Black September took a group of Israeli athletes hostage at the 1972 Munich Olympics because its leaders knew that people around the world were watching the games on television.

Had this group carried out the attack anywhere else, it would not have received the same level of coverage — television cameras and reporters from around the world were already on location. The event instantly commanded the attention of the global media and its viewers; approximately 800 million people watched the live coverage. As Jeffrey D. Simon wrote in The Terrorist Trap: "Terrorism was ahead of television technology at this time. The global sporting event was instantaneously transformed into a global terrorist event" (Simon, 1994, pp. 263–64).

Terrorist groups understand the power of the media well, and many operate their own media outlets. The Colombian leftist group FARC, for instance, broadcast its own radio programs, and many groups maintain websites to spread their message.

It is difficult to determine whether media coverage actually benefits terrorists. Many observers argue that any publicity is good publicity — even if an attack is unsuccessful, media coverage can raise awareness of the terrorists' cause. Terrorism, which commands a large share of news coverage, can also push neglected issues to the top of the political agenda. For example, a series of attacks in the 1970s and 1980s advanced the cause of Palestinian nationalism. Terrorism also sparks policy debates and public discussion, as the radical views of terrorist groups and the anger of victims and their families become widely publicized.

However, many experts doubt that media coverage reliably aids terrorists (CFR, 2003). Many terrorist attacks result in deaths and injuries that can alienate potential supporters and sympathizers. Furthermore, different terrorist activities carry different meanings for different audiences, making it impossible for terrorists to fully control how their actions are covered or perceived. When the media labels an event "terrorist," it focuses attention on the group's methods rather than its message, which often turns the group into a public enemy.

On September 11, 2001, millions of people sat glued to their televisions, watching seemingly endless news coverage of the terrorist attacks on the United States (Hamblen, 2002). Many watched hoping for information because they feared future attacks and wanted to be prepared; others watched because it helped them process the event; still others have suggested the media intentionally created addictive images reminiscent of an action film. This incident underscored the importance of understanding the community-wide effects of this type of media coverage.

Prior to September 11, the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in 1995 had been the worst terrorist act committed on U.S. soil. That attack resulted in 168 deaths and 700 injuries (Hamblen, 2002), and more than 16,000 individuals in the surrounding downtown area were affected by the blast. Given the severity of the event, the media covered it extensively.

Shortly after the bombing, researchers conducted a study revealing that two-thirds of a large group of Oklahoma schoolchildren in grades 6 through 12 reported that, in the seven weeks following the bombing, "most" or "all" of their television viewing was bomb-related. Even higher proportions of adults were tuning into coverage of the incident.

Several adult studies shed further light on the psychological effects of media coverage of terrorism (Hamblen, 2002):

Two hundred thirty-seven Israeli adults were divided into two groups. One group was exposed to television clips depicting terrorism and political violence; the other group watched news clips unrelated to national threat. Individuals who watched the terrorism clips reported significantly more anxiety than those who watched unrelated clips (Slone, 2000).

The Effect of the Media on Government Policy

Terrorists are adept at using the press to their advantage (Morgan, 2002). The TWA hijacking of 1985 illustrates the centrality of media planning to terrorist operations. Special events were organized for news crews, including an exclusive television network interview with Amal leader Nabih Birri. Another dramatic exclusive came from inside the cockpit of the hijacked plane: TWA captain John Testrake was shown to millions of viewers with a terrorist holding a pistol to his head. The terrorists even hosted a televised dinner for the hostages at a beachfront hotel (Nacos, 1994, p. 128). The more dramatic the coverage terrorists can generate — and the more effectively they frighten viewers or cause them to emotionally bond with the hostages — the greater their leverage in achieving their demands.

When the public becomes deeply concerned with the welfare of hostages, they are more likely to overlook the broader national interest, placing intense pressure on the government to act urgently. As Alexander Haig noted: "The emotional climate created by television in a hostage situation leads to national pronouncements in which the lives of the hostages take precedence over the broader interests of the American people as a whole" (Hickey, 1985, p. 22).

Regardless of its effect on terrorism, the media still feels obligated to cover terrorist events, because terrorism is newsworthy. According to CFR (2003): "Many terrorism scholars have identified a symbiotic relationship between terrorists, who want attention, and news organizations, which want dramatic stories to boost readership or ratings. Most news organizations, while aware that terrorist groups are manipulating them, want to report on major events without becoming a platform for terrorists. Critics say live television news is particularly susceptible to becoming an unwitting partner in the theater of terrorism."

Veteran news anchor Dan Rather captured the journalist's dilemma succinctly: "If you are covering a hijacking and you aren't going to cover the activities of the hijackers — even if they're staged — then aren't you in the wrong business?" (Broadcasting, 1985, pp. 76–78).

Charles Caudill, VP Senior Executive Producer of CNN, expressed a similar view: "It's our journalistic duty to cover it. We can't start deciding what news to cover. We can't censor the news. It's our job to put it all on — the good, the bad, and the ugly — and let people decide for themselves" (Morgan, 2002).

While most people accept that the media will not censor itself, many journalists adhere to a professional code of ethics. Most news stations avoid showing the most graphic footage they receive; choosing wide shots rather than close-ups of dead bodies still conveys the story without being gratuitously horrific. ABC's World News Tonight refused to air the disturbing footage of hanged hostage Lieutenant Colonel William Higgins in Lebanon, even though other stations had already broadcast it (Nacos, 1994, p. 158). Additionally, most news departments do not report suicides involving private individuals, to avoid encouraging copycat behavior or implying that the media will reward such acts with coverage.

Conclusion

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