No news is bad news

THE EDITOR, Madam:

On June 14, Canada’s second-largest broadcaster, CTV News, announced major unexpected layoffs that affected not only staff at local television stations, but also high-profile bureau chiefs in global capitals. Just by coincidence, that same day BBC-TV carried a panel discussion where the presenter stated that, according to Pew Research data, 25 per cent less viewers are watching television newscasts than six years ago. The main reason given was that there is too much bad news on television newscasts, which effects viewers’ mental health, and people were choosing to get their news from social media outlets.

Also on that same day, my newspaper reported on the recent Tony Awards show, with banner headlines about an award won by a transgender actor who declared : “ Thank you for seeing me, Broadway. I should not be up here as a queer, non-binary, fat, black little baby from Massachusetts.” Not being a Broadway fan, I checked my desktop and found a picture of the actor resplendent in a gold lame’ dress clutching the Tony Award. The Statistics Canada website informs that about 0.24 per cent identify as transgender, or about one in every 400 people. Presumably those percentages are similar in every country, yet stories about transgender, non-binary, gender-fluid, gender-queer or agender people are frequently predominant on so many newscasts these days. Just maybe that’s another factor why more viewers find some newscasts biased and tune out, simply wishing that people would keep their sexual proclivities to themselves. It is the most private of everyone’s business, after all.

I have always been an avid consumer of news, dating from early formative years in the UK listening to the BBC on my parents’ crackling tube radio, then through the transistor phase, and tuning into short-wave radio broadcasts from around the globe during my lengthy merchant navy career. That was long before the days of the Internet, with the advent of so many information highways going in various directions, and carrying what often turns out to be fake news. According to a leading technology website ( www.makeuseof.com), no news outlet is completely unbiased, but the top four that attempt to remain impartial are Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Associated Press and the BBC. Those of us who enjoy news broadcasts must be diligent to pick and choose between fact and fiction, while trying to keep informed; and remember that there’s more than one meaning to the old adage ‘No news is bad news.’

BERNIE SMITH

Parksville, BC

Canada