The Agenda-Setting Mystery Continues
Masterwordsmith
Oops! They are doing it again. Doing what? Agenda setting of course!
Agenda setting is a theory of mass communication effects which believes that via the editorial selection process, the MSM defines and transmits political objects to the masses in such a way which affects the relative importance of these objects to the public. Of course the news media may not dictate to the public what to think (such as which candidate to support in the forthcoming Kerdau by-election or the imminent Sarawak state polls), but they tell the public what to think about even to the extent of subtle propaganda via daily news snippets.
Professionally, journalists have been trained to abide by journalistic norms called news values such as proximity, timeliness, conflict, celebrity and human interest. With these, they can determine what is worth reporting thereby indirectly setting the topic of kopi tiam discussions.
In this way, the media subtly guides readers as to what to think, how to think and once they formulate their opinions, influence others to think likewise when these topics are made public not just from the airing in the MSM but also in blog posts, discussions and forwarded articles via email or discussion boards.
Take a look at a few articles that were aired today in chronological order i.e. from the earliest article aired today to the latest aired at the time of writing this post.
1. The Star carried an article HERE titled Talk rife Sarawak polls is near.
2.Reuters released this report on Possible ramifications of Sarawak election.
3. Aidil Syukri of Malaysian Digest wrote about Merlimau & Kerdau: A Sure Win for BN
4. The Malaysian Insider carried this story on One eye on Sarawak, Pakatan resigned to by-election losses.
5. The latest Bernama press release is on Analysts: BN Will Lose Seats But Retain Two-Thirds Majority In Sarawak Election.
This sudden surge in messages, especially pro-BN messages is unprecedented. Personally, I would go with the Reuters report. In fact, I was going to write something along those lines last night but was too dogged tired and hey presto, I saw the Reuters report this morning and knew I am on the right track.
Let’s face it. We know the news media agenda is essentially ubiquitous. The MSM acts like opinion leaders talking to opinion followers (the readers). In that way, the news media agenda permeates society bit by bit, day by day.
The five examples I listed above shows that the same stimulus/message is being transmitted via different communication channels and so such repetition can slowly ‘brainwash’ influence the masses to do/think in line with the thoughts/actions of the status quo.
