Afternoon Session 2: The role of the media in monitoring implementation Carl O'Brien
The media has a vital role to play as a watchdog in ensuring the government turns
treaty provisions into meaningful law, programs and services on the ground. Yet,
these issues are already under-reported in the media. So, how do we help ensure
that the media plays a stronger role in promoting a culture of transparency and
accountability? Firstly, we should look at HOW issues such as rights or issues
facing people with disabilities are reported; then WHY they are depicted or
reported in this manner; and then WHAT we can do to improve this.1. How these
issues are reported:- Rights of people with disabilities are under-reported in the
media. In many ways, the media accurately reflects society which has historically
addressed disability as a marginalised issue and not of relevance to the community
at large. It is rarely on the front-pages, or on the main headlines of the news
bulletins - despite that fact that as many one in ten people have some form of
disability. The fact that social affairs correspondents – who tend to report on the
marginalised or excluded – typically cover the area of disability speaks volumes of
how the issue is perceived in the media. Take a report last year by the Mental
Health Commission into the mistreatment of psychiatric patients and intellectually
disabled people in a hospital in Co Tipperary last year; its conclusions -that
patients were wrongly sedated and mistreated - were shocking, but it didn’t get
the kind of coverage it merited across much of the media. If, for example, patients
in an acute hospital were forced to endure the same experiences, it’s fair to assume
there would be a national outcry and calls for a statutory public inquiry. Yet this
report has effectively disappeared without trace.- A Lack of representation of
people with disabilities in the media. We don’t tend to hear them on panels on the
discussion shows; if they are, it tends to be in niche programming like Outside the
Box. There are exceptions, like Brian Crowley MEP, or Frank Gardner, security
correspondent with the BBC.- Stereotypes of people with disability still persist.
There is unease in language we use, many still using phrases like “wheelchairbound”, or “suffering from a disability”, etc. People with disabilities tend to be
portrayed as either a victim, or a hero. We don't always portray them properly.
Most of our focus is on cuts to entitlements or allowances, which can maintain
stereotypes of people with disabilities as passive and helplessness, etc.2. Why
people with disabilities - or issues affecting them - are reported or depicted in this
manner. Why the media reports issues of disability in this way is more difficult to
answer - but there are some explanations to why these issues are under-reported.Politically, issues affected people with disabilities are not seen as important. As a
result, they are not deemed important in the media. Journalists are not free spirits
wandering the world in search of the truth, but workers expected to produce news
to fill newspapers or broadcast time, often on a 24-hour basis. It’s no accident that
the political arena is where most journalists are found. (In fact, media
organisations tend to have more reporters covering politics than any other field.
The Irish Times, for example, has six, sometimes even seven reporters based in
Leinster House).This is because the political system supplies a never-ending
supply of information in an easily transmitted form through briefings and press
releases from people with an understanding of deadlines and the media. This also
means, given the investment media organisations make in the political system in
terms of staff numbers, many stories only become news when they enter the
political sphere. It’s no co-incidence that disability made headlines during the
Kathy Sinnott case and around the time of the failed Disability Act, because these
issues were causing political waves.- Issues affecting people with disabilities
deemed as less important to the community at large. Any news editor when
deciding to run a story will always ask “how many people does this affect.” As a
rule of thumb, the more people a story affects – especially those in the middle
classes - the more prominence it gets. This is a crucial point: if it affects powerful
people like middle classes - the people who vote, the people who buy the material
that’s advertised in the papers - they are considered even more important. For
example, the stamp duty became a major one in the run up to the last general
election, when, objectively , there were far greater issues affecting society in
general. There is a perception – rightly or wrongly - on the part of the news media
that marginalised issues like disability do not affect people who read newspapers
or listen to the radio.- A perceived lack of authoritative voices. Media relies to a
great extent on sources that are regarded or perceived to be authoritative or
trustworthy. This is important because a reporter cannot always know if they’re
being told the truth or not, much of the time. The most authoritative the source, the
more authoritative the story. That why there is such a reliance on the political
party leader or his spokesman rather than backbenchers; the trade union general
secretary rather than rank and file members, etc. Yet, there is often a lack of senior
professionals willing to speak out about disability. Beside groups like Inclusion
Ireland, it is rare to see health professionals playing a pro-active role in speaking
out or lobbying on disabilityissues.3. What can be done to ensure the media fulfills
its watchdog role regarding the implementation and monitoring of disability
issues? There are some steps which can help.- Disability issues need to be
politicised. There are examples of where traditionally marginalised issues have
entered the mainstream such as the Make Poverty History campaign. This had a
number of hallmarks such as (1) setting clear goals, (2) gathering disparate groups
together to share a stronger voice (3) politicising these issues to effect more urgent
change. Cancer care , also, was once marginalised as the big ‘C’. This has changed
through greater awareness of cancer, highlighting its prevalence, political pressure
over the lack of political action and the eventual appointment of a “cancer tzar”.
The disability movement can learn from this.- Emphasis on the voices of people
with disabilities; and the abilities of people with disabilities. There is still a
stereotype around people with disabilities; through awareness raising campaigns,
programmes to ensure voices of people with disabilities are heard, this perception
can be tackled. For example, there is interesting work in inner-city Dublin where
tenants of corporation flats are being given media training, so their voices can be
heard in the news, rather than their advocates; this is something worth examining
in the context of disability.* Professionals must play a stronger role in speaking
out for people’s rights and for proper services. Groups like Inclusion Ireland do
magnificent work - but they can’t do the heavy-lifting alone. Over and over again,
we see examples of the work of the media helping to provoke real and meaningful
change. Whether it’s exposing -- on an international level -- the torture and human
rights abuses carried out against prisoners in Iraq; closer to home, exposing
corruption and the slippery connections between political donations and planning
favours; or, at a more banal level, helping to get the streets cleaned or a homeless
shelter opened. I submit that the media has an enormous capacity to make a
genuine difference to society and to attitudes to mental health – but not on its own.
It need the proactive involvement of lobby groups, health professionals and the
State to fight this battle and ensure there is greater action on disability.