Will print media lose their freedom?

“What is the likelihood that there will be no freedom of the print media?” - asks Leonid Bershidsky in the article “Censorship from the Consumer”, published in Gazeta.Ru on February 25, 2005. And he answers the question: the likelihood of this is not too high if the publications do not turn into opposition ones.

Unlike television, where, of course, there is strict censorship, the author believes, there are print media that are still free.

It is impossible to sharply reduce the level of freedom in newspapers and magazines: “ Print journalists are more difficult to “build”: ... good reporters and columnists are needed everywhere.”

“As long as the editorial offices of paper publications are not sealed and circulations are not destroyed, an intelligent person - unlike a principled television viewer - will live in a country with an acceptable level of freedom.” And opposition publications, like the Weekly Journal, which have a clear political overtones, will fall victim to the “only form of censorship” - advertisers. The Weekly Journal was closed not by Putin, but by advertisers fearing suspicions of supporting the magazine's anti-Putin position. On the contrary, “advertising will not disappear from publications where sharp criticism of the authorities is not the only thing offered to the reader.”

“Print journalists are practically the only ones who, in the current politically gray times, have retained not only internal freedom, but also the desire to share it with others. Therefore, in good paper media there is no self-censorship. The desire to find a balance between the struggle for justice and interest in life is here and now - not self-censorship ,” says L. Bershidsky.

Sources

• Bershidsky L. Censorship from the consumer // Gazeta.Ru. 25 February.