by Alexis von Mirbach / The feud between Siegfried Weischenberg and Michael Meyen is no secret in the world of communication studies and provides the only logical explanation for the claim that our book Das Elend der Medien [The misery of the media] forms part of a field called alternative media criticism (AMC).
by Florian Zollmann / Siegfried Weischenberg regards Noam Chomsky’s propaganda approach as exemplary of an Alternative Media Criticism (AMC). According to Weischenberg, the AMC is lacking in balance as well as scientific relativization and differentiation. As the following article will show, Weischenberg’s account of Chomsky’s propaganda approach is incorrect and inconsistent with the academic literature.
by Mandy Tröger / Building on the paper by Günther and Schultz (2021) »Ten Theses for Strong Journalism in a Digital Media World«, this paper adds an eleventh thesis to the case: Good digital journalism will have to face the issue of new structural dependencies created by tech sponsorship. For when journalism is funded by corporations such as Google or Facebook, digital journalism is subjected to new market and product logics, not least because these corporations provide the digital infrastructures.
by Oliver Günther and Tanjev Schultz / Digitalization is transforming journalistic processes and ways of working. The sector must resist being subjected to the logic of markets and products. Reflecting on the standards and objectives of journalism is vital. In ten propositions, this paper outlines the tension between journalistic autonomy and technological change, calling for confident journalism that trusts both editorial offices and the audience to play a more proactive role.
by Martina Thiele / The author makes a case for a new perspective in the journalistic debate about political correctness and Cancel Culture. Instead of discussing specific terms and language or freedom of expression and censorship in general, we should focus on privilege and power in order to determine who exerts power over our social discourse from which position as well as to expose inconsistencies. For it is mostly those who wield journalistic power who claim to be threatened by speech bans and censorship.
by Ingo von Münch / Much has been written about political correctness (also: Cancel Culture) in many media. Less attention has been paid to the question of whether and why political correctness represents a serious threat to freedom of the press and thus poses a danger to journalism. The following debate contribution answers this question in the affirmative, referencing key aspects such as information bans, topic bans, governmental language regulation, and a trend towards intolerance.
by Gabriele Hooffacker / Today, »alternative media« is used as an umbrella term for a variety of different media products. Some of them simply aim to inject new topics and information into the public discourse of civil society, while others disseminate content that fuels hate against certain groups.
by Michael Meyen / The very fact that this magazine is dedicating space to the topic of »alternative media« is a symptom of the decline of journalism. Its compulsive focus on attention, increasing medialization, and the proximity between editorial offices and decision-makers are keeping the mainstream media from fulfilling their public mandate.
by Timo Rieg / The journalistic reporting on the coronavirus pandemic displayed many essentially familiar deficits. Research and diversity of opinion came up particularly short. Journalism failed to ask crucial questions or look for critical voices. At the same time, policymakers were implementing measures that will have effects and side-effects for many years to come and for which, given its lack of involvement, the democratic sovereign cannot bear responsibility.
by Tanjev Schultz / We are living in strange times. Few other countries have (so far) dealt with the coronavirus crisis as well as Germany, yet there are many who would have you think that the country and its institutions are on the brink of ruin. Arrogant media critique is not satisfied with merely highlighting the errors and mistakes that the press has undoubtedly made – it clamors to diagnose systemic failure of the media. This type of media critique noticeably suffers from exactly the distortions that it claims to see in journalism itself: negativity, one-sidedness, and exaggeration.
