Weekly Commentary

June 09, 2008

"The sky is falling!" That headline would understandably grab more attention than one that says "The sky is blue." However, extreme or catastrophic announcements aside, I wonder at times if it is a journalistic requirement to maximize the negative and minimize the positive. Let's do a consumer test right now to test my (jaded) theory on this.

Ready? Here goes. Were you aware through the media last week that there was a closing down of an auto manufacturing plant in Ontario? If you were aware, please raise your hand right now, wherever you are reading this and hold it up until you feel silly. Okay, I can feel by that show of hands that quite a few of you caught that item on the news.

Now, by a similar show of hands, were you aware that last week there was an opening of an auto manufacturing plant in Ontario that will create at least 500(!) jobs? Hmm, I'm looking all around and I can't see nearly as many hands in the air. Ok, you can put them down now.

Now don't you find that interesting? A plant closure gets such media saturation that everybody hears about it. But a plant opening gets so little reporting that very few know about it. Now, I fully realize that a closure of that magnitude is big news. When that many workers and families have their lives so totally upset that's a human interest and economic story of compelling proportions. But, to have in the very same week and region a plant opening that will also affect thousands of lives, but in a positive way, that should also be worthy of broad, not scant coverage.

Quite rightly we enjoy freedom of the press in our vibrant democracy. We would never want that diminished. It just makes me wonder on a daily basis if there is a genuine sentiment or even an unwritten law in the major media outlets that bad news (which of course must be reported) must outweigh good news.

Here's an interesting bit of news. This week in Parliament we moved ahead with something called Bill C-10. Among other things, this piece of tax law will deal with tax credits which can be awarded to film productions in Canada. This Bill will allow the Government to decline a request for subsidy if the film is pornographic, excessively violent or denigrating to ethnic or other groups. We are continuing a process initiated under the previous Liberal government and approved by all parties.

Most of the media reporting on Bill C-10 covers certain lobbyists in the film industry who accuse us of censorship. This is not the case at all. As a matter of fact pornographic films for instance or grossly violent films are produced independent of taxpayer dollars all the time. The government is simply saying that as the stewards of the hard earned dollars of taxpayers we must have the ability to say there are some things that should be left up to private citizens to pay for, rather than the Government.

So fear not, there are no Government thought police sweeping the theatres to see what you've chosen to watch. But we will watch your tax dollars for you to make sure they're being appropriately spent on the things that matter most in public policy.