THE NEWSPAPERS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 19, Issue 486, 15 October 1948, Page 14

THE NEWSPAPERS

Sir,-Unfortunately, I did not hear the 1ZB Citizens’ Forum discuss the New Zealand Press, but if the account given by S. G. Gapper and B, A. Melville is in any way accurate I suggest that the "second-hand and shop-soiled knowledge" of Dr. Musgrove and Mr. Laird can still do with plenty of airing. Even if it can be proved that. the newspapers are providing what the public "wants" we can still ask: is this a Good Thing? And how far~does the presentation of the news condition us to want what the newspaper wants us to want? Now that universal literacy and swift communications have made it possible for the Press to make and unmake mass attitudes within a matter of days, it is all the more urgent that we should have constant reminders of the necessity to read our newspapers with critical judgment. The spate of now-it-can-be-told books by such newspaper correspondents as Beverley Nichols, Douglas Reed, Vincent Sheehan, van Paassen, and others, even allowing for the personal foibles of the writers have given ample evidence to support the charges made against the Press, and I suggest that research into New Zealand newspaper files would do the same.

Your correspondents. attack the restriction of advertising by arguing that this would raise the cost of the paper, .but surely if the present cost of lavish advertising were chopped off the price of goods, the reader would have so much more cash to buy his paper at the increased price. Morever, those at present engaged in the parasitic advertising industry would be released for more socially useful work. A final point: Is modern man any happier for looking on his daily newspaper as a necessity? Do we live any the better for eating our breakfast every morning to the accompaniment of the latest diplomatic hand-outs and café gossip of the world’s capitals?

NEIL

SMITH

(Otorohanga).