Spzi

So is social media, and the openness of free societies to internal (the rich owning the media) and external (foreign adversaries) tampering. Spreading misinformation, eroding trust in institutions and truth itself, poisons like that.

Many democracies are crumbling this way. We yet have to find an effective antidote.

Regardless of the voting system, there still is a worryingly large portion of voters who were corrupted to serve other’s interests. And that is true to all (?) countries. That not just any two democracies fall first, but GB and US, kind of shows us that it could be anyone.

So while it is easy to look down on the fallen, or feel ashamed to be that - we’re helpless in this together. Hate to end like that.

There is so much in this direction. For a fraction of the budget, you could obliterate both the Russian army and economy, without losing any soldiers. What an opportunity, what a deal. Unless you’re owned by Russia, of course.

why bother reporting?

Here are some of the many ways this could be answered:

• To exercise this core freedom, to not lose it. What comes out of it is a much less important question. The day news outlets remain silent about wrongdoings because they believe nobody cares anyways is going to be one of the darkest days towards the death of democracy.
• Separation of powers means the Press is not the Legislative, which is not the Judicative. The question seems to assume they were all one, or since the Press lacks the means of the other two, it’s mission would be kind of futile. But since these powers are separated, it is irrelevant to the Press wether and what legal actions follow (aside from being stories worth covering in themselves). It’s simply not the job of reporting to carry out arrests, and the lack of arrests, even when necessary, does not devalue the reporting. Maybe even on the contrary: It’s probably of much more value to society to report about things which aren’t already dealt with.
• It is totally relatable to feel powerless, maybe even getting accustomed to things going south. But I think we should be extra careful how these sentiments are communicated. A necessary prelude to that darkest day from above, is when outlets still report, but are met with nothing but indifferent “water is wet”, “can’t do anything so why care at all?” comments.