DEC 2 — Corruption was the topic of discussion on the evening programme of my favourite local radio station, BFM, yesterday while I was stuck in traffic.

They were talking about corruption relating to the country’s governance and law enforcement. I had my opinions on that but that’s not really what I want to write about here.

The discussion on the programme really got me thinking about corruption in my profession, which is journalism and the media.

I’m sure most of you readers would have heard about the recent controversy involving the BBC and the Malaysian government. 

The BBC was found to have breached its editorial guidelines by broadcasting paid-for programming that was promoting the Malaysian government.

This act would be considered by many, me included, as unethical and corrupt. It involves money and it is misleading. Am I right?

But I am also sure that many would disagree and their argument would be that there are many news media organisations that take advertising and sponsorship money.

From my perspective, I strongly believe that news and journalistic content should never be corrupted by money, and this includes advertising and sponsorship money.

My argument is that money is the root of all evil and, hence, when it comes to journalistic content, money can influence the way this content is portrayed.

And if money becomes such a big influence, the content may be compromised and not be credible (read: honest) at all.

For the sake of proving a point, let me give you a simple example. Let’s say a newspaper has a car review section and it also accepts automobile advertisements.

Let’s say that the latest car in the market is a Proton Saga and the newspaper decides to write a review of the car so their readers can be better informed.

Let’s say that the newspaper will also be running advertisements paid for by Honda. Wouldn’t that mean that Honda now wields a certain amount of influence?

Wouldn’t that mean that Honda can now dictate how the review of the new Proton Saga model should be?

The influence may even be as indirect as the fear that Honda might pull out their advertising money if a positive review was published. Journalistic content is compromised.

So in my honest opinion, I think that all news media organisations should never accept advertising or sponsorship money because it would mean a loss in credibility.

So how would I suggest news organisations sustain themselves? I don’t know because in an ideal world, there would be no money involved in journalism.

But, of course, an ideal world is not upon us. So these organisations could probably sustain on donations by the public or it could be through taxpayers’ money.

My reasoning for this is that journalists are supposed to be responsible and obligated to their readers anyway. Am I right?

And this can be actually quite feasible too. PBS in the US actually takes donations and the BBC is funded by taxpayers’ money (but now we know the truth!).

I know I’ve also been known to denounce objective journalism and that there is nothing wrong with biasness when it comes to journalism.

Honesty is key and full disclosure should be made and that the biasness has to be something that the journalist truly believes in.

Let me try to explain this in a clearer way. Let’s say a journalist is writing a review of the new Proton Saga model and he hates the car because he has had a bad history using Proton cars.

If the journalist is honest about his biasness because of his experience, as a reader I would actually consider the review to be fair enough.

However, if I were to see a Honda advertisement right next to the Proton Saga review, then I would definitely not consider the review honest enough.

Why so? Well, the newspaper could be pressured into writing a negative review — or even go so far as fabricating its feelings and thoughts on the Proton Saga.

So there’s my two cents’ worth. But I do understand that I could wait forever for an ideal world to materialise. So we just have to trust that journalists do have integrity.

* The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist.