Cologne puts Germany’s "lying press" on defensive
Media’s timidity on refugees prompts charges of bias.
By
Matthew Karnitschnig - 1/20/16
German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere at a news conference
BERLIN — Germany’s police and politicians have faced increasing anger in the wake of the New Year’s sex attack spree in Cologne, but much of the public’s ire has been directed at a group more comfortable asking questions than answering them: the news media.
After largely ignoring the story for several days after the attacks, much of the national media appeared reluctant to explore possible links between the attacks and the recent influx of refugees. Some commentators went so far as to suggest it was unlikely asylum seekers were even involved.
“In all likelihood, the people behind this have been here for a long time,” left-leaning daily
Süddeutsche Zeitung declared in its lead editorial a week after the attacks.
In other words, just as with the terror attacks in Paris, the culprits in Cologne were most likely homegrown “foreigners.” The real problem, the paper concluded, was likely “failed integration” — German society’s failure to assimilate foreigners.
Just hours after the article appeared, a police report on the assaults surfaced, revealing that many of the suspects were, in fact, refugees.
The German media’s timidity on the Cologne sex assault coverage has presented right-wing agitators with a useful “told you so” moment.
More thoughtful observers see a problem deeper than political bias behind the coverage of Cologne and the broader refugee crisis: a press corps that has shifted from dispassionate observer to political actor. Instead of just reporting and analyzing events, some influential journalists, especially those who work for the public broadcasting networks, consider it their professional duty to serve as a counterweight to the populist rhetoric fueling the country’s right-wing revival, critics say.
“Cologne has helped blow the top off,” said Roland Tichy, a veteran German editor who now runs an eponymous opinion site of conservative commentary.
Rise of the Right
The rapid rise of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party amid the refugee crisis — recent polls predict the party would win about 10 percent of the vote — has unnerved many liberals in and outside the media.
A core aspect of the AfD’s message is that Germany’s public debate is controlled by the politically correct strictures determined by the country’s media elite.
That view has resonated with many citizens who feel their voices aren’t being heard. A decision by local state broadcasters on Tuesday not to include the AfD in upcoming live studio debates ahead of March regional elections will only harden the belief that authorities are trying to suppress the party.
Even before Cologne, many Germans worried the media weren’t telling them everything. In a poll conducted by the respected Allensbach institute in December, 53 percent of respondents said they didn’t believe the media presented an accurate picture of the refugees’ qualifications for employment or other details.
A majority of Germans still trust the media, but more than 40 percent described the reporting on refugees as “one-sided.”
The most virulent strain of that distrust can be seen on Germany’s streets, during the regular marches by the anti-foreigner
Pegida group. Even before the recent wave of refugees began arriving, right-wing marchers revived a slur popular during the Nazi-era –
Lügenpresse, or lying press. A number of journalists have even been assaulted at the rallies.
While Germany’s printed press offers a multitude of opinions and views, the public broadcasting sector, once similarly diverse, has veered left in recent years, critics say.
“The public stations have evolved into Social Democratic/Green mainstream broadcasters,” Tichy said. “There’s no denying it.”
Hans-Peter Friedrich, a former interior minister under Angela Merkel, accused the public broadcasters of operating a “cartel of silence.”
“There’s suspicion that they believe they don’t have to report on such assaults, especially involving migrants and foreigners, for fear of unsettling the public,” he said.
Following Friedrich’s critique, a freelance reporter for German public broadcaster WDR
told a Dutch radio program that she and her colleagues were obliged to toe the government’s line on the refugee crisis. “We’re a public broadcaster and are therefore expected to approach the problem in a more positive way,” Claudia Zimmermann, the reporter, said.
WDR, the local broadcaster in the Cologne region, vigorously denied Zimmermann’s characterization. The station said it “follows the highest journalistic standards,” including on the refugees.
Zimmermann has since retracted,
saying she was nervous during the interview and had spoken “nonsense.”
The cautious approach to news, what one commentator recently called “nanny journalism,” is a vestige of the effort to reprogram Germans after World War II from Nazi sympathizers into peace-loving democrats.
http://www.politico.eu/article/colo...e-migration-refugees-attacks-sex-assault-nye/