Editorial: Media manipulation insidious

Government officials can choose not to believe the media reports claiming that China plans to pump US$1 billion into Taiwan's economy in order to manipulate it. However, there is the possibility that Beijing may take advantage of Taiwan's economic difficulties and try to manipulate the media and media advertising. As Chen Po-chih (陳博志), chairman of the Council for Economic Planning and Development, said: "One doesn't need to spend US$1 billion to influence Taiwan's economy. One can do it by just starting a few newspapers [in Taiwan]."

Quoting the results of an opinion poll it conducted, the United Daily News (聯合報) claimed last week that the proportion of people in Taiwan who support "one country, two systems" had risen to 33 percent. Anyone familiar with polling knows how easy it is to manipulate a survey to get the desired results. In the United Daily New's questionnaire, the key phrase "one country" covers both supporters of the PRC and ROC -- people who support different ways of interpreting the word "China." The problem is that a "one country, two systems" model generated by such a broad definition of China is not what Beijing is talking about. To Beijing, "one country" means the PRC.

Such manipulation of a storyline lowers the United Daily's actions to the level of Beijing's Xinhua reporters stationed in Taiwan -- who consistently blacken Taiwan's image, misleading the government and the people of China.

Taiwan has long witnessed the dissemination of pro-China propaganda by a handful of people who have control over the print and electronic media. Negative reports and commentaries about Taiwan are found in the local media on a daily basis, writing the country off. Meanwhile, China is viewed through rose-colored glasses -- its economy is said to be shining, with the world's second-largest foreign exchange reserves (the fact that China's foreign debt surpasses its foreign exchange reserves is overlooked). According to several stories, China is Taiwan's only savior, the only force able to pull Taiwan's out of its economic doldrums and, of course, the only torch-bearer of hope for ethnic Chinese throughout the world. The electronic media is even worse, with biased politicians and scholars presented as political observers on call-in shows. Their constant barrage of abuse at everything the government does has a corrosive effect on public opinion.

There have been rumors recently that Beijing wants to wrest control of Taiwan's media and advertising companies in the run-up to the year-end legislative and local elections by infusing capital via Hong Kong. According to these rumors, Beijing wants to back an advertising campaign for pro-China legislative candidates in order to weaken the impact of an alliance between the DPP and former president Lee Teng-hui's (李登輝) new political party and to prevent pro-Taiwan groups from winning a majority in the legislature.

While it is easy to dismiss such rumors as paranoid delusions, the people of Taiwan should still keep up their guard against a foreign regime using a handful of greedy, unscrupulous people to interfere domestically. Otherwise, once the campaign begins in earnest, people may be shocked to find their streets filled with anti-Taiwan and anti-localization propaganda. Both the government and the people must be alert to any attempt by Beijing to manipulate the mass media. The people of Taiwan must be willing to stand up for themselves, otherwise they will be nothing more than lambs headed for the slaughter.