Media watchdog organizations yesterday denounced the prevalence of unfounded information reported in the nation's newspapers and the large amount of obscene language on television.
A report conducted by Taiwan's Association of University Professors (
Yu Ying-fu (尤英夫), a member of the professor's association, said that the reporting of news without providing sufficient information about sources or facts is "upholding gossip instead of news professionalism."
"Providing names and a clear source of information is the basic knowledge a news reporter should have. Reporting news without giving facts and sources is totally outrageous," Yu said, citing the example of a report from a local newspaper on an alleged drug party at Taipei City's Huashan Arts District (
The TAA said it would send copies of the reports to media organizations and advertisers that have registered with the TAA.
Meanwhile, at a press conference yesterday, the TAA released its media watch reports for June and July.
The report on TV entertainment programs was done by Mothers Observing Media Foundation (
The foundation monitored nine entertainment shows produced by the four major broadcasting stations -- TTV, CTV, CTS and FTV -- and said they found the most serious problem among the programs was what they called improper content.
The foundation defines improper content as obscene language, pornographic or violent behavior or a violation of privacy.
Fang Di (
"These use curse and swear words, which are often used as catch phrases by the show's hosts. This could have a profoundly negative influence on our children," Fang said, emphasizing that the shows monitored had all been rated as suitable for viewers of all ages.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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