With the rise of social media, which have provided fertile grounds for the proliferation of fake news, a veteran journalist and former president of the Press Association of Jamaica (PAJ) is urging citizens not to abandon traditional media as a source for credible information.

“Jostling with traditional media is the new guy on the block, social media. Social media is a real information jungle out there. I don’t run with any information I get from social media without checking and cross-checking. My mantra is when in doubt, check it, still in doubt, leave it. Obviously, social media is one of the new wonders of the world. It only has one way to go and that is up, yet you have to wonder how good it is right now for a small information star, still-not-literate enough country like Jamaica, and can you manage to advance a country like Jamaica without traditional media? Desmond Allen asked the gathering of tertiary students, academics and media practitioners.

Allen was speaking at the University of Technology (UTech) Jamaica 65th anniversary distinguished public lecture on Thursday, November 9, at the Papine campus in St Andrew.

“We can’t live on fake news, we have to clean up the news, clean up information before we send it to the public, and that is the basis for doing the job. So, until we reach that point where we can be confident in the information served on social media, we need to protect the traditional media and I am saying this to advertisers, don’t abandon traditional media for you are certainly not sure what you are going to get into and I believe this is a national imperative,” he added.

Allen, who has more than 50 years of experience in journalism, expressed that the traditional media has evolved from hard-hitting news to now focusing on sports, entertainment, and economics.

He further underscored that the traditional media must revive itself to help in the country’s fight against crime.

“Of course, in exchange for greater protection, the traditional media must revamp itself. It must find ways to give more to the society. May I suggest that one way in which the media can best serve the country is in the fight against crime. Our politicians have lost the battle against crime. Let’s not even fool ourselves for one minute, they have run out of ideas, calling for divine intervention or relying on states of public emergency, which are meant to be a temporary short treatment but now have become permanent,” Allen stressed.

He further urged media entities to establish a media crime watch to encourage the public to operate as the eyes and ears of law enforcement by providing information anonymously about the activities of criminals to the media which will then be passed on to the commissioner of police.

“We will also appeal to the political parties to remove crime as part of their partisan political agenda and support us in the national fight against crime. Finally, I believe that the media can incentivise the political parties to revive and energise themselves to renew their national intention to serve the country at election time. The media should seriously consider endorsing a political party and that party would have to do its best to meet a set of criteria that will be the benefit of the entire country. That endorsement will not be for a lifetime, it will be exercised when it’s a general election, it will be a new endorsement in the Jamaican society but is common in developed countries,” he said.