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JEDDAH: An executive at the Saudi Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) has stressed the role of media in being consistent with the human values that drive forward development, not violence.
Majid bin Jaafar Al-Ghamdi, director of training and development at SBC, said the media greatly affect people’s thoughts and opinions.
He noted that if one wants to change the youth in any society, five factors are at play: Convictions, interests, role models, skills and relationships — and this is what media content presents.
“Here comes our role to focus on directing these five positive factors to serve Arab and Islamic values,” he added.
Al-Ghamdi counted 1,294 Arab satellite channels — of which about 152 channels are dedicated to drama, 124 for music, and 170 for sports.
“On the other hand, there are only 17 educational channels, 16 documentary channels, and only nine cultural channels,” he added.
He also pointed to a significant fact: Only 4 percent of the public creates good information on the Internet, against 96 percent who consume this content.
Al-Ghamdi noted a study on American children which said that children consume an average of 20 hours or more of television a week.
He added: “By the time the child becomes 18 years old, he has already watched more than 20,000 media contents laden with violence, and more than 16,000 media contents imbued with murder.”
The director of training and development at SBC stressed six basic factors that every media employee should adhere to: responsibility, media and press freedom, independence, credibility and accuracy, neutrality, and maintaining the rights of others.