Madam, - The recent unremitting media campaign to force a private sports organisation to change one of its rules underlines the need for a compulsory media studies course in Irish schools.
The Irish media exercise their power to influence elected governments and instigate social change while, at the same time, remaining completely unaccountable to the community at large, which has to bear the consequences. Many in the media justify their right to exercise this power on the basis of the inherent superiority (as they see it) of their value systems over those of everybody else. The fact that this hubris undermines the role of the media as a democratic watchdog doesn't seem to bother them.
Realpolitik dictates that no government will attempt to make the media properly accountable to the electorate. The only solution is to ensure that Irish youth are taught to view all media pronouncements as cynically as they view everything else. - Yours, etc.,
W. ROE, Dublin 6.