The Media and Environmental Issues
The function of the media amongst others is the surveillance of the environment in order to keep society duly informed about events (Harold Lasswell; Wilbur Schramm; Dennis McQuail).This means the monitoring of the activities of people, objects and systems within the environment to make sure they act in conformity with the expected laws for security social and environmental control. This is done to expose any violation and then giving the public the pieces of information in anticipation of expected reaction or action on the issue (Seema Hasan, 2014).Life will not be of quality and the ecosystem may be degraded without the surveillance of the media because it provides us with the information about the environment in which we live. This enables us to protect ourselves from harm. This protection could be in the form of providing vital information on the degradation of the environment by dumping of toxic wastes, overflowing refuse dump, untreated nuclear waste, pollution of the sea and any other unwholesome act of man to degrade the natural environment.
The media have a social responsibility to mobilise the audience against any act that will act against human existence, such as the degradation of the environment, thereby fulfilling its mass mobilisation role as posited by Dennis McQuail.This is based on the belief that the media assume a very vital responsibility in society, therefore, it should uphold certain obligations as it is accountable