Media justice

Carlos Ramos, QUITO, Ecuador, September 3, 2003

A prestigious polling firm in the capital city of Quito recently published the results of Taxi Heathrow Airport a survey about the popularity, credibility and positive management of several politicians responsible for different state sectors.

The same study also measured which institutions have the greatest credibility and are most trusted by Ecuadorians who live in Quito and Guayaquil, Ecuador’s two most populated cities. According to the survey, 12 percent have confidence in the Church (in this poll and in many sectors of society the “Church” is exclusively considered to be the Catholic Church).

In August 2003, 14 percent of Ecuadorians said they have confidence in the communication media, 12 percent in the armed forces, and 12 percent in both the municipalities and the anti-corruption commission.

If the results are compared with a poll taken in January, the changes are significant. In January, the Church was in first place with 38 percent, followed by the armed forces with 13 percent. Communication media were in third place with 8 percent, the anti-corruption commission had 5 percent while the municipalities had 4 percent.

Why did the Church (understood to be Catholic) fall 26 percentage points in six months? The explanation lies in a scandal that broke in March that allegedly implicated the Rev. Carlos Flores in several crimes, including embezzlement. Flores reportedly amassed a fortune while he was Quito customs’ officer in 2000-2002 under the government of Catholic Gustavo Noboa.

Flores is currently a fugitive from justice living in the United States. His guilt has not been established but the major media coverage given to the scandal has meant that the general public is convinced that he and his superiors were guilty: the priest for having stolen money and the hierarchy for having allowed him to exercise a public role in the first place.

The case leads us to make several reflections. The first is the inconvenience of mixing a priestly or pastoral role with a public and political role. The second is the lack of common sense and discipline on the part of the hierarchy that allowed a priest to exercise such a delicate role. Thirdly, it is false to assume that a single personal can moralize corrupt public arenas; it is absurd to believe that a priest can moralize a brothel by administering it honestly.

The most important lesson that we can glean is what we could call “media justice.” This is the tremendous power of modern media to present a case from their own perspective and to lead the population to judge and condemn the involved, regardless of whether they are in fact guilty.

Finally, the case invites us to reflect about the enormous importance of our individual conduct as it can lead us to raise up our community of faith or to cause immense damage.