Editorial. Does Emmanuel Macron want to muzzle the media and press freedom?

To fight against disinformation, Emmanuel Macron would like journalists to grant a label to so-called “serious” media. An idea which attracted the wrath of the right and the RN, from Marine Le Pen to David Lisnard, including Éric Ciotti.

“The union of the rights” exists… Or rather the union of the right and the extreme right. It manifested itself loudly on Tuesday December 2 all day in a parallel world, a sort of Stranger Things politics, this Netflix series whose heroes rush into a space-time gap to discover an upside-down world where a monster is rampant. In the upside-down world of the right and the RN, the monster is called Emmanuel Macron. He wants “sort media” pour “control information”.

Everyone, from Marine Le Pen to David Lisnard, from Éric Zemmour to Éric Ciotti, have sounded the alarm against “authoritarian drift” of an apprentice dictator who wants to gag the people to impose his “Ministry of Truth”straight out of 1984George Orwell’s novel. Until Bruno Retailleau who launched a petition for “defend freedom of expression” attacked by this “chief censor” of which he was still, less than two months ago, the Minister of the Interior.

The Minister of Culture, Rachida Dati, had to deny the accusation of the boss of LR, who supports her for the municipal elections in Paris, which shows if the right lives in an upside down world… Emmanuel Macron would like professionals to award a sort of label to distinguish the ethics of certain media from others which practice disinformation. But he repeats that this is certainly not the role of the State, because we would then be in “dictatorship”. This is precisely the false lawsuit that LR and the RN are bringing against him by taking up a charge launched by the media of the Bolloré group, which urge, evening and morning, the right and the extreme right to marry. QED. A well-executed political disinformation operation.

But is a label awarded by journalists a good idea? No, not really. There already exists an international standard called “JTI”, developed by 130 media experts and launched seven years ago by the NGO Reporters Without Borders. More than 2,000 media outlets around the world have requested it, 17 in France, including Radio France, are already certified. It’s serious, it’s virtuous, but that doesn’t stop the consumer of “fake news” from scrolling on Instagram and binging on TikTok videos. A bit like in our daily lives when we praise organic and fair trade, but we collect pairs of Sneakers while stuffing ourselves with burgers and fries. A standard is probably not very effective. But to cloak ourselves in outraged corporatism to reject any regulation in the age of AI and all-powerful networks is to condemn journalism to be swept away by the storm of disinformation.