A new world of free speech is dawning in the region and according to the columns appearing in the New York Times, the International Herald Tribune and other arbiters of global opinion, most of the credit goes to Al-Jazeera channel. Well, there are a number of ironies right there. The channel does have very real and less ambiguous accomplishments which I will touch upon later on. Many hosts, in contrast to Ad-Deeb, are not necessarily well prepared. And the drift of TV talk shows, while theoretically opening up new channels of public discourse on previously taboo subjects of social import, to quote the favorable literature, is receding away from opinion that is informed to opinion that is sensationalist.
Opinions are indeed a dime a dozen.
It's an intellectual vice that the modern Arab world suffers from. Presumably what makes an opinion informed and thereby contributes to informed public opinion is the acquisition at least of relevant and substantial fact, and ideally of knowledge and wisdom. In the Arab East there was never any TV journalism until the Gulf War. Until recently only cameramen would cover official events, editing their footage in camera, footage which would then be aired while the news reader read wire copy from the official news agency, approximating the event without any organic relationship of image and voice that is intrinsic to an edited TV news report script. There were reasons for this.