Sociologist: They do not care what you write about them (video)
Freedom House, a U.S.-based independent watchdog organization, says Armenia comes 136 in the list of 199 countries according to the organization’s Freedom of the Press index. Sociologist Aharon Adibekyan says the data issued by the organization says is ridiculous as Freedom House was to have considered the state of democracy and freedom of speech in the give country, which, in turn, is based on economic freedom. Besides, Mr Adibekyan says the data is incorrect from the methodological point of view because it reflects the results of a survey. “In our country, the vast majority of the population receives information via the Internet and we can say that Armenia is among the leading countries in terms of Internet freedom,” the sociologist said, at the same time adding that some media outlets in Armenia are politicized and are owned by officials. “Almost all political forces represented in parliament – Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), Country of Law (OEK), Republican Party of Armenia (HHK) - have their TV channels. However, I must say that different TV channels show different approaches to the same issue and interpret it in their own way, thus enabling the audience to have an alternative,” Mr Adibekyan said. In this context he stressed that in the West the law prohibits media to belong to any political party ‘otherwise they may be sued for pouring water over the mill of an official.’ “A similar ban is placed on media in Armenia as well but no one pays attention to it or cares what mass media are writing about them,” he said in conclusion.
