The First Live Panel of our MedyaBiziz Project was held on the Anka Youth Association Facebook Page.

In our first panel, 3 valuable speakers on Media Literacy, Accessibility and Tools shared their knowledge and experiences with us.

Gökhan Barışkan – Emphasizes the importance of followers and social media accounts. The media stated that it now belongs to social media and us, not to old-style news channels. Cryptocurrency example of Elon Musk.

Infodemi – An epidemic of excessive and unfounded information. It plunges society into chaos. It caused many problems, especially in high-population countries such as China and India, because people continued to share such news and videos with their friends, believing blindly instead of questioning the news source. The most important precaution that everyone should take against Infodemi is not to share the news without being sure of its accuracy.

In Turkey, like other countries in the world, some institutions and sites are used to confirm the accuracy of the news. We should give enough importance and value to such sites. It has been proven that 47% of trends in Turkey are created by fake accounts.

We can use internationally used tools such as Google Trends. With the Google Alerts app you can get the latest news about any keyword on any topic.

Zehra Güngör – Our speaker for 40 years, communicator and journalist for 20 years, shed light on media literacy for young people. In daily life, reading correctly is the most important function for us to understand the news in newspapers, television and digital media. Media is not just about the alphabet. Moral and human values ​​are also necessary concepts for media literacy. Media literacy is a doctrine that emerged in the 1980s due to the negative effects of media on children and youth. Developing the habit of reading is very important.

Reason, logic, intellectual knowledge and common sense are important concepts for media literacy. Every conscious and sensitive citizen must be a good media literate.

Knowledge, common sense, conscience and quality communication are essential requirements for a true literate person. It is necessary to question who is behind the news sources and the aims of these news. If you have a reputation, you are already sought after media. The most important supporter of media literacy is civic movements. People’s questioning is essential for accurate and impartial media. Non-governmental organizations, public and voluntary organizations outside the administration should exert pressure on the media and seek democratic rights. They should act jointly on issues such as the environment, women, youth and nature. It is our civic duty to deal with this problem that the Marmara Sea is facing. Media literacy education in our schools should start much earlier.

Gürkan Özturan – He introduced the concept of journalism with the definition of George Orwell. In the internet freedom statistics, Turkey is the 35th country among 100 countries and is in the list of non-free countries. On the other hand, the presence of digital journalism in Turkey has become widespread in the last 5 years. Among the most used social media applications, the most used applications in Turkey are Facebook, YouTube and Instagram, respectively. He once again emphasized the importance of the security of our personal data.

It is very dangerous for the media to be in the hands of a person, institution or community. In this case, the new generation will come without knowing how to reach the right news. In this case, it is an inevitable fact that the news dynamics that the society can extract from itself will disappear. Even unintentionally, journalists who present false information to people violate media ethics. Education is essential for an independent media. You can support the economically correct news channels as much as possible and you can always question every news source and be objective.

Our #Media Project aims to guide the youth and the Turkish society in a way that provides accurate information about the right methods of using the media for their own benefit. In addition, stakeholders will be reached and possible solutions to the challenges of the media will be gathered, while strengthening national cooperation between CSOs. While creating national awareness, media literacy will be correctly explained to the participants/audience. Also, the panels will help create an open space for ideas, help to discuss freely and inform the audience freely. The online broadcast system will allow the audience to ask questions to the speakers at the same time; therefore an inclusive environment will be provided for all. The consortium was also formed with the partnership of 3 different institutions from 3 different regions of Turkey, Marmara, Central Anatolia and Aegean Regions in order to increase the visibility of the project and reach more young people from different regions. The consortium members were established under the coordination of the Anka Youth Association (Ankara), in partnership with the Buldan Foundation (Denizli) and the Community Support Association (Çanakkale).