ABIAS, Leonard Paul B. Paper No.

1
AB Communication June 29, 2009

TO ERR IS HUMAN...TO GATEKEEP IS DIVINE!

Ever felt sorry for newly hired writers and first time field observers? I always do. They
bother themselves in making their first article good enough to make it to tomorrow’s paper or the
6 o’clock news tonight. They take the risk. They take their chances. Unfortunately, only writers
with God-given writing skills make it on their first time. But we cannot blame media and
publication companies. Whoever would want to read a newspaper or magazine as thick as the
Webster’s dictionary or watch news or entertainment programs whose airtime is as long
as...nobodyknows? They do not print or air every single event that happens on Earth everyday.
They categorize those which they think is significant and would appeal to the public from those
which would much likely be a bore. This process is called gatekeeping.
One of the models of communication makes gatekeeping a part of it. George Gerbner’s
model of communication explains that the communication process is subjective, selective,
variable and unpredictable. Selective, in particular, refers to gatekeeping wherein the
communication events are being chosen upon for the most meaningful and significant ones.
Another communication model which shows some signs of gatekeeping is Wesley and
MacLean’s model. One element in the model (X”) is defined as “message as modified in the
media for transmission”. This element represents the channel’s (media) selections both from the
messages he gets from the advocate (e.g. a field reporter) who responds selectively to his
immediate physical surroundings and from the abstractions in his own sensory field which may
or may not be from the advocate. Based from Wesley and MacLean’s model, one can deduce that
gatekeeping does not happen on the editor’s desk alone but it starts right from the advocate
selecting the events for modification by the channel.
To cite a concrete personal experience, I was one of five students who were offered a
position in our high school paper as Science corner contributor when I was in sophomore year.
My first assignment was to write about Pluto not being a planet anymore. I was able to meet the
deadline and I anticipated that it would be published. A month later, I immediately looked for my
write-up in the feature portion the moment I received a copy of the paper, and I did not find it. I
tried to look for it in other parts of the paper. I was upset for days. When the editor-in-chief gave
me another assignment, I intentionally did not do it out of frustration.
Personally, gatekeeping really is a significant process of the communication process. It
has always and will always be. Imagine communication without information passing through
categorization of filtering first. The world would be...unimaginable! Neighbours fighting, boring,
lengthy news programs, bulky newspapers and magazines and businesses going down. It’s a no
brainer. The tenth world war could have started just yesterday or this morning if not for
gatekeeping.