While rereading Yuval Noah Harari’s Nexus in preparation for a course on Media Ethics, I came across several insights that I found particularly relevant to understanding the ethical challenges of contemporary media and communication. Harari’s analysis prompted me to look beyond individual moral failings and consider the structural problems inherent in the functioning of information networks. His understanding of information not merely as a passive reflection of reality but as a social force that connects people and puts them “in formation” offers an interesting perspective on some fundamental principles of media ethics. I found these reflections worth sharing, particularly in the context of our ongoing engagement with the ethical responsibilities of media and communication.
1. Beyond the Counterspeech Doctrine: The Duty of Curation
One of the foundational principles of classical liberal media ethics is the counterspeech doctrine, associated with figures such as Louis Brandeis. According to this view, the remedy for false speech is more speech, and an unregulated marketplace of ideas will eventually allow truth to prevail over error. However, Harari’s analysis challenges the adequacy of this assumption.
Fiction often enjoys structural advantages over truth. Factual truth can be complicated, nuanced and painful, whereas fiction can be presented in simple, attractive and emotionally compelling forms. Moreover, in an uncurated flood of information, inexpensive and sensationalist falsehoods can easily overwhelm the more demanding and costly process of producing rigorously verified factual reporting.
Consequently, media organizations and media persons cannot regard themselves merely as neutral conduits or passive transmitters of information. Their ethical responsibility must include deliberate curation. The central question of ethical media should not be how many people will click, read or react to a particular story, but what evidence establishes that the information is true.
2. Trust through Institutional Self-Correction
Media organizations sometimes fear that acknowledging mistakes will undermine their authority and public credibility. Yet Harari’s comparison between religious dogma and scientific disciplines highlights the limitations of institutions that claim infallibility. Authority founded on the pretence of never being wrong is fragile and ultimately destructive.
Institutional credibility is strengthened not by concealing mistakes but by establishing mechanisms for identifying, acknowledging and correcting them. Harari also draws attention to the development of periodical journalism in early modern times. Regular publication provided editors with recurring opportunities, as well as commercial incentives, to correct earlier falsehoods and thereby retain readers’ trust.
This perspective gives transparency and correction a central place in media ethics. Prominent retractions, transparent corrections, ombudsmen and the auditing of editorial processes are not signs of institutional weakness. Rather, they are essential mechanisms for maintaining credibility and preventing ideological rigidity and public cynicism.
3. Resisting Engagement-Maximising Business Models
Another major ethical challenge arises from the conflict between commercial interests and civic responsibility. Harari illustrates how information platforms that prioritise user engagement - measured through clicks, likes, shares and viewing time - can develop mechanisms that amplify errors and misinformation.
Algorithms designed to maximise engagement quickly discover that outrage, tribal hostility and conspiracy theories often attract more sustained attention than calm, balanced and truthful reporting. By treating audiences primarily as sources of attention, these platforms exploit reactive human instincts and undermine the social cohesion required for collective decision-making.
The ethical responsibility of media organisations therefore extends beyond the accuracy of individual reports. Headlines, framing choices and distribution strategies also have moral significance. Employing rage-bait or prioritising algorithmic virality over factual integrity violates the fundamental ethical responsibility of media, subordinating social well-being to commercial interests.
4. Preserving the Distributed Democratic Conversation
From an information perspective, Harari understands democracy as a distributed network with strong self-correcting mechanisms. Independent institutions, including the press, courts, academia and civil society, communicate freely and hold one another, as well as those in authority, accountable.
This democratic arrangement faces two contrasting threats. When centralised power monopolises information or silences the press, the network loses its capacity to expose corruption and correct mistakes, paving the way for totalitarian stagnation. Conversely, when the information environment is overwhelmed by fabricated news, bad-faith actors and manipulative synthetic content, public debate deteriorates into digital anarchy, making democratic consensus increasingly difficult.
A free press, therefore, is not merely an industry but an essential component of society’s capacity for self-correction. Media ethics requires media persons to investigate rigorously and hold those in power accountable while maintaining standards of evidence and responsible public debate. Such responsibility helps preserve a shared public sphere against fragmentation and mutual incomprehension.
5. Resisting Cynical Populism: Information as a Weapon
Finally, Harari warns against a populist worldview that reduces media and social interaction to struggles for power. According to this perspective, objective facts do not exist, and anyone claiming to pursue truth is merely defending elite interests.
Media ethics must resist this cynicism. Media persons should remain conscious of human biases, institutional weaknesses and their own limitations. Nevertheless, such awareness must not lead to the abandonment of objective reality or factual truth. The pursuit of truth remains essential to responsible communication. Once society abandons this pursuit, it risks leaving raw power and propaganda as the only foundations of social order.
