YOUNG people should improve their observation, judgment and analytical skills in order to counterbalance information given by the media.
Speakers at the recent Hong Kong Youth Leadership Seminar '95 pointed out that the ability to analyse information would allow the public to exert more influence on the media and correct any misrepresentation of the facts.
Columnist and radio phone-in programme host Bernadette Tsui Wing-suen said: 'Many things that we see on the media today may just be an illusion.' Ms Tsui used a recent magazine report as an example to make her point.
She said a well-known Chinese weekly not long ago put 'bruises' on a local businessman's face with the help of computer technology and then used the picture on its cover.
She added that the headline further suggested that the man had been badly beaten up by thugs.
The truth, as Ms Tsui and many people later found out, was that the man had been attacked but the motive could not be established. Also, there were no bruises on the man's face as shown on the magazine cover.
She said the magazine later apologised in an editorial, but maintained that the special visual effects had been used to 'enhance the dramatic influence' of the story.
