Friedrich Merz recommends relying on social media channels instead of traditional reporting. The German Association of Journalists announces resistance.
- Friedrich Merz (CDU) caused outrage with a statement about conventional media.
- Information via social media channels would suffice.
- The German Association of Journalists ( DJV ) criticizes Merz in an open letter.
A cancellation by the CDU politician Friedrich Merz * to conventional media reporting has caused outrage at the German Association of Journalists (DJV). At an event in Aachen on January 21, Merz said: "We no longer need them." Politicians could use their own social media channels such as YouTube to protect their own interests and "retain their own sovereignty of interpretation," said Merz. "And that's the good news of digitization," he added.
Friedrich Merz: DJV is "highly irritated"
In an open letter to Friedrich Merz, the Federal Chairman of the DJV was "highly irritated". The DJV would offer “bitter resistance” if the CDU politician wanted to undermine journalists and the media as an “independent pillar of the state”. He asked Merz about his “understanding of the role of the media in the democratic constitutional state” and whether he considered journalists to be “a professional group that had become superfluous”.
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Merz said at the "AKV Rittertalk", a series of lectures by the Aachen Carnival Association: "At the moment there is a real shift in power between those who spread the news and those who generate the news." Merz added: "And that's the nice thing: You can now reach your audience via your own social media channels, via YouTube, and you can reach an audience that partly no longer reaches public and private institutionalized media . "
Friedrich Merz: CDU politician speaks of "shift in power"
Friedrich Merz has now responded to the open letter from the DJV. The sentence he said "we no longer need it" was only in connection with the distribution of news on social media channels. He had "never questioned the importance of a free press".
Meanwhile, the CDU is struggling for a new party chair. A team solution is currently under discussion.
