DOI: 10.4185/RLCS-2014-1028en

Since its very beginnings, journalism has swung between the servile repetition of biased versions of events and its own distorted versions caused by its lack of knowledge of a hardly glimpsed reality. The powers that threaten the journalistic independence have in fact constantly increased their manipulative ability. Journalism originated as a „profession of slaves ‟ during the Roman Empire, and many current indicators seem to resemble its origins: the large-scale strategic public relations, the rise of the „spin doctors‟, the shameless extortions that take place in the weakest democracies, and the populism of the social networks, among others. All these elements are being accompanied or promoted by the internal degradation and dismay of the journalistic institutions, which are unable to distance themselves from all these forces. Journalism should neither become an ally or a competitor of the powers that surround it; instead it should cleverly distance itself from these powers in order to be able to move among them without ceasing to perform the watchdog function that citizens still need from the professionals of journalism