World Media Association

Role and responsibility of the media

True Parents have often spoken about the importance of the media in realizing a world based on the culture of heart. For this purpose, they have made tremendous investments.

They have especially emphasized that the media as the fourth estate, connected to the first three estates the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government has the important mission to promote the realization of world peace and defend the democratic system.

To accomplish this, True Parents established and actively supported various media outlets and began World Media Conferences.

1. I have advocated that we consider this time to be the era of the fourth estate. The media, which is the fourth estate, needs to fulfill a leadership role that goes beyond the three estates of government the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. I have long been aware of this.

Only the media can take on this role. Therefore, despite the difficulties, I have established media organizations and raised them to positions of prominence in the world. In America, The Washington Times occupies the most central position. (403-141, 2003/01/21)

2. The fourth estate, the world's media, has to be joined and set in a proper direction. Unless this is done, the world has no way forward. I have prepared for this for a long time.

If we can educate people properly through the media, comparing and contrasting the truth of God and the spirit world with the world's present way of life, the ideologies of humanism and materialism will be shown to be bankrupt.

People will lose interest in free sex and homosexuality. With this in mind, we have to educate people through the media. (403-187, 2003/01/22)

3. The era in which the first three estates dominated life will pass. The world should be guided primarily through the media, the fourth estate. I am not talking about the World Media Association in its earlier form. We must propose something revolutionary.

That is why we have to organize a “Supra-World Media Association” conference in Korea. What is the meaning of “above” in this name? You cannot understand it if you do not know God and the spirit world. When you become aware of God and the spirit world, you can resolve all the problems of communism and politics.

I have been contending with the world until now to establish a media foundation. The Washington Post and The New York Times are no longer an issue for The Washington Times.

They have no choice but to follow the direction of The Washington Times. Some time back, the World Media Conference in London invited The Washington Times to take the leading conservative role.

The Washington Times is also a leader in the adoption of the Internet and is affiliated with the UPI news service. It is robust, both internally and externally. (403-009, 2003/01/19)

4. In this era of the fourth estate, we have to set the direction in all areas. No nation, or even the United Nations, can set the proper direction. The media must do it. We all can see how the media organizations in Korea influence the elections.

When people misuse the media, they destroy society. To lead the world from an unbiased perspective, media professionals need to have God behind them.

If they do not work together with the global leadership of religion, they can destroy society. That is why we are holding conferences centered on the fourth estate, the media. (403-010, 2003/01/19)

5. Who will lead the world into the future? Universities cannot lead the world, nor can governments or the military. Those approaches have already been tried. Democracy and communism cannot lead the world either. In this era of the fourth estate, the media must investigate communism.

If media professionals cannot achieve a clear perspective on whether it is right or wrong, they must resign. They must also look into the democratic world.

The capacity of the media to investigate things in a short period is unparalleled. The media has this power. Therefore, media organizations must be objective and accurate. (403-011, 2003/01/19)

6. In America, progressives are trying to dominate the three estates of government. The media organizations, which make up the fourth estate, are decidedly liberal. There are more than 1,700 media organizations in America.

The Washington Times has contended with all of them, but an environment now exists in which one-third of these 1,700 media organizations respect us.

In the past, The New York Times reported negatively about the Unification Church, and The Washington Post also had a biased viewpoint, but now the environment has changed; it cannot keep going as it has been. Distortions and false reports have been exposed. (403-043, 2003/01/19)

Conferences and fact-finding tours

On October 19, 1978, the first World Media Conference was held at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City.

Since then, almost every year World Media Conferences have been held to discuss the responsibility and role of the media and to establish true principles for the media.

Publishers, editors, columnists, reporters, and scholars from media organizations around the world, as well as other eminent figures in the world of media, have participated. 600 representatives from 65 nations attended the 11th World Media Conference, held from April 9 to April 13, 1990, in Moscow.

On April 11, 1990, True Parents had a face-to-face meeting with President Mikhail Gorbachev in the Kremlin, opening a new door for relations between South Korea and the Soviet Union. True Parents supported fact-finding tours for journalists worldwide to, gather information on under-reported stories.

7. In the United States, because the internal and external environment is prepared, and we are at the center of things, I founded a newspaper company. As soon as I set this up, I invited editors-in-chief and publishers from 40 top newspaper companies in America to visit Moscow.

This was a significant event. It was a sensitive matter for officials in the Soviet Union to know that Reverend Moon, representing The Washington Times, which was well known in the free and democratic world, was organizing this event. In this environment, we need to inspire media professionals to hold summit conferences shortly.

In developed nations, such as Germany, we should create a press corps to gather information about the government's agencies. This will cause those agencies to work for all of Europe.

If one nation in Europe starts a movement that improves the political climate and helps achieve peace in the region, other nations will follow suit. If the media continues working in this way, there is no doubt that eminent journalists will rally together. (121-027, 1982/10/21)

8. I declared that I would convene a Moscow rally. When I get there, I will aggressively ask questions of the Soviet media. I will ask about communism and insist that they answer my questions.

Then a representative from the Soviet media and a representative from the free world's media will organize a summit meeting between the President of the United States and the general secretary of the Communist Party.

That is why we need the media. We are already in an age when the media can lead the world. I host World Media Conferences to guide global leaders.
(124-332, 1983/03/01)

9. Media organizations should adhere to an impartial perspective by which to guide citizens daily, a perspective that can highlight what is right and what is wrong. In reality, media organizations seek their benefit. They are so busy seeking their benefit that they ignore the benefit of society.

They have reached the stage where they have become selfish. Behind the scenes, they abuse political power, and as long as they have the money, they do whatever they please.

Therefore, global media organizations that are following the right path as public-minded organizations should advocate a perspective that will lead to having an unselfish viewpoint at all times.

Next is the issue of information. The Soviet Union is collecting and disbursing information that is adverse to the United States and the free world. If the policies of the Soviet Union and the free world do not change, this problem will never be rectified.

Communism, with its ideology as the absolute standard, is trying to weaken the foundation of the free world by pursuing its communist interests. Moral education can serve to rebalance the flow of information, but no one is providing it.

That is why journalists worldwide, who do have that ability, must come together and stop the United States and the Soviet Union from simply pursuing their benefit.

To restore the balance, journalists should proclaim this balance publicly, but they cannot do so. This is an issue. That is why I am educating the media through the World Media Conferences. (165-160, 1987/05/20)

10. In the United States, I founded The Washington Times. I did so because there must be a conservative daily newspaper in America. It has been five years since its establishment in 1982, and today it is considered one of the top four daily newspapers in America.

It has become the only newspaper that provides hope to people all over the world. The Washington Times has gained the people's confidence.

Furthermore, I have been organizing World Media Conferences. On September 20, 1987, I will hold a great global event in Seoul, where hundreds of people will gather. In this way, I am proposing the direction the world should take.

In doing this, we enter a stage in which even the extreme-left political parties, which opposed our international gatherings, will have to participate. If they do not participate, they will become increasingly isolated. This is how the world is moving now. (165-162, 1987/05/20)

11. Scientists always seek results, and cause and result always need to be aligned. Nothing can exist based on contradictory values. Pursuing this, we must establish the absolute standard of God and connect human ideological standards to that absolute standard.

This is the work that scholars, religionists, politicians, philosophers, and leaders of all fields worldwide must do. In this way, based on an ideological standard, I am connecting journalists to society's leading centers of education and suggesting a direction.

The directions envisioned by the Chinese, Americans, French, Germans, and Soviets cannot differ; they need a single direction.

I am planning to establish this, and that is why I am bringing scholars and asking them to lead, and I'm asking the media organizations to report on them.
(165-164, 1987/05/20)

12. The media organization that I have established has become so successful that media in the communist world consider it a threat and a problem. I founded The Washington Times, hosted the World Media Conferences, and began the fact-finding tours.

By engaging in these activities, the media has entered my sphere of influence, and that is why the communist world feels threatened, so on May 12, 1984, it attacked me as soon as I arrived in the United States. This attack was unprecedented in American history.

We confronted and fought the communist power. The communists accused and tried to defame us. Any ordinary organization would barely have survived and might have even been destroyed. However, we grew even stronger through this fight between good and evil. (132-169, 1984/06/01)

13. Based on The Washington Times, and through the World Media Conferences and the fact-finding tours, I established a foundation for the media to set a new direction. My media network is feared most by both the communist world and liberal media outlets in America.

Through our organizations, we are receiving all sorts of sensitive information from around the world. We are in an age of information warfare. Amazingly, we can stand on such a global foundation and deal with such issues. (161-052, 1987/01/02)

14. The Washington Times had a significant influence on the Reagan Doctrine. In the absence of that influence, the reformation of the Soviet Union and its open-door policy would not have succeeded.

Furthermore, at the time of the Gulf War, The Washington Times emphasized that Christianity, Judaism, and Islam should not be divided because of this war. If a religious war had broken out, it could have become a race war, costing countless lives. Furthermore, Buddhism and Confucianism are Eastern religions and Christianity is a Western religion, so even an intercultural war could break out. (216-257, 1991/04/07)

15. There is one way journalists differ from other people. When journalists from around the world visited the Soviet Union, the authorities told them to follow their guide. But the journalists said, “Don't be ridiculous.” There was no way the journalists were going to follow their guide. Whenever the guide took them somewhere, one-third of the journalists would disappear.

They all looked around collecting information, and exposed the Soviet Union's restrictive policies being carried out behind the scenes. That is why the Soviet government said, “We are in big trouble; we cannot let this happen.” But they could not deny what the journalists had seen and reported.

In this way, after having visited the Soviet Union, the journalists changed from pro-left to a more true and open way of thinking. They came to know very well that the Soviet Union disguises its actions and thus deceives people.

This is straight out of communist theory. Their political system has carried out hidden activities and deceived the world throughout its 70-year history.

They deceived people and nations, creating a foundation for global dictatorship. Therefore, journalists no longer have any choice but to realize that until now, they have been wrongly accusing conservatives. Journalists will eventually come to see from my perspective. (183-126, 1988/10/31)

16. Through the World Media Association (WMA), I sent fact-finding tours to Moscow.

There was no other way to expose the Soviet Union. There is no political approach that can block Soviet attacks on the free world.

If I had not taken action, there would be a big problem. Communist forces thought that the world would become communist by 1984. I knew this and blocked them, which is why they had to revise their timetable.

There was no way to expose the Soviet Union other than through the media. The Soviet Union itself mobilized journalists and utilized diplomatic contacts. We must do the same to counterattack. I founded the WMA and have been carrying out activities related to the Soviet Union for over 15 years.

We must mobilize the media. There are about 1,700 newspaper companies in America. Until now, they have been used as tools of the Soviet Union's foreign policy. That is why America is collapsing.

It is due to the media. At the time of the presidential elections too, they gathered behind-the-scenes information and manipulated public opinion.

I have begun to put a stop to this, and now I am implementing a strategy to defeat the world of sensitive information. That is why I created a fact-finding tour, invited the press corps, and sent them all over the world. (198-177, 1990/02/03)

17. We have to stand in a position to lead the conservative world and resurrect it. The world I have been dreaming of has opened before our eyes. This is why I started and have been hosting conferences under

the World Media Association. I am bringing together eminent people to build a world with God at the center. I plan to nurture them to serve as representatives in all fields.

Therefore, we must have newspaper companies as well as cable television companies in 185 nations. The Internet makes it possible to connect everything.

We need a means to connect the information we gather to the political world. An information highway is necessary. Figuring out how to make this information highway is a time-sensitive matter. With this information highway, it is possible to guide the entire world from the highest point.

To establish a reporting and information system that offers worldwide coverage, we need to connect media organizations, cable television broadcasting companies, and the Internet. When that happens, instantaneously we can share information from any one location with the entire world. (281-047, 1997/01/02)