Mainstream media in my part of the world - north-western Europe in general, Sweden and the Netherlands to be more specific - seems to have forgotten that it is

Mainstream media in my part of the world - north-western Europe in general, Sweden and the Netherlands to be more specific - seems to have forgotten that it is the fiduciary duty of the news media to keep watch over those in power, instead turning their gaze on those who oppose the government position. While some critical journalism still exists in the main stream media, especially in Sweden this has mostly moved to what for some reason is called 'alternative media' Given this lack of critical opinions in main stream media it is rather pointless to rely on them to keep informed. The 'alternative' media often offers a more critical voice but that voice often comes with an agenda and an accompanying myopic view which makes it as unwise to rely on any single 'alternative' source as it is to rely on main stream sources. The solution to this conundrum is most emphatically not to 'stick your head in the sand' (i.e. giving up on reading news) as that just makes you less informed and with that less prepared to make rational decisions. This goes from the small - missing the small article hidden on page 7 in the local paper where the council declares its intention to close down the school you planned to send your children to because they claim to need the building for other purposes (this happened where I live, those who did read the news gathered to protest leading to the decision to be suspended) - to the large ('brexit', 'Russia is the new/old enemy', etc). Is there an easy solution? No, I don't think there is. Finding truth in the media is like finding a needle in a haystack full of pins. What I do is use a news reader (the News app for Nextcloud, think 'Google Reader' but under private regime) with a select list of subscriptions from both 'alternative' as well as main stream sources. Reading the headlines gives an idea of what is being reported, comparing how what is being reported between sources gives an impression of what really happens or happened.