Nope. The media is here to serve the government, but to be able to do what they gotta do, they must maintain an image of a trusted source at all times: "independent press," "freedom of speech," "protecting democracy/freedom," etc. Thus, ever since we come into this world, we are taught to believe those slogans so we could trust the media by default. Considering all those half-truths and other stuff, I believe we can try to get some information from the media, but we must use critical thinking to process everything we hear or read in the media.
Well, when you think about it, they do protect democracy. The government is very happy with the way "democracy" currently works. It basically goes, "You vote for us, then we do whatever we want." People don't really have a say in what leaders actually do. This is media protecting "democracy" and it is exactly what the leaders want. I'm not even mentioning the fact that "elections" are typically a "choice" between two different puppets for the same big companies.