that's because freedom of press and similar rights are a uniquely western phenomenon that are --- despite what droves of its proponents will tell you --- derived from christian values that didn't and don't exist anywhere else.
Many in the broader region don't care about freedom of press, while also being poorly paid and uncomfortable. No placation of masses needed.
This is incorrect. Europe is quite unique in that since the advent of Christianity there has always existed a church separate from the state acting as a counterbalance thereto, and offering an alternative foundation of moral authority. Despite this, brutal suppression of all dissent and criticism of the political structure was almost always supported by the Church, which generally allied itself with dominant regimes (i.e. feudal rulers).
It wasn't until the flurry of neoclassicist-inspired philosophising of the Enlightenment and the emergence of monied elites in a position to pressure the state to grant them rights that said rights were slowly granted. They often couched their arguments in terms of Christian doctrine, but this is just the incidental result of the dominance of the Christian religion in society at that time.
I wouldn't say that it's entirely incidental. Christianity is compatible with individualism in a way that some other religions are not.
This is not quite correct. Christian values would be a strict theocracy with no freedom of the press.
Liberal values descend from a robust view of agency, eg humanism which is more or less incompatible with strict interpretations of Christianity. Compatible with deism though.
Two very different messages.
Love your neighbor and judge others as you would judge yourself.