Module 5 Readings
While reading this article I found it interesting the contradiction of the cardinal rule of news media. That it needed to stay politically neutral, only to find out that “The third bias of professional journalism is more subtle but most important: far from being politically neutral, it smuggles in values conducive to the commercial aims of the owners and advertisers as well as the political aims of the owning class” (McChesney 2002). I also found it sad that media today is based towards a more “desirable middle and upper class.” It really shows a bias toward people that are less fortunate. Many stories will as they said “fall through the crack” because it will not reach the target market that the media avenue wants to appeal to.
“The biggest harm media power can yield is not in creating killers, but in creating complacency.” I agree with what Sternheimer’s words here that it is created from news reports based on emotion. “Not everything you see on the news is newsworthy, and not everything newsworthy is on the news” (Sternheimer 2003). Redford’s saying reminds me of the previous article that the information the news sometimes doesn’t tell can be due to that it won’t reach the demographic that they are wanting.
In the article “Who Gets to Speak on Cable News?” I found it disturbing that when guest were coded by their race/gender that “eighty-four percent of guests were white” (Hart 2014). In this day and age I find that number to be quite high and unexpected. Are we still living in a day when there is still such a discrimination on race? I also found it interesting that “Male guests widely outnumbered women on every show” (Hart 2014). It shows that with all advances this country has made, there is still bias against women and their capabilities when it comes to media.
“A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic,” Joseph Stalin observed. Media today will usually relay more stories of homicide’s deaths than suicides, even though suicide rates are higher. Even when it comes death there still seems that media shows bias.
In the article Conservatives vs. Liberal Beliefs, you get to see different viewpoints of the same issues. The two sides of democracy, left and right. This article explained different issues such as abortion, death penalty, education, global warming, gun control, immigration, and taxes. This related to media because if we know how each side feels on the issue, then we can better understand how they are trying to influence us. Different news stations are usually guided towards a certain side. Learning about the two sides gives us the bigger picture and makes us more media literate.
While reading FAIR the first heading is How to Detect Bias in News Media, it made really happy thinking that in this course I have learned some ways to do that. As well as other tactics in advertisements, it feels good to have useful knowledge and see media in a different way now. The next, Who are the Sources? I feel like that is something that I normally automatically consider because of writing. In high school and college you are expected to have “academic” sources, or trustworthy sources. I like the paragraphs on double standards and skewed coverage. Another one I really enjoyed was do the headlines and stories match, I never really thought about it but it’s so true! The headline is there to grab your attention and it could be a very small detail of the story and then the main purpose of the story turns out to be completely different than what you thought.
In the Who Makes the News video it explains that we assume news is true and accept the facts they present to us. It also shows that 51% of the population are female but only 24% are represented in the news. The media reinforces stereotypes and gender inequalities. The video said what we don’t see it just as important as what we do see.
In this chapter, it first discusses how young adults have “misguided priorities”. Instead of worrying about education, they are focusing less on that they do have and are stirred to what they can’t have. Adults try to blame advertisers and how they prey on the innocence of the youth but it is not that simple. Sternheimer describes how parents are actually the easily targets because of the great influence their own kids have on them. Advertising isn’t a easy business anymore and it is often hard for the industry to keep up with all the fast moving trends. A huge part of the business is not even sales but whether the companies are receiving an increase in “brand awareness.” Another big problem Sternheimer talks about is advertisements coming into education. Not only is there brand names in the cafeteria or on the student’s clothes and lunch boxes, but schools are actually the hosts of multiple advertisements in order to gain school supplies or updated technology. Due to the fact that “consumerism is deeply intertwined with the American economy and linked with economic growth”, in order to progress we must first realize that we are driven by a “consumption-based society.” In essence we need to stop wanting what we don’t need and what we can’t have.
Sources:
Global Media Marketing Project. (2015). Who makes the news Retrieved from http://whomakesthenews.org/gmmp
Hart, P. (2014, July 1). Who gets to speak on cable news? Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting. Retrieved from http://fair.org/extra/who-gets-to-speak-on-cable-news/
How to Detect Bias in News Media. (n.d.) Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting. Retrieved from http://fair.org/take-action-now/media-activism-kit/how-to-detect-bias-in-news-media/
McChesney, R. (2002). The rise and fall of professional journalism. Into the buzz saw: Leading journalists expose the myth of a free press. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books (363-381) McChesney The Rise and Fall of Professional Journalism.pdf
Radford, B. (2003). The news bias: Distorting reality and feeding fears. Media mythmakers: how journalists, activists, and advertisers mislead us. Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, pp. 65-101. Radford 2003 The News Bias Distorting Reality and Feeding Fears.pdf
Sternheimer, K. (2013). Consumption and materialism: A new generation of greed? Connecting social problems and popular culture: Why media is not the answer, pp. 245-268
Sternheimer, (2013). Beyond popular culture: Why inequality is the problem. Connecting social problems and popular culture: Why media is not the answer, pp. 273-287.
Student News Daily. (2010). Conservative vs. Liberal Beliefs. Retrieved from http://www.studentnewsdaily.com/conservative-vs-liberal-beliefs/ (NOTE: Student News Daily is a great resource for people working with middle and high school aged students.)
