Blog Reflection: News and the Media

1) I would like to think that it's the people who decide what the news is. That's one of the roles of the media as a watchdog. We watch how the people react to what is going on in the world around them, and judging by the scale of the impact on them, we base the level of coverage.

Unfortunately, it is my realistic opinion that the government and the higher-ups at the stations and newspapers that determine the news and set the agenda for coverage. If they personally do not believe it to be newsworthy, then it is no covered, like Bill Moyers mentioned when he covered the anti-war protests. It seems like individual reporters are relying less on their own intuitions when it comes to newsworthy materail and more on the conventions set on them when thinking about news. I myself am guilty of this.

2) The interests of those of different races are definitely everyone's interests. After all, tell me how their race makes them less of a person than I. If something in the world affects them in a positive or negative way, the same news standards should be applied to them as anyone else.

Coverage, like freedoms, should not be contingent on the color of a person's skin. That's bias if I ever heard of it. I think we could increase the interest in other topics by not only bringing more minority representation behind and in front of the camera, but also by allocating a broader sense of freedom amongst reporters.

Let them decide what they want to cover and don't hinder them with titles like "newsworthy" or not.

3) The war was initially reported in a rather biased and ignorant way. Nearly everyone took the prospect of going to war with Iraq as absolutely necessary.

Why? Because the government as well as the president backed the idea 100% and fed the media exactly the propaganda that was needed to further the same sentiment to the American people.

There was hardly any questioning of the initial findings by the Bush administration sbout weapons of mass destructino and whether or not Saddam Hussein and his country was involved with the tragic events of September 11th.

Ironic, one of our main principles is always to question. Always double-check, never take anything as a token truth until you find hard evidence proving it to be so.

4) As I mentioned before, the coverage of recent protests has been downright abysmal. I mean, for Bill Moyers to report that such an esteemed newspaper like the New York Times didn't run a single article about a large anti-Iraq War protest in their own neighborhood is to me scarier than the war itself.

5) Yes and no. It all depended on the specific coverage. I think the media definitely helped to wake up the American people to what was actually going on right under their noses when it came to the movement.

Broadcasting and printing pictures showing police turning firehoses and dogs on not just men but women and children really drove the point home.

The media served the civil rights movement best when it was coverage that built the movement up, when it was receptive to what it was truly trying to accomplish and when it was willing to go that in-depth, discover the truth behind the picket signs, and ensure everyone else knew it as well.

6) I do agree with Bill Moyers. What has annoyed me more than anything when I turn on the broadcast news is that I see 4 or 5 or 6 windows on one screen, each containing a person with an opinio that in some way, shape, or form contrasts with someone else's in another window.

Just this morning I saw a story about how the chair of thew Republican National Committee could pursue a bid for the presidency.

Correct me if I'm wrong, did we not just inaugurate our newest president not two months ago? And we're already talking about four years into the future?

Seems to me that that Iraq War is much more important than that story. That's my opinion of course, but Barack Obama hasn't been president for a year already and instead of reporting on a war that we've been in for almost seven years now we're going to talk about how one guy is thinking about running for president, but doesn't know for sure just yet, and the fact that he's a Republican makes it a huge headline.

Too much politics, not enough war. That's my view. Let's talk about what's happening in the world, not whether or not we agree on politics. Trust me, that's never gonna happen.