"The media's the most powerful entity on Earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that's power. Because they control the minds of the masses." Malcom X
"A newspaper is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier. " H. L. Mencken
Last Thursday I witnessed what news networks are really all about: being the first to report, regardless if the facts are there. I don't doubt that each network had prepared days in advance multiple different stories and scenarios to begin with, and as the facts came in, would tailor their stories to the facts. But the Supreme Court issued a document nearly 150 pages long explaining the ruling, so how could anyone decipher the complexities of the bill and its explanation of existence in less than a day?
I personally have lost all faith in news networks. Too often we forget that the news, like sitcoms, is driven by ratings, advertising, and feedback from focus groups. E
ach network has some kind of angle to every story, because "good television" is more important than honest straightforward facts. "Good television" allows for opinion to be masqueraded as fact.
Networks know they can play on our competitive nature because "good television" evokes emotion in the viewer. No matter what happens in Washington, you will turn on the news to see a "win for the Republicans today" or "a devastating blow to the Republican party" depending on the channel. Thursday was a montage of contradicting statements of whether Obama's campaign hung in the balance or if he would gain momentum, depending on the each channel's chosen side of the political spectrum. It's almost as if there is an invisible scoreboard of victories and losses that drive the stories that are aired like a countdown to the superbowl. Chalking up wins or a losses skews the way Americans view current events.
The media also plays on our innate sense of justice and injustice. When a crime is committed the villains and victims are immediately identified by the networks. The recent case of Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman comes to mind. Depending on which channel you watch, Zimmerman was a racist, cold-blooded killer, or Martin was a dangerous hoodlum who had it coming. The only people who know what transpired that night are Martin, Zimmerman, and God, and yet Americans pretend to know "what really happened." And before you know it, what the murder case is "really about" is racism, class, and status.
Casey Anthony, Amanda Knox, and O.J. Simpson are good examples of media villains. Blood for blood was demanded by the reporters, but in a court of law there was not enough evidence to convict any of them. By digging up enough information to create a colorful past, the media convinced viewers that these lowlifes were definitely capable of murder. Nobody knew who Casey Anthony or Amanda Knox were, but over night they were hated by all America because we were convinced they are murderers.
I'm all for freedom of speech, but it is unethical to report opinion as news. The way news is reported today is shameful. In the eyes of the netorks, Americans are too stupid to understand current events and come up with our own opinions. We're told exactly how to feel, and we're blinded from seeing the more important issues. It shouldn't be about which political party comes away with a win, but did we as Americans win? In the case of healthcare, did Americans overall win from the Supreme Court Ruling?
Maybe we are too stupid to come up with our own opinions. We like be told what we want to hear because we're afraid the truth may evoke a sense of duty to act and remove ourselves from complacency . We like to pick villains and heroes. We like to see our heroes as invincible, and we're willing to overlook our heroes' flaws because we like to hate the villain more than we like to love our hero. We like to point fingers and pretend we are experts on everything. We enjoy telling others why they're wrong, especially when we know that we're wrong. We enjoy believing that underneath every executive decision lies a bigger cinematic plot bubbling to escape.
Each political debate in which we engage is about who's a better debater, when it should be what is the right answer? The media preaches only black and white, right and wrong, good and evil, and those are defined completely different by each station. Deep down, I think Americans know that there are not two solutions to every problem, but that's what we've decided to accept.
