1. I believe that the government helps to set the news agenda. I also think that competing television news stations are so concerned with battling one another that they focus on what story the last station presented and then becomes more concerned with getting the latest story out the quickest. This results in a merry-go-round of the same stories being produced leaving the “agenda setters” unable to think outside their box.
2. We need a media that specifically represents different interests of people of color because every minority/race has different issues that may be more attention grabbing and more interesting to them as opposed to another cookie cutter group. For example, I have African American friends and they always talk about how they don’t want to get their hair wet and when they do there are all kinds of different steps to take. That is a minor detail in difference between African Americans and white people but the point is, I don’t know the first thing about an African American’s hair or how to treat it. Therefore people of color want to hear about issues, stories etc. that they can relate to more just like any other person.
What can be done to increase the mainstream media’s interest in other topics and concerns is people can take a stand and turn off their TVs. Refuse to watch Fox, CNN, and other mainstream stations that play the every day kind of things. They will begin to see their ratings go down and hopefully turn to the people to hear their voice on what topics and concerns they want to be covered in the news.
I think those interests are everyone’s interests. However many are overwhelmed and busy with problems of there own that they don’t want to take the time to change the future news stories. So rather than doing anything about it, they just sit around and complain.
3. The media reported the war as something necessary but not supported by all Americans. However it wasn’t covered thoroughly. Many stories that should have made the news did not. Stories that entailed deaths, kidnappings and explosions became more of a daily situation that the news didn’t feel that it was necessary or important enough to cover.
4. What has the media covered recent social protests that came to mind is the government bail out. The government is going to be spending billions of dollars to support major financial institutions that made bad decisions. Resulting in the American people having to pay the bill for their mistakes and irresponsibility.
5. I whole-heartedly agree that the media was beneficial to the civil rights movement. From what I’ve seen I think it showed how mean and cold hearted many white people were behaving. It also gave Martin Luther King more of a national voice along with many other legendary heroes.
6. My thoughts on setting the news agenda are we the people need to have more of a say in the agenda being set. When focusing on the minority media, I definitely feel that there should be more outlets that cover the majority of minorities’ interests. Also throughout this exercise when thinking about the war and how the media reports it, I think it is very clear who is running those messages across America. I think it’s obvious that the government has mostly full control over the news media which is why we have usually one-sided stories.
