Sunday, August 29, 2010

The Truth About The Media

             I always believed what the media revealed on television was the truth. But, after watching the video “Media Hype,” my views have change. The video reveales that the media stretches the truth and has given America a distorted view on what’s really going on in the world. Media creates stories that is much more appealing than the truth.
            I believe that news stations don’t reveal the whole truth and are just reporting events that bring hype. For example on the video, multiple news stations reported on shark attacks and brought the public to believe there were more shark attacks occurring than the previous year. But, that was not true and the number of shark attacks did not increase from the previous years. 
            This scares me to believe that media has that big of an impact on our perception of reality. Most people watching the news don’t realize that they are not being given accurate information. Over exaggerated events scare people and make them feel unnecessarily unsafe. The media creates a greater danger from reports because that’s what sells papers and makes them money.
            I think that media should report the whole truth of important issues and events instead of focusing on what will sell. The public is being brainwashed into believing whatever the media tells us. There are politics in the media that also report bias opinions. In my opinion, media should report the facts and let the viewers come to their own conclusions and opinions.
            Media is misinforming the public and creating panic or needless concern over issues they have created. In the video, there were multiple reports on Internet predators and that our children are being hunted and stalked. This is not the truth and the statistics of Internet kidnappings are rare but this issue gets so much crime coverage. People should be aware of Internet danger but not mislead to believe the Internet is completely dangerous. Viewers are being manipulated by their only source for information.