News, trust, and “truthiness”!

After reading several of my classmates blogs from last week I think there is a general impression that satirical news reportages is equally reliable but it also allows the public to see different sides or opinions on a story.

 

Alexandra Deyman talked about how it is good because it allows for people to form there own opinion, but bad because not every story is correct. It’s possible that they could leave out a big part of important information, which could mislead the public. (http://alexandradeyman.wordpress.com/ )  I agree with Alexandra, because we live in Canada and we have freedom of speech about our opinion, so having TV shows that only have one side of a story doesn’t allow us to formulate our own personal opinions, with all the facts.  The different forms of culture jamming that are available on TV now, allows us to have more of a free opinion.

 

Raven Henry says that they can be seen as insensitive and rude  “This is because these news reports can be shed in a softer light and sometimes that can be taken  as they are not being taken seriously.” (http://askrae.wordpress.com/). I couldn’t agree more; this type of news report is suppose to make the public take what happens not as serious and to look at all the things that could come from looking at the information from a different perspective. Sometimes they can be hurtful to people but it’s meant to give the public two sides of a story.

 

Christina Clark says, “ It forces us to listen to both sides of the story before making up our mind on an issue. “(http://cclark865.wordpress.com/). I agree with her, it makes us see that the first news report we hear or see isn’t the end of the story.  It also makes us consider that the news reporters who first tell us about a story, aren’t always to be fully trusted, all the time. Yes, the people on the Daily show and Saturday night live might not always say the nicest thing but at least they aren’t afraid to speak their mind, about their perspective of an issue.

 

The implications of satirical news reports becoming a mainstream form of our public sphere is that it gives the public their right to use there own freedom of speech and thought.  Sometimes it appears that the media wants to stop our consideration of an issue.  I think satirical news reporting allows everyone to see another side of a story that maybe they didn’t think about in the first place.  It also gives the public a chance to laugh about all the crazy things that happen in society now a days. 

Is the fake news the real news?!

I believe that shows like the daily show and the Rick Mercer report is a mainstream form of culture jamming. “The objectives of culture jamming often include consciousness raising as well as using the media to criticize the media and dominant culture”(O’shaughnessy & Stadler, Media and society, 214). Shows like these are satirical news reports, so they tell the consumers what is going on in the world or more so what is popular in the news, but they take away the seriousness that regular news reports use. They bring out the truth, yet it’s done in a way that the audiences laugh.  This makes it seem less like culture jamming but more like   entertainment. Although it is very entertaining it actually brings the consumer information that is hidden and not talked about in the regular news at 6.

 

These satirical news reports are a more mainstream form of culture jamming because they are aired on popular TV’s station. In the past culture jamming was done by graffiti on billboards or making a post, going against a specific add or campaign. With it being done over the TV it allows for more people to see the information.   This makes it more comfortable to talk about the subject afterwards because more than a few people will agree with what the anchor man is saying. Also the TV show can then be put online for even more people to see, making the message they are trying to get across reach far more of the world population.

 

This reportage is a useful addition to the public sphere because it shows perspective and information that the regular news doesn’t show. “Often they actively try to denaturalize the media images that we see every day by making us notice and question their underlying messages” (O’shaughnessy & Stadler, Media and society, 214). This reportages are very successful at making us notice underlying messages by the comedic approach. They help the public sphere not take everything so seriously the way the regular and dominate media provide their coverage.  It helps us realize that we might have to do some digging ourselves to get the true and full story of a topic. 

Demonstrable demographics!

There are obviously many different techniques to interrelating a demographic. After reading many of my classmates’ blog, which are mostly female, we have the same demographic and we have more similar techniques because we are females around the same age. I found that many of my classmates found that they use their lifestyle to make a choice of what advertisement draws their attention.  They are drawn to wanting a perfect, happy life.  But the difference is that the ads are using celebrities that may have a very different life than those of us that are not famous.  While they attract our sense of desiring their lifestyle they are not accurate according to the lifestyle we lead.

 

I found that many other blogs had the same opinion as mine.  Many beauty products give the user false hope of what the product will actually do. Just take a minute to think of the general term that describes all make-up, hair, and personal hygiene products, which is normally listed under “beauty products”.  To me, this implies that we are not beautiful without one or more of these products being used. As I read Karly Mclnnis blog I found it to be very similar to my advertisement, other than Karly’s advertisement used a famous person. The celebrity, Beyonce’ was used in Karly’s advertisement, trying to influence women to believe that if they used that product they would be more confident and more sexually appealing, just like Beyoncé.  Karly says “If this advertisement had happened to be a women who did not appear as confident or attractive as Beyoncé, than the advertisement would not be selling the product to the best existent. This advertisement leads a false impression of what the perfume will do to a women.” (http://mcinniskarly.wordpress.com/) . This shows that our demographic is represented by perfect successful women whom are beyond beautiful which makes us feel like if we use the product we will be like that too, perfect and successful.

 

 

The ad Alana Lutz used also uses a very well know celebrity, actually they use many well know celebrities in many different kinds of ads. Proactive promotes that their product will give you clear skin, which is something every girl and guy wants because acne is seen as ugly and non-beautiful. They use celebrities in their teens as well as old people, making their product appealing to a large age span. So it represents a wide range of demographics making the product sell to more people.  “Their ads are successful in representing the norms and beliefs of the public, be it clear skin, or success in life.” (http://itsalanalutz.wordpress.com/).  The manufacturers are more able to do that with successful celebrities. This is a different strategy then the one used in my ad but it may just be the most successful form of hailing and interpelating an individual.

 

The ad Emma Goegan used has the same type of hailing and interpelating which is showing the media’s perception of what a happier and younger ‘you’ would look like, if they used their product. This is successful because every women or person in general wants to feel happy and to feel they have a perfect life. “This ad, sadly, accurately embody’ s the norms and values held within western society towards young women.”( http://emmagoegan.wordpress.com/). I strongly agree with Emma here. It’s very sad that many women and girls feel they need fewer calories and more beauty products to feel good about themselves.

 

The different types of hailing works in getting the consumer interpelating by relating to specific demographics, which helps manufacturers because people are buying their products which is keeping the business wealthy and happy. I don’t think the representations they use are accurate but I think they are desired by many different people. 

What the Hail?

Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s Maybelline. You hear this slogan every time a Maybelline makeup commercial is ending. The commercial, from Maybelline representing Fit Me Foundation has a women talking about how her make-up won’t change her individuality. This commercial seems to target my demographic, because she is a young beautiful woman that cares about her appearance. If you would like to view the commercial you can watch it at the following link: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJLVj-j6ze0). Most make up commercials have a young audience target, aimed at women between the ages of fifteen and thirty. They want you to feel like you can’t be flawless or completely beautiful without makeup.  That if you want to get somewhere in a career or in a social life you must wear their make-up line to succeed.  There is no room for natural beauty.  People get hooked believing that they can be more beautiful or more successful if they wear the Maybelline cosmetic line.  This is the beginning of a long life of purchasing cosmetics, because we become dependent on make-up to improve our self-esteem. 

 

There are many strategies that advertisers use to make their product desirable to many people but one of the biggest ways is by hailing us and interpellation immediately takes place, once we are hailed. Maybelline hails us first by reaching out to our gender or feminine sexuality by having the subject in the commercial to which we relate in the commercial as young, beautiful and seems to have a fun life with many friends and seems to be desired by many people, when wearing the make-up.  This person is a girl and because of that, based on my gender I interpellate with the subject in the commercial.  When you are born you have a gender and from that time on, people tell you about the traits and characteristic that exemplifies that gender. The textbook talks a lot about how gender is a major part in identity, “To confirm this gender identity you probably adopted certain kind of appropriate male and female behavior. Simple being labeled as ‘boy’ or ‘girl’ may determine your behavior to some extent” (O’shaughnessy & Stadler , Media and Society, 185). Little girls are raised being exposed to women wearing make-up and they start earlier and earlier probably because of the influence of the TV and magazine advertising.

 

The second way this commercial hails us is by the age and activity the girl is doing in the advertisement. The age of the girl in the commercial is young and desirable because she is able to go out and is having fun.  They don’t show this girl having worries about running a house hold or if she’s going to be on the streets next month if she doesn’t pay her bills. The activity she is doing during the advertisement makes it seem like she is a free spirit who enjoys every moment life has to offer and is always happy. Now of course this probably isn’t true but problems in life don’t sell and the point is to sell the product.  The book talks about whom we define ourselves with and how we are influenced by many outside factors to aim for a happy life.    This advertisement is doing just that, providing a happy visual experience for us to want that same type of happiness and beauty in our lives. “This is quite a challenging belief because it causes us to question ourselves. What this suggests is that our personality, our individual identity, and our subjectivity have been produced by a number of external factors” (O’shaughnessy & Stadler , Media and Society,184). It’s very obvious that one of the external factors is the media and there ability to hail and interpellates the target audience.

 

I believe that this advertisement is successful in its attempt to represent our norms/ values and beliefs as well as attract are intention and interest us in the product. The product has been out for a couple of years now, so people must be buying it, making there advertising successful. 

Wanted: the media that we need

As I read more and more of my classmate’s blogs it became clearer that the media we want may not be the media we need.  It’s not a simple black and white question with a simple black and white answer; rather it has a large grey area.  The media does inform us about important social, political, cultural and economic matters but it only gives us enough information so that it influences us toward the popular opinion of the masses.  Rarely does the media provide the information in a format that debates the issue for pro’s and con’s,  helping us define the truth of a subject.  More often the media has made the decision of what side of the argument will be represented by their company, which influences the way we think.

 

Although we might not get the full truth with the media we would have no idea about what was going on in the world, without the media. This point was brought to my attention when I was reading Natalie Kits blog, she states, “We also gain vast amounts of knowledge from these sources. It is important to recognize that without the news, not many people would know about the events occurring on other continents. It is only because of the demand for information that we have this kind of information available to us.”(Natalie Kit http://nk13ps.wordpress.com/) Everything she said is true; many people including myself wouldn’t even know what was going on in our own town without some sort of media influence.  Media is easy to access and to get information about all kinds of different topics, the issue becomes how true the information is from those sources.

 

Victoria Ahle made a great point that I fully support, when she said “Not all media will be to everyone’s taste; people are still individuals. But the media must play on the biggest universal themes that the majority of the population will enjoy and consume.”(Victoria Ahle http://youthnomore.wordpress.com/). It’s true not everyone’s going to like everything on the radio, or TV, but that’s normal in most things, that’s what makes us individuals.  As an example, not everyone’s going to like pizza, nor is everyone going to like a certain magazine. People choose what type of information they want to find and they have dependable types of media that they believe is reliable and they seek out information from these dependable sources.  An individual who doesn’t have the interest in social, cultural, political or economics in our world, will chose not to search out media.  I think we choose what information we want to find and what we like.  When the masses like specific topics it influences how easy it is to find the information.  Simply because the more the media sells the more money the media makes and if people are interested in the topic, they will purchase the media.  This makes finding information dependable and easy.

 

The media makes it easy to get any information we want at any point with all the types of technology. Nikki Hough shared this in her blog when she said “The generation we live in today is highly affected by technology, we rely on having everything and anything we want and NEED in the tip of our hands.” Nikki Hough http://nhough95.wordpress.com/). It’s true, whatever we want to know we can just look up on our phones, iPods, and so on. It’s not a bad thing because it makes us more knowledgeable and able to access the media whenever we are searching out information on a topic.  Instant information on a variety of topic’s through various types of media.  The media we want may be different then the media we need; however, they are very similar, we just need to search for our truth.  The effectiveness of technology today is that it allows us to get any information we want, whenever we want, using any type of media that we find to our satisfaction.

CPCF 1F25: The media we want?

I personal believe that we get the media we want rather than want the media we get, there are a few reasons why I think this. The stories from the media that we get are the stories the people want to read.  One reason I believe this is because if we didn’t buy the magazines that we do then the magazines would change the stories to ensure they sold the magazines.  Television programing also need to sell their stories, and they depend on the ratings of their programs to justify the type of information they are giving to the public.  So if we didn’t buy what the media was advertising then they would change it, because the media goes by what’s going to make them the most amount of money possible.

 Media is like an on-going circle, it always changes but it changes based on what the audience wants to read or view.  In my opinion the audience generally likes to read and watch program’s that doesn’t take too much thought.  Most people like the media to be easy going and entertaining.  So in return the media responds by producing shows, magazines, and advertisement’s that are easy to understand and generic to try to capture a larger percentage of the public.  The media attempts to affect our emotions to create a connection.  “But media producers, text and audience are all part of the social whole; they are not separate entities.  The media are one of the social forces that produce popular common sense, the general social beliefs and feelings of a society.  In turn, these social beliefs and values influence the media, who reflect them.” (O’Shanughnessy & Stader; Media and Society; 59).  O’Shanughessy & Stadler suggests that the behaviors and beliefs taught by the media are the behavior and beliefs of the average user of all types of media.

 Changes over the years of the type of television shows provided are another example of the masses getting the type of media we want to watch.  In the past 10 years crime shows have become very popular as well as reality TV shows.  Many of these TV shows focus on “kids”partying.  Programs like “Jersey Shores” are marketed to specific age groups.  Crime shows are marketed to another group of individuals.  Since many people watch these shows it makes the media companies very rich and this encourages them to make more of the same type of stories, because it is what sells to the people.  Every year one or two new crime and  reality show comes out with the continuation of the old ones.  Some people believe what they are watching are real situations, but what they don’t realize is the media puts twists on them and only shows things they want you to see, to influence the viewer’s emotions.  “Many media products represent the real world but these media products are not the real world.” (O’Shanughnessy & Stadler; Media and Society:36).  Representations and constructions can be very false and give many people the wrong impression.

 The media wants money.  We give them money by watching are favorite TV shows or buying magazines, so they use the stuff that sells over and over again on TV or in their magazines.  If it didn’t sell then they would change the information to what does sell and this is how the general masses influence’s what the media produces in the on-going media circle.

1f25 blog response 1: media impact on others

The blogs that I have read from my classmates support the belief that the media has a very significant impact on their worldviews.  Most believe that the impact the media has on their own life and the life of others is negative. Some things my classmates said in their post got me thinking how it affects us negatively in different ways and how we carry that negativity around with us or release that negativity to others in our life. I believe that the media influences our thoughts negatively, which has made me consider that there is an overwhelming atmosphere of negativity created by the media.  We proliferate or reproduce the negativity through various forms of media.

I never really thought about it like this before but I, like Taylor also haven’t traveled many places outside of North America, making most things I know about the world come from the media or pop culture (Taylor Umer, http://t7ums.wordpress.com/).  When I consider another country I think about the negative aspects of the country and tend to ask questions such as, “Is it safe?”  “What goes on there?” “Is it a third world country?”  “How do they live?”  The media covers most of these questions by focusing on the negative perspective. The media doesn’t cover how beautiful the landscape is or how nice and caring the people who live there are, or the wonderful and exotic cuisine that can be found. I guess the media influenced my opinion to be judgmental and wrong at times. The only way you could experience the real nature and culture of a different country is if you went somewhere for yourself.

 

I also agree with what Madison said about sensationalism and how we tend to pick sides after reading something. “I have personally read an article in the past and have sympathized with the victim and assumed that the person who is being investigated was automatically guilty even before he or she had gone to trial!  It should be “innocent until proven guilty” but it seems we have it backwards.” (Madison Sylvester http://madysylvester.wordpress.com/). Normally I sympathize with the victim just after reading the title of the article because the media makes it sound so horrible that I just can seem to reason why someone would do that to another human. Obviously in some cases the person who does a horrible crime or injustice to another person isn’t very mentally stable, and maybe I should be giving them just as much sympathy for being mentally unstable. However, the media makes it seem so bad that I just can’t find the sympathy within myself.  It seems like they do this on purpose, they manipulate the information so that we only get the bad news during an event.   As a result we choose the side of the victim, but maybe that’s the reason we all think our world is so screwed up now a days. Or maybe it’s always been like this?  It would be interesting to see how the media reported information years ago.

 

I loved the point that Deanna made about miss-commination in texting and social networking  that is the cause of fights and ruined friendships.( Deanna Quait , http://deannaquait.wordpress.com/). It’s such a regular thing that happens, because you don’t truly know the intent behind a text.  It’s easy to misinterpret the message  in a totally different way than someone meant, since body language helps communicate the intent and over some electronic devices there’s no way to know for sure.  People could think that someone was saying something rude or sarcastic about them but they could have been sincere and generous.

 

Either way you look at it I think most people would agree that the media has a significant effect on their life. Most of the blogs had the same view as me, that it affected our lives in a negative manner.  Some of the other blogs were able to express it differently than I had considered and it opened my eyes to things I didn’t recognize were happening. 

1F25 post 1: media impact

HOW SIGNIFICANT DO YOU THINK THE IMPACT OF THE MASS MDIA IS ON YOUR WORLDVIEW ?

Personally I feel that the mass media has a negative impact on my view of the world. There are so many different forms of media that there is just no escaping the bad or the good, it is part of our everyday experience, when you first get up in the morning and put on the radio you get a perspective on an issue by the radio announcer…when you turn on the TV you get a different perspective on the TV announcer perspective of the issue…turn on the computer and you get different sites perspective.  How do you see them representing issues negatively?  (TV and radio and computer are based on sales, therefore they try to represent issues that will sell to the public…trauma, death, sex sells, so they often taint the real issue with a bias of making money).  The way I see it is that today people think that what is posted on the Internet or reported in the news is the absolute truth.  They don’t bother to consider alternate ways of considering an issue.  What is even worse is that people believe that texting is time better spent then sitting down and having a conversation with someone.  When you text rather than have a face to face conversation you lose the body language that accompanies a message, so it is more than likely that we miss the intent of the text.  At one time reporting and using media was based on providing the facts and representing the issue with integrity.  Today media requires a far more substantial financial backing to keep their media tool considered popular and in existence.  The media often enhances a story to provoke a different truth, like – Brad Pitt and Angelina jones were said to have been arguing in public – headlines read – Brad and Angelina are getting a divorce. On the other hand it is nice that we can communicate and keep in touch with the events in the world by turning on the Internet or through the phone while you can stay in the comfort of your own bed or living room.   The comfort of texting and the internet can be addictive but what happens when your with someone and they are more interested on what’s happening online, rather than paying attention to the person sitting in front of you trying to carry on a conversation.  A conversation with friends may lead to considering the real truth of an issue.  Consider, that I invite my friends over to bake, watch movies and talk and most of the time my friends are on their phone’s texting other people, checking Facebook, twitter and Instagram every 5 minutes.  Where does that leave me? Sitting there doing my own thing which we all could do at our own houses.  We could have spent the time discussing real issues and our different thoughts on those issues.  I think people are obsessed with their phones and apps that come with them, leaving no time for real human connection. Personally I have no problem leaving my phone behind and going to hang out with real human beings in person.  The information on the Internet that seems so important to read will still be available years from now.   You’ll have plenty of time to catch up with the Internet, but the real humans that you love and care for could be gone tomorrow. 

 

might as well!

So for anyone who decides to look down my blog( even though i’m only using it for the blog assignments ) i though i would give a brief bio of myself!

My name is Skyla read, i am a first year student in community health. I live of campus because this is my hometown. I picked CPCF as my humanities credit because i am interested in how the  media effects the society we live in. So far i am enjoying the class, and  i can wait to start posting blogs on my opinion  on the topics at hand, but even more important i’m excited to read other people’s thoughts!

Thats all for now !