The Influence Of News Media

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The media has always played an influential role in our society. Starting centuries ago with newspapers and flyers, the news media has been the primary source for society to share and learn about important events. It has the ability, especially with today’s technical advances, to get information to large numbers of people quickly and efficiently, therefore having the potential for great influential power. However, the information disseminated isn’t always accurate for various reasons to include personal agendas and governmental pressures. Instead of assisting in fully informing society, the media has frequently caused society to be ill-informed and unknowingly ignorant to many events and situations. Through media censorship, misinformation, Through the omission of information and neglecting to provide the entire truth to the public, the news media deprives society of information they deserve, thus making them less informed and aware. In an analysis of media coverage in Russia and the United States, written by Olga Lazitski, there is an explanation of omission resulting from “governmental pressure, market pressure (ratings), or just a lack of a journalist’s education.” (904) Lazitski continues and references an article about suicides in the U.S. Army that never received any large scale media coverage. This situation could be an example of omission due to governmental pressure, possibly being a result of the government wanting to mitigate a negative view on the pressures of Military lifestyle. Through the omission of this information, society was censored from the entire truth of the prevalence of suicides in the U.S. Military. People of society then continue to make conclusion and assumptions falsely out of unknowing ignorance, perhaps the conclusions that the news media wants its viewers to believe. This is just one example of how the news media can use censorship in order to deprive society of certain types of information keeping society ill-informed. The omission of information through censorship is a tool frequently used by news media. The news media doesn’t always omit information, they also have the ability to publish inaccurate information to persuade its viewers unknowingly, keeping them poorly

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