Why Do We Fight?

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Recommended: The role of the media in politics

Imagine a world - full of love - free of war. What if one day everyone got along and there was not anything to worry about? Nothing was in the way of anyones happiness. Media was out of the picture, weapons were not an option, and nobody had more power than anyone else. Imagine a perfect life of perfect freedom.
Walter Lippmann once said, “We must remember that in time of war what is said on the enemy’s side of the front is always propaganda, and what is said on our side of the front is truth and righteousness, the cause of humanity and a crusade for peace.” Every battle has two sides to the story. One story comes from the media, and one comes from the field of battle, the people who were there. The media insists on using hyperbole to attract people into believing the complete wrong story. ("War, Propaganda and the Media." - Global Issues. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2014.) The goal behind media is to get people excited into knowing the wrong things. Maybe not necessarily wrong, but maybe they just don’t tell you the whole story. They only use selective stories and they also narrow down the range of discourse. For example, Vietnam was named the first television war. PBS was the station that reported things. Also, the people that wanted to know things about the war and follow it, were very disappointed in what they heard. Americans finally realized this was a war we should have fought to win and wondered why we didn’t. People believe it was because of how the media reported the war. It was said that “during the Vietnam war, journalism and news media unintentionally caused a massive shift of American citizens viewpoint of the war.” The reason for this was because it was the first time people could write and report to the American citiz...

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...vented losing the Vietnam war, nor would it have stopped Hitler coming to power, or World War II. However, without all these things in the way, it definitely could have helped avoid a lot of the problems that were caused because of Media, nuclear weapons, and people with “more power” than others. A world full of peace is far beyond reach, especially now with all the power everything has.

WORKS CITED:

"War, Propaganda and the Media." - Global Issues. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 May 2014.

Gonthier, Hannah. "How Media Affected the Vietnam War." YouTube. YouTube, 26 Nov. 2012. Web. 15 May 2014.

"Key Issues: Nuclear Weapons: History: Cold War: Strategy: Introduction to Nuclear Strategies." Key Issues: Nuclear Weapons: History: Cold War: Strategy: Introduction to Nuclear Strategies. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 May 2014.

"Adolf." Hitler's Rise to Power. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 May 2014.

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