Week 4 Media and Bias

Week4: Media and Bias

InstitutionAffiliation

Week4: Media and Bias

Inour world today, it is critical to note that we live in a time wherewe are essentially manipulated by the media through the ways that itshapes what we are thinking and what we talk about. The mediamanipulates the public by focusing on various topics and subjectsthat they turn into fodder for the people. For example, last year,during the ‘Pokemon’ craze that befell the world, the media wasall awash with information on the game as reports on variousaccidents, celebrities and profits associated with the game.Essentially, the media played a significant role in popularizing thegame among the public.

Inother instances, however, the media can also create panic in thepublic through manipulation. While the media reflects the society, Ibelieve that it plays a more significant role in shaping how we thinkand this is seen in the arguments made in the video. In the criticalthinking piece, the speaker argues that indeed, television played arole in shaping the American society and today, the statement couldnot be any truer. For instance, in the past two years, reports onrace-related violence soared as the media focused on events whereAfrican Americans were shot by police. These reports essentiallyshaped how people perceived the society and African Americans as thereports affirmed biases on black criminal tendencies and whitesupremacist views developed. According to some critics, while themedia reported on such events, this is a great example of the powerof media manipulation whereby tales of doom and misrepresentation arechanneled (French, 2016).

Whileit is harder for people to break away from the media hypnosis, acritical point is to note is that we need to accept that we arevulnerable to bias through our various stereotypes and cognitivebiases that we have learnt in the society. To overcome this control,we need to address our confirmation biases by diversifying oursources of news. Through this strategy, we would expose ourselves tovarious perspectives that would make us more open minded and lesservulnerable to media control.

References

French,D. (August26, 2016). “How to Sustain a False Police Shooting Crisis”.NationalReview.http://www.nationalreview.com/article/439426/police-shootings-media-created-fake-crisis