You turn on Channel 6 News at any given time of day and learn about what it is that is going on in your world that day. Or be tantalized by bits and pieces of information for hours on end, receiving answers to questions you would never have had and not understanding anything you actually wanted to.
At the beginning of any given news program you get tidbits of this or that. There was a house fire on fifth street. There was a robbery at the 7 Eleven on McDade. The local school's canned food drive brought in over 5,000 cans. And in other news... On and on it goes until all the tidbits have thoroughly tantalized you. Then, the news anchor proceeds to go into some level of depth with each story. She tells you the house fire is under investigation and there were no injuries. Maybe there is someone on the scene that relays the same information to you after the anchor is finished. The only difference being that the field anchor is actually there. Whoop. The next anchor goes into the next story. He tells you the owner of the 7 Eleven was held at gunpoint and gave up everything in the cash register. You may see an interview that they held with the officer that responded to the call. He will tell you when he got the call and how close they are to finding the perpetrator. You will be encouraged to call in with any information you may have. On and on to the next stories until you make it through the beginning repertoire. The weather report comes in, and then you go back through all of the information you just received, this time with a bit more to tell, maybe.
Looking at the news, what I see is another form of entertainment. I see companies vying for attention from their audience and utilizing anything they can to get that attention. I see stations not giving full stories at any given time. I see anchors playing off of viewers emotions: pushing and pulling them between high and low stories. I see programs that are structured to keep people watching for that one piece of information that they want. What I do not see is an efficient information transfer. This bothers me.
When I watch the news, I am watching it for one reason - to get information. Call me crazy, but I want to be able to understand what is going on in the world without being tantalized the entire time. What is so difficult about giving information to the public in a straightforward matter? Why is it that the news has mutated into this complex sequence of entertaining the public? I fail to understand what it is about the news that so requires stations to behave this way. For this reason, I never watch the news on my own accord. I go online and read articles, watch videos (that are sometimes no more straight forward than the programs), I go on Facebook and get information. I do not watch the televised show that is put on daily multiple times a day.
This causes a separate issue. I have a distrust of the news because they cannot give me facts as facts. Given, a certain level of story-telling is needed, but it should not overshadow the news itself. So I go off and get my information from other sources, which are not always the best sources. Much of my generation I am sure falls into a similar category. We want to be educated, but we do not need to be patronized by the system we are trying to be educated from. To put it bluntly, if news stations would cut the crap and return to a focus on the news instead of entertainment and viewing numbers, I would watch it, and I would be better enducated for it. Because I know they are a more credble source. I understand that I should be getting my news from people who do this for a living (in conjunction with multiple sources). But I do not want to because it feels like I am pulling teeth everytime I watch the news to get information.
