"It was on the news, so it must be true and important!" Or so we think. As a student in Mass Communication, I've learned how mass media can influence the public in many different ways. There are many mass media theories describing exactly how this is done. With the election that is about to happen, candidates are preparing through debates, rallies, traveling, putting out public policies, and trashing each other's actions. Of course, the media is covering almost every action, as expected. With this type of coverage, the mass media theory titled the Agenda Setting Theory comes into play.
According to Mass Communication Theory, the Agenda Setting Theory explains that viewers learn about a certain issue, and how much importance to attach to the issue, from mass media. During a campaign, it is stated that the media could "set" the agenda of that campaign. The media may not tell you exactly what to think, but it can tell you what to think about, and in what order of importance.
We all know that our news media should be unbiased, get to the point, and inform us of what's going on. As I study journalism, I've also learned how the media can use information and sound bites in a story to give it a bias (or lack thereof). An unbiased story will inform the readers of the who, what, when, where, why, and how in a clear and concise way so that the information is understood and acquired. It also includes both sides of the story, along with facts/stats from both sides to prove or disprove. A biased story would show the who, what, when, where, why, and how, but a slant is given by cutting certain soundbites of quotations while leaving out other pieces of spoken information, leading to an incorrect presentation. This is also done with a picture or video, possibly cutting out important visual information. Of course, a journalist can pick and choose what quotations and info to put in the story, but it is possible to put in the necessary and correct information. There is obviously a time limit for news stories, but it can still be done correctly.
This is not a Democrat or Republican (or even a Libertarian) issue, it is a journalist issue. It's perfectly okay to have your own opinions, beliefs, and party affiliations, but it's very important to prevent those from leaking into your news work. There are so many real world examples of this bias in media.
A very recent example is the video leaked of Donald Trump having a conversation that included some lewd comments about women. Yes, it's wrong, it's gross, and it's disappointing. My question is, why was the mainstream media so quick to bring this up, but say nothing about Hillary Clinton's past scandals? The key here is that both references here are from the past, but one is drug through the mud, while the other isn't.
At the second debate, the video of the "locker room conversation" was brought up almost immediately. When Trump went to defend himself, he also brought up Clinton's email scandal. He was cut off rather abruptly when bringing it up. What about the recent WikiLeaks? According to Investor's Business Daily, the recent batch of emails from WikiLeaks show that Clinton has both public and private policies. One outlines her true view on immigration: "The main reason behind successful immigration should be painfully obvious to even the most dimwitted of observers: Some groups of people are almost always highly successful given only half a chance (Jews, Hindus/Sikhs and Chinese people, for example), while others (Muslims, blacks and Roma, for instance) fare badly almost irrespective of circumstances." Why has the media been silent on this racial stereotyping?
Speaking of, we always hear about Trump's rhetoric on Muslims and other immigrants. People worried when he said that there were criminals and rapists in that population, but what about Clinton's aforementioned racial stereotyping? What about the time when she called young black men "super predators" during tenure as First Lady? Why is this never brought up?
Not only has this hypocrisy involved the two main candidates, but even Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson. According to NewsOK, the media left out a part of the story when Johnson couldn't name a foreign leader, therefore, presenting him to be seemingly unqualified. His running mate, William Weld, helped him out by naming Angela Merkel, Germany's foreign leader.
It's sad when people have to turn to often obscure media outlets, rather than using mainstream media, for unbiased information. I could've named some more examples, but this would've made my article double in length. It seems from the media portrayal, if you're not Hillary Clinton in this election, then you're unqualified. This isn't to say that the candidates can't be hypocritical themselves (they can be), but it isn't right to paint candidates how you choose to do so. The correct information should always be used.
