I recall passionately watching episodes of a Japanese television show called “Sailor Moon” back when I was a young child. That show has been very popular, especially among young girls. The show is so well-known and globally liked that it has been interpreted in several different languages. Since I was living in Belgium at that time of my childhood, the dialogues between the characters were translated from Japanese to French so that we could understand what was being said. Now looking back at some of the episodes on Youtube, it does not only refresh my memory of my favorite childhood television show but I also presently learned something that I never before was aware of.

Among the main female warriors in the show, there are two that are evidently very close to one another emotionally. One of the two females, Sailor Uranus, has always considered as a guy due to her boyish appearance. However, from her outfits which match the other female combatants, viewers ceased to mistake Sailor Uranus for a man and referred to her as a woman later on. Along with the puzzlement and controversy of that matter, the relationship of the two warriors has altered based upon the various cultural views of countries that air the television show. In Japan, the original version is that Sailor Uranus and her companion, Sailor Neptune, are actually lovers. However, in the English-translated version, the relationship changed for the sake of the children viewers and the two were labeled as cousins instead. The French edition modified them as simply cousins by adjusting their conversations to each other to restrain the audience from misreading them as lesbians. These unique, little differences by individual countries in that one aspect of the television show indicate that there was much disapproval toward the homosexuality subject.

Personally, I’m very pleased that some countries decided to greatly consider the mentality and well-being of children by altering that small part of the story. Since I’m a conservative type of person, I reject the idea of seeing two TV animated characters that happen to be homosexuals, especially when the show was created specifically for young kids. Children should not be witnessing something abnormal and unnatural at such an early age. If the countries had not chosen to censor that factor, I would predict that thousands of those kids were likely to believe that homosexuality is conventional and completely normal. That would put a terrible psychological affect on the young and innocent audience.

Engel, in my perspective, covered the topic with a satisfying amount of information. I was content at the fact that her diction included words and phrases like “suggesting” and “possible explanations”.  She made sure to bring up the qualifications about the findings by stating, “the association between autism and precipitation has not been clinically proven and that possible explanations need further testing.” Since the story tells of a study that still isn’t quite certain of the causes of the disorder, it’s crucial to mention that the discoveries of the investigation are not fully absolute. By notifying the reader about this uncertainty, the reporter makes her article more trustworthy. Several people, including me, have lost dependability of the media more and more because of their false, deceptive reporting. There are so many statements that are easily taken out of context by journalists, which triggers doubts of whether or not the news we read and hear are true. 

Furthermore, the researchers pointed out that autism is a very complicated issue to understand. Knowing that they put so much effort into figuring out the reasons of the disorder and have found potential causes is already a vast progression. Therefore, I say that the article answered my questions about the topic even though the conclusions are not entirely positive yet. I’ve previously assumed that autism was a disorder that is formed genetically. Now I come into the realization that environmental factors play such a significant part in this.

This kind of brand must be directed toward teenagers due to its attempts of entertaining and attracting the young groups of viewers with the “sex appeal”. As I checked out the site’s privacy policy, I noticed that they gave emphasis on not allowing children under the age of 13 to give out personal information. I’m not sure if that also means that anyone younger than 13-years-old should not enter the site. However, I say that it would be a waste of time for them to get in there. I do admit that some of the music videos can be funny at times, but they’re not of high quality in the comedy sense. For example, sometimes we would see comedy movies that are too silly and stupid to get any laughter out of them. Other times, we would watch movies that are so harebrained that we can’t help but laugh. I think that White Gold has an equal level of both elements.

Plus, I personally find the male singer quite creepy from his wide-opened eyes and the way he grins. I don’t see him as sexy at all and that’s why I put the phrase “sex appeal” under quotation marks. The rock band occasionally drinks or splashes a glass of milk while they’re singing and dancing, but I still think that it’s not enough in terms of milk commercials. Indeed, they’re surrounded by whiteness everywhere at all times. Yet we could easily mistake the pale environment for a snowy or icy region instead of a milky one. Viewers could also be more distracted by the fact that the singer keeps mentioning his long, white hair and they may not even recall that the main focus of the website is about the dairy liquid product.

Overall, White Gold does not affect my attitude or actions toward the merchandise. It was only a little bit engaging when I first saw a segment of one of their music videos because I have never seen nor heard about this online brand before. I don’t feel a sudden thirst for milk when I watch the clips. It could tempt other people but as for me….I’m not the type of person that lets the media influence her that easily.

This week, my assignment was to select a mass medium that could create controversy in terms of the messages it sends out to the public. I chose to look at the various effects of rap music since I’m one of the few people that enjoy listening to it. I was asked to find and read three academic journal articles about my topic and reflect on them afterwards using Toulmin’s model once again.

Claim and Qualifiers

From the journal articles that I’ve gathered, I do agree that rap music can generate troublesome behaviors in the younger groups of listeners. However, I hold strong disagreement to the fact which states that rap music is at complete fault when a child or teenager becomes more violent.

Grounds

The first report that I read was about an interview with some of the well-known rap artists of our generation.  It’s harder to find valuable rappers these days, but we need to realize that there are still artists around who work at using their rapping skills to convey a positive message to their young listeners. Therefore, we cannot label the entire rap music industry as insulting. As Houston rapper Trae said, “There’s a lot in rap music that does influence, but you cannot sit here and just blame it on hip-hop. If you do blame it on hip-hop then blame it on all the fake rappers out there.”

The second article of mine was a research on the relationship between rap and the level of sexism in college students. The study involved three groups, one that did not listen to any music whatsoever, another which listened to songs that had no sexist lyrics, and the third group was provided with songs that did have sexist lyrics. The results of the experiment revealed that every male in all three groups became more sexist afterwards. The fact that even males who didn’t listen to sexist lyrics had undergone a higher level of sexism later on does not prove that rap music causes sexist behaviors.

The third article examined how the issue of race is entailed in rap music. Carrie Fried evaluated the outcomes of her survey, which had asked people’s responses based on the lyrics they were given. The lyrics had a picture of either a Caucasian man or an African American man. The study indicated that people still correlate racial stereotypes with lyrics. When lyrics were presented with a picture of a black rapper, every viewer’s reaction was more negative than their reactions toward lyrics with the image of a white rapper.

Warrant

The findings about the causes and effects of rap music are relevant to the rap industry as it shows that the music is not responsible for the rising of youth violence altogether. It confirms that those who listen to that kind of music need to change their perspectives. Rap has rotated more and more around the subjects of sex, drugs, and violence. It is true that Hip Hop nowadays is evolving in a way that is not truly seen as an evolution due to its obscene lyrics. The contents of most songs are becoming more explicit. However, if listeners were to be more educated, they wouldn’t be easily swayed into following those kinds of lyrics and putting them into action.

Rebuttal

Rap music falls under the “Agenda Setting Theory” because the theory states that media tell people what to think about, not what to think. I truly believe that the two matters associate with one another. It’s evident that sex, drugs, and violence are some big concerns in our world. Rap artists communicate those issues so that we’re not ignorant about them. They merely share those realistic affairs, but it is our own job to absorb what they say in way that we learn how to better ourselves. Parents cannot just blame rap music for their children’s mischievous manners because they’re the ones that are strictly in control of how their kids conduct themselves.

References

Llobet, E. (2007, November 19). Rap artists assess hip-hop music’s effects. The Daily Cougar, Retrieved October 29, 2008, from http://media.www.thedailycougar.com/media/storage/paper1206/news/2007/11/19/News/Rap-Artists.Assess.HipHop.Musics.Effects-3109639-page2.shtml

Mancini, G.. Rap music: ‘Danger’ to society or just another waltz?. Indiana University, Retrieved October 29, 2008, from http://www.iuinfo.indiana.edu/homepages/0919/text/rap.htm

Unknown. (2008, February 21). Study: Rap Music Linked to Sexism. North Carolina State University, Retrieved October 29, 2008, from http://www.physorg.com/news122832232.html

Based upon the name “New Internationalist”, we can already expect to find mostly issues from abroad while Newsweek handles issues within the United States. Yet the greatest distinction that I noticed between the two news suppliers is that the alternative media source of my choice does not provide the latest stories daily. Newsweek, on the other hand, keeps presenting up-to-minute information every single day. Newsweek entails various topics such as health, technology, and entertainment. It also includes international stories that the other media source covers. The fact that it possesses basically all the categories of subjects makes it more fulfilling than New Internationalist. The presidential election is definitely the hot topic at this point in time as the final voting day approaches. Therefore, Newsweek’s section of the “latest headlines” is mostly occupied by articles that focus on McCain and Obama. New Internationalist contains very limited amount of news, which leaves viewers to be clueless on some other subjects. It tells a lot more about the health conditions that are going on globally as world poverty is its main focus. Although the majority of its reports are serious and depressing news, it also takes time to embrace a few amusing scoops. An example of such comical story is an article called “THINGS TO DO BEFORE I RETIRE”, which was derived from the diary of our current president, George W. Bush.

While there are many differences, there’s also an essential similarity between the two sources. Both consist of interviews with regular people seen on the street. The quotes they use in their reports are directly taken from what their interviewees have stated. This makes their articles more precise and valuable, indeed. The two sources aim to concentrate on the issues that the public would want to know more about and would be interested in understanding more deeply. The fact that they involve ordinary people in their interviews gives the rest of us viewers the ability to relate to those people, which is definitely important.

For my first blog assignment, I was instructed to examine the election coverage by a media source of my choice. I decided to study how USA Today online reports the presidential campaigns in terms of Kathleen Hall Jamieson and Paul Waldman’s book called “The Press Effect”. The time of which I monitored the source from Saturday to Monday was between 10pm to 11pm. We have also been taught in class how to construct our argument based on Toulmin’s diagram. Therefore, I will be using his model to compose my own analysis and standpoint.

Claim and Qualifiers

In my perspective, USA Today effectively covered the election during the three days of my investigation as it has carefully engaged a wide range of approaches within its information. However, parts of the statements appear to be irrelevant to the main messages that the reporters were determined to focus on.

Grounds

I read fourteen articles from the politics section of www.usatoday.com/ overall.  Nine of the fourteen articles included several surveys and polls to inform the reader about which presidential candidate was leading before and which one has now taken the front spot. The various fluctuations of the public’s votes and the way the reporters take significant account of them carry out the format of a horserace. Along with the horserace layout, news writers followed the polls with strategies that the candidates need to execute to acquire victory. Those two features make the articles slide under the “soothsayer” role. However, most of the stories have also fused the role of both the “custodian of fact” and the “press as storyteller” together. Those individual news reporters incorporated pieces of history and biography of each candidate in their articles, which is what the role of the custodian of fact carries out. Additionally, they personally selected certain details of their preferences in order to express their desired concept. This doing represents the trait of the “press as storyteller” role. One of the articles directed more toward the role of the “press as psychologist”. It used a few phrases of “seemed to” as it talked about particular people’s behaviors and feelings in the campaign. The usage of expressions such as “seemed to” implies the act of supposing, which isn’t a fact.

Although each reporter’s article contains bits and pieces of the many roles from “The Press Effect” book, they all have one big similarity. Every one of them entails numerous word-for-word quotes from the presidential candidates, their running mates, as well as the public. Some news writers don’t just put out the facts and details and leave it at that. They also strengthen their gathered information by giving an analysis of certain parts. A few of the articles don’t quite stick to their primary focus as they deviate to mention other facts that the audience wouldn’t need to know about. Those unrelated pieces of information could only serve for the purpose of quick, short entertainment. One example is in an article that concentrated on Sarah Palin’s speech in Ohio. At the end of the description of her discourse, the reporter decides to add the fact that she went to a local farmer’s market to buy some apple cider. This random inclusion may be purely for fun detail and to release the seriousness of the topic.

Warrant

Since the articles possess so many little chunks of each various role in Jamieson’s and Waldman’s book, they are found to have more diversity and description. They are less bias as well. The reporters do not disregard the opinions of any groups of people. Children under the age of 18 are even included in the reports about the election as there was a completely separate survey for them to vote on. Furthermore, each article consisted of both the Republicans’ and the Democrats’ points of view. Some reporters’ objectives were to discuss one specific party, but they considerately brought up the reactions and counterattacks of the other party as well.

Backing

Although I believe that the “custodian of fact” is the most important role out of all the other possible ones, it’s even better when an article is able to enfold a mixture of the four roles excluding the “press as patriot”. Integrating all four makes the story well-rounded. As a voter, the person would want to know every angle and aspect of the running candidates such as their personalities, their beliefs and policies, and their history in order to make a greater educated decision. Perhaps even fragments of irrelevant information can be included like a couple of the articles that I read. The irrelevance may not seem fully professional at times, but it can also work in some cases.  In this election, it does seem to serve a purpose for the reader if they wish to know more about the candidates and their personal tastes. That shouldn’t be taken into consideration toward which person to vote for, however.