To View or Not To View :: Media News Television Essays

To View or Not To View Staying in touch with the outside world, via the 10:00 evening news, has become increasingly difficult for me the last couple years. Not only am I usually not awake at 10:00, but if I am, I do not want to spend my time hearing about the many murders, rapes, and robberies that plaque our city. Television news has not only taken on a tabloid-like feel, but the substance of most of the news stories is a total waste of my viewing time. However, in an effort to stay connected, I currently listen to the morning TV news as well as read the Chicago Tribune on a daily basis. The local news broadcast I taped to critique for this paper was the 5:00 News on Channel 5 which was shown on Monday, April 7, co-anchored by Joan Esposito, a 30ish white female, and Warren Saunders, a late 50's black male. I viewed a total of 13 stories which were comprised mainly of murder, weather and informational topics. The "Top Story" was about a 7 year old girl who was murdered by a gang member while she was waiting in line to get ice cream. The story's time went for approximately 4 minutes and included 3 interviews of people, 3 different on-screen captions and a camera span of teddy bears on a fence. The actual meaty parts of this story, that is, the facts, were fully given in this broadcast. However, interviews with crying persons of the gang members' families, and the little girl's school superintendent musing out loud on what this little girl could have become, was a total waste of time. Conversely, scanning the teddy bears was touching, but lent nothing to the telling of the tragic event that took this girl's life. I suppose the "powers that be" at the news station do not feel the public can feel on their own, thus we are constantly being given visual reminders of how sad a story is. I can safely say that the Top Story of the majority of broadcasts that I view are murders. Based on that premise, the senseless murder of this child was an important story in Chicago that day. I do take exception, however, to the many visuals used to evoke emotion as the sadness of the story spoke for itself. Apart from this story, the only remaining "news stories" consisted of a murder of a cab driver and two stories of missing persons.