subject: Media Manipulation - Our Reality Every Day [print this page] Media Manipulation - Our Reality Every Day
Media manipulation is part of our daily life. Each event is presented by the media in a way that is convenient for each of them. The misconception of the reality created by the media in the audience, can lead to wrong assessment and behavior in humans.
Media not only have a social role, but they actually are tools for controlling public temperature. Media manipulation consists of the way news is presented and depends on how people will understand a process and how they will react to it.
The media have a social role to varying degrees. They can talk about certain issues and keep silent about others. This is exactly what turns them into a new type of power.
In closed and authoritarian countries, media aim at persuading the audience that we should accept unconditionally all political and social actions of the government. So they become part of the state power bodies. While in the open and democratic societies, the media are an intermediary between the authorities and people. They should provide a two-way flow of information from the institutions to society and vice versa. Media competition leads to differentiation of news and information, also called media manipulation
The relationship between media and politics is an important issue. Some authors argue that mass media have a negative role in the political sphere. According to some experts, manipulation occurs when people are forced to accept beliefs and actions. Thus, they become dependent objectively and become objects of manipulation.
There are two types of manipulation. In the first case, certain classes and elites occupy the media and provide information suitable for them. A second option - in the society is formed apolitical mass culture through the mechanisms of market economy. So politicians are free to act without worrying that the society might be dissatisfied with their work. There are five types of media manipulation:
Publication and broadcasting of materials criticising existing political and social conditions
Isolation of the personal lives of a public framework, leading to underestimation of the problem
Giving priority to volume of the entertainment at the expense of political information
Unclear boundaries between information and entertainment
Depoliticize issues by omitting important details of the information
Many analysts believe that the media are harmful to democracy because they encourage political passivity by offering only sensational and entertainment information.
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