Blog post 2
Bill Clinton. What comes to mind when seeing his name. Is it his policies? The laws he passed? How many supporters he had? For most of you, upon seeing that name, you think of the Monica Lewinski scandal. The scandal that ripped through media like a fire storm, being covered by every outlet and medium imaginable. I find that fascinating, as this showcases perfectly one of the concepts we touched on in class, which is privatization. In short, this is the practice of focusing more on the private matters of a politician's life as opposed to their normal political business dealings. This is clearly something that has been done for quite some time now, but is becoming more prevalent in our day and age.
As shown in the Lewinski scandal, more and more politicians are being presented as celebrities. Being showcased in tabloids with big flashy headlines having nothing to do with their policies. A more recent example is that of president Trump, who made more headlines than one could count. His tweets, whereabouts, and everyday shenanigans were detailed in every type of media imaginable. People were treating him more like a celebrity than the politician he was supposed to be. Granted, he was certainly a special character, but there is definitely something to be said about if all this press coverage was good or not. Perhaps a debate for another day, but food for thought.
As media becomes more and more focused on what gets the clicks, and the more eyes on their content, there may be cause for concern as to what they are portraying as facts. As we know fake news and deep fakes are becoming more and more prevalent, as these politicians are getting treated more like celebrities, media outlets know these influential people get people talking and tuned in. It would therefore be easy, unethical yes, but easy for said outlets to publish fake or non fact checked stories in favour of views. Seeing into a politician's personal life may be interesting or fun, but is this what we should be prioritizing? It certainly seems the media has made its mind about the matter... have you?
I think where things differ between Clinton and Trump is that Clinton's scandal was not something he wanted shared with the media and it quickly became a source of gossip, whereas Trump utilises social media to express his controversial opinions to drown out the gossip about him (there is a lot more accusations against Trump that seem to fly under the radar which are far worse than an affair). But I do think it is beneficial for politicians lives to be in the media as it holds them accountable. Politicians should be held to a high moral standard as they represent entire countries and reflect what is acceptable to the rest of the population. I certainly would not want someone with sexual assault accusations to run the country I live in.
ReplyDeleteI agree that politicians are being treated like celebrities. With the digital media, it‘s hard to control what’s being published, but I feel like that the more serious media and newspapers should focus less on gossip and the private life of politicians and more on their work and policies.
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