Author: EP1CERIC (Page 1 of 2)

I deeply appreciate Lewis Wallace’s authentic and unfiltered article about his (don’t know his preferred pronouns) personal opinions on the current status of journalism. I have always been kind of a free thinker, and whenever an idea comes to mind I always thought it was a good idea to express that idea with others and engage in open dialogue about it. However, I feel like this type of engagement is dying so it was refreshing to hear someone freely speak their mind no matter how radical or polarized their thoughts may be. I also believe that the more radical the thought may be, the better reason to have those thoughts heard, as we can see how individuals in society think and can identify people’s stances on topics and live in a more transparent free society. You don’t always have to agree with them but their voice should never be silenced especially when they express a minority opinion. It would be very contradictory if we shut their thoughts down. In response to Wallace’s thoughts, he loses me on the very first point and the whole topic of this article to begin with. I feel news should be objective. I don’t listen to the news to hear the opinion of others. I listen to the news to find the facts of a story to then formulate an opinion of my own. But to Wallace’s defense, it is nearly impossible for an imperfect human with feelings and thoughts and agendas to remain neutral on anything. This is the reason all governments on Earth are corrupt, for humans will always carry out their personal desires and do what’s best for them in positions of power. This isn’t a reason to stop trying though. I believe objective journalism isn’t unattainable. What we should do is practice admitting when we are being biased so that we don’t impose our values on a population that has none. They should choose their side of the story after analyzing the facts of the story and that’s what we should focus on putting out there as journalists. 

P.S. Was I supposed to answer the topics you addressed as alternative topics?

Whistleblower Frances Haugen has sparked a nation wide debate on the morals and behavior of the social media giant of Facebook. Haugen has expressed her distress for Facebook’s awareness of their role in spreading misinformation and literal physical violence in other uprisings in the world. Despite Facebook coming out and saying that they will combat the spread of dangerous misinformation, the team’s response has been proven to not be as effective. Additionally, Facebook has done its own research on the affects of the company on its users. These studies have concluded that when a user is presented with something that triggers rage, increased activity on the site always follows. When presented something that triggers joy, the user doesn’t engage with the platform as much. Knowing this Facebook uses this tactic to promote user interaction as much as possible to generate larger profits. Now, Francis Haugen vows to take legal action to get Facebook moderated by the government. This is either a very wrong step or useful experience for history. Handing out more power to the central government and giving them the ability to limit and censor speech sounds like a very unamerican move. However, big brother nowadays seems to not be the government but major social media networks like Facebook. Maybe having the government regulate major monopolies like Facebook may not be such a bad idea. But on the other hand, America grants its citizens free speech and just the very words of “hate speech” is a non-American belief. If we want to preserve free speech in America, hate speech or speech in general should never be dictated by the government as that is a freedom we will never get back. Facebook is an independent company and should have the right to control what gets posted on their site. This is a very interesting topic and I am honestly puzzled on where I stand on this argument.

Joe Biden, was asked by a reporter on his thoughts toward Facebook and the censoring of Fake News. His response I believe was a little far fetched. Miss information is if you think about it killing people but Covid-19 is really killing people here. Everyone in the United States has access to getting the vaccine. It’s easier to get the covid-19 vaccine than it is to get working papers in the US. Both of which you need to be eligible to work in this country. Biden has reportingly signed an executive order to “check” the power of Facebook. My reaction to this article is one of concern. A few months back I had seen of headlines of Biden possibly signing an executive order to ban assault rifles which is a direct infringement on our most important amendment, the 2nd amendment, which grants the people our last defense against a tyrannical government. Now, I see the same has been done to Facebook a private company. What if this executive order limits Facebooks right to the 1st amendment and the freedom of speech. America is supposed to be a small government in which the people can self govern themselves with a limited roll of federal government inference. Yes, fake news can cripple a society but we should be very careful in how much we let the government limit our free speech. If we give them an inch they will take a mile as seen throughout history. I’m always a firm defender of free speech and I believe it should be up to Facebook to moderate what gets posted on their platform as they are a private company. It shouldn’t be up to whatever political party is in charge to dictate that. If Facebook wants to ban the current president at the time then so be it, it is within their constitutional right. However, a big tech takeover can be a side effect of my philosophy. An example of fake news being spread like wildfire and causing damage is the Breonna Taylor story. Initially the headline that was released was that an unarmed innocent black woman was killed in the dead of night in her bed by police. This sparked nationwide outrage and many people were injured, had their lives ruined, businesses’ destroyed and property destroyed on this false notion. Later we found out that, although I don’t agree with no-knock warrants, that there was a legal warrant to enter the house. We also learned that she wasn’t shot in her bed but in the hallway and that the officers were just returning fire to defend themselves from a suspect who had just shot a police officer. The media had made it seem like a personal attack had be conducted against an innocent women when in reality it was a police raid gone wrong and tragically Ms Taylor was killed. But somehow all these other details were conveniently left out.