Ebola 2

Political bias and documentaries

Political Bias

Write down everything you know about the following:ideologyleft-wing right-wingleft/right wing bias

Learning Objective:

To be able to identify how political bias can affect the representation of

events in media texts.

Why?

“Sophisticated and perceptive analysis, revealing a thorough understanding of key signifiers and techniques. Complex ideas expressed coherently. Awareness of the polysemic nature of texts with a recognition of the ideological.”

MS1- Examination Mark Scheme

Why?

“Sophisticated and perceptive analysis, revealing a thorough understanding of key signifiers and techniques. Complex ideas expressed coherently. Awareness of the polysemic nature of texts with a recognition of the ideological.”

MS1- Examination Mark Scheme

Starter Put these ideas into the columns of left or right wing.

• Cut benefits to save taxpayers’ money.• Expand the NHS• Regulate the banking industry (create rules for them to

follow)• Support immigration, seeing ethnic diversity as a positive

change• De-regulate the banking industry (making fewer rules /

cutting ‘red-tape’)• Ensure equal entitlement to benefits.• Creating strict laws to curb immigration, seeing British jobs

and taxpayers’ money at risk• Privatise the NHS

LEFT WING RIGHT WING

DefinitionsLeft-wing• Emphasises the role of the

community (we’re all in it together).

• Supports liberal values, more open to cultural diversity.

• Supports higher taxation (ensures that everyone has access to healthcare, education, literature etc.)

• More government intervention in big business (to avoid corporate dominance and excessive profiteering).

• Supports a robust and healthy welfare state.

Right-wing• Emphasises the role of the individual

(every man for himself).• Supports conservative and traditional

values.• Supports lower taxation (if people

want healthcare, education, literature etc., they can pay for it).

• Less government intervention in big business (a successful business is a respectful exercise in individual success).

• May support a welfare state, but a more basic and ‘stripped down’ version. Big cuts will be made.

Political ideology and crime

Left wing• Crime is a symptom of a sick

society. Therefore, criminals should be rehabilitated and society improved to prevent further crimes.

Right-wing• Criminals are individuals who

have made the wrong choices. They should therefore be punished. The harsher the punishment, the bigger the warning to prevent other criminals.

Grade C• Use media terminology• Make specific reference to

the text• Sound grasp of connotations

Grade B• Proficient use of media

terminology• Make detailed reference to

the text• Some awareness of audience• Good grasp of connotations,

extrapolating on ideas

Grade A• Sophisticated use of media

terminology• Make detailed reference to

the text• Full awareness of audience• Expert grasp of connotations,

fully extrapolating on ideas• Awareness of the ideological

The SocialistWorker’s headline shows sympathy for the rioters. The word “injustice” connotes that the riots took place because of social inequality, and that they were an extreme form of protest.

The SocialistWorker’s headline shows sympathy for the rioters. The word “injustice” connotes that the riots took place because of social inequality, and that they were an extreme form of protest. The word “erupts” creates the impression that the rioters could no longer hold back their feelings and were therefore victims rather than criminals.

The Socialist Worker’s headline clearly displays a left-wing bias. Its language positions the reader to view the rioters as victims of social inequality. The word “injustice” evokes sympathy for their supposed political cause, suggesting that the rioters are the victims in this event. This is furthered by the use of the word “erupts”, which connotes that this is a natural phenomenon (like a volcanic eruption) due to the government’s ruthless policies – which places the paper’s focus on the breakdown of society, rather than individual criminality.

How has this paper represented the London riots?

Back to Ebola

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/10/19/how-right-wing-media-have-used-ebola-to-scare-a/201222

• Blowing the threat of ebola out of proportion and trying to link it to Obama has been a constant theme on the right in recent days. Elisabeth Hasselbeck of Fox News literally demanded that we put the country on lockdown, banning all travel in and out. In a bit of race-baiting, Andrea Tantaros of Fox suggested that people who travel to the country and show symptoms of ebola will “seek treatment from a witch doctor” instead of go to the hospital. Fox host Steve Doocy suggested the CDC is lying about ebola because they’re “part of the administration”. Fox also promoted a conspiracy theorist who is trying to claim the CDC is lying when they caution people not to panic.

• Other right wing media joined in. Tammy Bruce blamed ebola on the “Obama legacy”. Laura Ingraham said Obama was prevented from doing more to stop the disease because of his “core ties to the African continent”. Rush Limbaugh even went as far as to accuse Obama of letting the disease spread because he supposes liberals believe “we kind of deserve a little bit of this”.

• With the threat being so small, why are conservatives going crazy like this?

• Part of it is pure political opportunism - anti-Obama.• as conservative pundits know that when people are afraid, the are more

open to reactionary ideas. • But a large part of it might be that conservatives are just far more prone

than liberals are both to getting wound up over the fear of disease and being compelled by the idea that people who are not themselves are undeserving of care.

• Researcher Jonathan Haidt is the architect of the “moral foundations” theory that suggests that political inclinations, at least in modern times, are rooted in five different foundations: harm, fairness, ingroup, authority, and purity. Liberals and conservatives weigh these five considerations very differently. For instance, liberals are more likely than conservatives to factor in whether an action causes harm when deciding if it’s wrong or not. Liberals also worry more about fairness and have more regard for people that are outside of their “group” than conservatives. Conservatives, on the other hand, put far more trust in authority. Conservatives are also far more obsessed with “purity” and far more likely to get hung up on the idea that the body “is a temple which can be desecrated by immoral activities and contaminants,” as Haidt explains.

Left v Right• You can see these differences play out with the response to ebola. For

liberals, the proper response to ebola patients is to reduce harm by caring for them and to treat the people who got it fairly, by understanding that they didn’t do anything wrong to get it.

• for conservatives, two big, red buttons. First, it’s a disease, so of course it’s going to set off the fears of contamination that Haidt demonstrates plague conservatives far more than liberals.

• Second of all, conservatives associate ebola with people who are different from them—from different countries, often of different races—and they have little regard for people in “out groups”, which is Haidt’s term for people who are different. And because conservatives are less worried about harming others or being fair, it becomes easy for them to demonize people with ebola, demand that they be left to die without care, and simply kept from “contaminating” the rest of us.

Documentary 1Ebola - The Search for a Cure

• BBC2 (Think about the License Fee!) The BBC is not funded by advertising but by the licence fee. Therefore it is a PSB and has a duty to educate, inform and entertain the whole British public. This means BBC1 programmes have to be popular, but have to have an extra quality - being very well made, having educational value or representing all the different parts of Britain, for example.

• BB2 Horizon, 2014-2015 Episode 6 of 13http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x27s0q9_ebola-the-search-for-a-cure_news

The Ebola virus. No-one knows exactly where it comes from but one thing is certain - it's one of the most virulent infections known to science. This special episode of Horizon meets the scientists and doctors from all around the world looking for the cure and hears first-hand accounts of what it's actually like to catch - and survive - this terrible disease.

Documentary 2Ebola : Inside the Deadly Outbreak

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0Jpn22HJys

• Published on 22 Sep 2014• Ebola : Inside the Deadly Outbreak.

ABC News’ Dr. Richard Besser travels into the hot zone – where thousands of Africans are dying of Ebola, and doctors risk their own lives to save them. Interviews with those on the front lines, and an American survivor, weave together an incredible story

Use guide to answer

Using your own detailed examples, explore the representation of Two events in the media today. [30] Candidates must discuss the media representation of two events, using at least one example of each event. The two examples should be in two different media forms (newspapers, TV news reports etc.) …blog….analyse print texts……

Q1

• http://www.bsm-media.com/MS1%20Winter%202011%20Marking%20Scheme.pdf

• Recap – Print text for exam!

• Peer marking – Q1