1) To what extent do you agree with Alain de Botton's views on the News?
I do agree with Alain de Botton in terms of news being bias, where news don't have views themselves, as they are feeding us the information, we as the audience as well as the news organisation should be able to make judgements so we can come up with conclusions of the story they say. Alain de Botton quoted "neutrality is impossible" news is unbalanced. News channels only just explain what has happened in today world but don't really go in deeper, explaining their views and concluding what should happen next but instead they just feed us the news and move on, which in my view is a problem. Furthermore, Alain de Botton said that there is a lot of excess in news, theres too much news which makes it harder to know the priorities of what news we, as the audience should take in, through all this excess news, we have become less political. News distracts as all from the important problems that are happening in society, at times news much focuses on softer news or news that is not as important as others - Alain de botton said a really good quote that i think it is very relevant and makes me question our society; "how do you get the most important news the popular news" us audience are to blame in this case, its because we prefer the softer news or non-political news because it would grab our attention more than the other, we'd like to see more of the negative news (Galtung & Ruge's.) This all makes me realise that audience are not empowered but news are in control more than anything.
2) How can you link Marxism and Hegemony to de Botton's criticisms of the News?
I think that somethings that Alain de Botton says do sometimes link with what he says about news but it is majority of the time linked with Marxism and Hegemony. For example, Alain de Botton says that news do focus on one comical class over others and the media/news would portray them as the higher class would see the other classes or their own - they are controlling what we know and need to know, this reinforces the status quo since we are only retaining the information/stories that news are showing without questioning or challenging it. Marxism is strongly linked with how Alain de Botton criticises the news, news will do everything they can in order to keep their jobs but also gain profit, they will show what the audience want to see; negative news, which may not even be important news hence why Alain de Botton said "news corrupts us"
3) How could you use Pluralism and new technology to challenge de Botton's views on the News?
We can use pluralism and new technology to challenge de Botton's view on the news is through UGC which is then lead to citizen journalism. Pluralists believe that audiences are perceived as capable of manipulating the media and having access to 'plural views of society' enabling them to 'conform, accommodate or reject' - they believe that audience are able to challenge the news, and UGC and citizen journalism can challenge de Botton's views on how the audience react to news. This would reinforce that audiences are no longer passive but now active and get to control what they take in from the news/media.
4) Choose two news stories from the last six months - one that supports de Botton's views and one that challenges his belief that the News is used for social control.
Suppports de Botton views - I'm A Celeb bosses accused of 'fixing' show by giving Scarlett Moffatt extra airtime
Challenges de Botton views - Andrew Lansley chides chancellor lack of NHS and social care funding
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