Imagine you are a fair-minded news editor. You have been asked to respond to an online discussion thread regarding how news and information media have affected American culture. Note: the plural of journalist is journalists.
Answer the following questions in 100 to 150 words each bullet point (this a Q&A presentation in Microsoft Word requiring APA formatting and cover page):
Does a journalist have an obligation to present opposing sides of any controversial subject on which he or she may be reporting, or may certain facts be left out to promote an agenda that the journalist may consider to be for the greater good? Please justify your answer.
Is political reporting today mostly ethical or not? What ethics should be applied by media in political reporting?
How have electronic media and their convergence transformed journalism and news consumption?
What role does satire have in the news today? How have programs and websites such as The Daily Show, The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and The Onion provided a separate space for commentary on the news and news providers? Do these satirical media contribute to political knowledge or are they mostly propaganda glorifying biased and fake news?
Fake news generally means political reporting in mainstream media (not social media) that attributes information to unnamed sources and is found out to be lying, untrue, and/or fraudulent. (It is not reporting on opinions one may or may not disagree with, and we are not asking for your opinion about the claims made in a fake news story.) Is fake news a legitimate journalistic tool? Why or why not? Provide at least two actual examples from the last two or three years that originated in mainstream U.S. media (not blogs or social media) along with the names of the mainstream news services they came from. You might want to use a browser other than Google that has not scrubbed itself of examples of fake news.
Illustrate your responses with specific examples.