The view from the "Rule"

I’m sure for most of my media and politics class this whole post about anything you’d like thing is probably very easy and they all must loving choosing what to what to post about. However for me and this new “opportunity” I usually have no idea what to write about.

The answer to this is because I always felt unless there is an election or a war most of the things in the news happened yesterday and the day before. And when there is something important going on its coverage is usually botched up, or this important news is a very sick, sad and absurd story , and makes me want to punish the culprit of the crime myself. For example the story about the lady who caged eleven special need’s children that she was taking care of , and made them sit in their own urine, while giving them little to eat, In my opinion that’s deserving of the death penalty and then some.

So basically news either disgusts and anger’s me or bore’s me, and unfortunately I don’t think a blog about my opinion on the death penalty is so relevant to our media and politics class. So back to my main point, that’s why I like looking at the sports scores and the weather and gossip so much, its always new and if its not new its for sure entertaining as opposed to the news that I look at which is just irritating.

So being the spontaneous original person that I am I couldn’t write a blog on something that I felt is old news because that would be hypocritical to my very existence, I couldn’t write a blog about my issues with the world because that’s not so course relevant, and I couldn’t write about my issues with Gillmor’s book because I already did, and wasn’t in the mood to write about how my original issues with the book have evolved into greater and more frustrating issues.

To get off topic a little, I have e-mailed Gillmor my problems that I have with his book and when he finally emails me back (judging by the fact that he hasn’t posted in six days I don’t understand what’s taking him so long!), I will write a follow up blog hopefully solving my original blog which was about my problems with his book.

Unfortunately none of these excuses would exempt me from my two blog a week requirement for my media and politics class, and more importantly I thought it would be a public disservice for the world not to write my blog. So I sat back and thought about the various blogs that were assigned to us over the semester thinking I’d get some inspiration, and as usual my brilliant idea worked.

I am not sure if many of you remember but our first blog of the year was to pick something out that we felt was not news. Many people chose various celebrity updates under the big news headlines to be declared ad un-newsworthy, irrelevant and over covered.

Personally I’m a fan of the celebrity news and gossip so I didn’t have the heart back then to declare one of my prime interests as “irrelevant”, instead I said a John Kerry update wasn’t news.

A little prelude to this topic; our class likes to consider ourselves as the exception and everyone else in the world as the rule. For example the exception clicks on an article about the new bill that was just passed ,looks at it on several websites and then formulates his own opinion regarding the issue, the rule doesn’t even look at this and clicks on the Paris Hilton story.

Given my love for the celebrity gossip and my distaste for the news nowadays I finally was able to settle on a blog that I like. Since I get to choose what I write from now till the end of the semester I finally realized that this new liberty is to my advantage.

I had always felt that it is fun to look at things from the other people’s perspective because it’s interesting to see how other people think ,and it gives you a different perspective on the way you think. Luckily I am on who has both perspective’s when it comes to the news. I like celebrity gossip and I am also considered the “exception” so I think both ways.

That’s why my blog for today is what I think isn’t newsworthy in the entertainment section of all the big MSM websites. So now you get a genuine example of how the opinion of what our class likes to call the “rule” thinks.

Today as I was going through my daily update through all the entertainment sections of MSM news websites I became enraged. What got me so angry is the fact that they don’t give you the news in their right order of their importance and place things that don’t belong in the entertainment section at all.

For all you who don’t follow the celebrity gossip Britney Spears is getting a divorce from her bum of husband Kevin Federline, since this breaking news she has been partying hard with her new best pal Paris Hilton. This is old news. So what is this new news I speak of?

On Thursday night out on the town while with her new gal pal Paris Hilton, Britney Spears lifted up her skirt and showed the paparazzi that their was absolutely nothing whatsoever under it
(Britney!)

This is major news, it capped off another crazy partying week by our beloved and newly single Britney. However CBS.com, ABC.com, and CNN.com, did not put this as their main headline in their entertainment section, I was astonished.

The only website that had this article as its main headline was the one website that our class hates so much that I am even afraid to mention it, Foxnews.com (sorry). MSNBC.com had an article mocking the coverage and the two pals ,so I don’t consider that a proper story that should have been written regarding the incident.

The other website’s had petty headlines such as Dick Clark auctioning his stuff off, Holiday Movie Blockbuster’s, the penguin movie beating out the new James Bond movie, and some follow up of the whole Kramer racist rant.

None of these should be headlines in the entertainment sections of the news. Entertainment is called entertainment for a reason, and in all honesty what could be more entertaining then the interesting lives of celebrities partying? Nothing!

Furthermore I will use a quote from In Leighley’s book (yes I know not what the “rule” would write but I some time’s just can’t control my damn “exception” side) when she is defining news is she uses a quote from Jack Fuller to explain it better. Jack Fuller who is the president of the Tribune Publishing Company, defines news as “The report of what a news organization has recently learned about matters of some significance or interest to the specific community that the news organization serves”

So being part of the specific community I was pretty astonished when none of these headlines interested me at all. The media correct me if I am wrong is supposed to give the audience what they want. So as a member of the specific community I don’t want to hear about any of these boring headline’s and I’ll tell you why I think they are all not newsworthy in the entertainment section.

The Michael Richard’s racist story is old and tiring already, if he was gay or had a black mother then fine that would be newsworthy, but I’m getting a little sick and tired of him hogging the headlines with his apologies to every black man in the world. To make matters worse CNN wrote a story about all the bigots in Hollywood, this does not belong in entertainment it belongs in politics or law.

The next undeserving headline was the one about how the Penguin movie made more money than the new Bond movie, again if the James Bond actor was sleeping with hmm lets say Robin Williams…. , then yes that would be news worthy, but this headline is about money and it belongs in business.

The next undeserving headline was the one about Dick Clark, he’s old and nobody cares about what he does anymore, if he slept with Ryan Seacrest’s wife (they are co-hosting the new year’s ball drop together)or something like that then that would be newsworthy. But otherwise Dick Clark is old and boring and has no place in my entertainment section

The last undeserving headline was the one that said the upcoming holiday movies, the headlined movie was “Dream Girls” starring Jamie Foxx and Beyonce, this again should not be under entertainment because it is telling me which movies are good for the holiday’s, that’s not news about entertainment, rather its an opinion about entertainment and anyone who is looking at the entertainment section for news like I do, are not looking to see which movies will be good for the holidays, we are looking for celebrity news!
If Jamie Foxx got drunk at the premier of “Dream Girls” then slept with Beyonce and her boyfriend Jay-Z caught them and shot Jamie Foxx, then yes that would be newsworthy.

However telling me which movies they think will be good is not news, it is only a plot by the company making the movie to make more money by putting a plug fir their movie on a website most likely owned by them. This should either be at the bottom of the headline’s or in another section, it certainly has now place in introducing me to the entertainment portion of the news.

Surprisingly the only station that got it completely right was Foxnews.com; MSNBC just wrote an article mocking the whole incident and its victims. Fox however gave an in depth story of what went down, I knew everything and was able to talk to my mother about it the next morning with a complete knowledge of the entire incident.

Foxnews.com as Colbert said best “has two sides of every story the President’s and the Vice President’s”. However in the entertainment portion of the news they lack bias and give us the cold hard facts. It’s nice to see this puppet network get something right once in a while. So kudos’ to foxnews.com for being the only reliable news station for celebrity news and gossip.

As I said before our class has a very clear opinion of Foxnews.com and their lack of ability to give us the right news. It is known to us “exceptions” that when we check the news we shouldn’t go on Foxnews.com and if we do we should disregard what they say or use it as an example of what not to do; basically Foxnews.com is good for nothing.

So I would like to enlighten my fellow “exceptions”, Foxnews.com isn’t something that is good for nothing, it has a purpose. What is this purpose? To relay us the news, but my fellow “exception” would respond to me in anger saying “ they never give you the right news!” and I would say they do when the write about celebrity gossip. We now see that foxnews.com is actually good for something and what their purpose in the world is; to update us on celebrity gossip**. See they finally got something right!


**General Blogers warning: be warned anything else you read will only mislead you from the real news, and might cause severe manipulated opinion syndrome, so when you go on foxnews.com go right to entertainment and you will get your “real news”.