Refugees in America

Last Week Tonight With John Oliver

on accepting Syrian refugees in America

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver is classified as a news satire television program that airs weekly on HBO. Despite its satiric classification, the show has been commended with its quality journalism which attracts an audience of people between the ages of 25-45. His quirky approach at news keeps viewers busting a gut while learning something interesting and important all the while. Typically, his show starts with a recap of political buffoonery for the week and then he takes a moment to put on a serious face and gets right into some deeply investigated topics. Topics of which would be skipped over by legacy media outlets because of their lack to catch the attention of audiences in typical monotonous fashion; however, Oliver's approach to these topics and his humor make these topics far more interesting.

On this particular episode, he dissects the method with which Syrian refugees are indeed "vetted", despite the claims made by other legacy media outlets who express fear that terrorists will make their way into the United States via the refugee program and carry out an assault on our entire population. Please excuse the crude humor - he eventually gets to the point around 5:03 where he explains the insanely lengthy process for which Syrian refugees must endure in order to get a pass to get inside the United States. The process can take anywhere from 12 months to two years and Oliver makes a good point that terrorists would be more likely to get in quicker by simply applying for a visa. Likewise he makes a good point about how irrelevant the claims of US Governors and their denying of refugee acceptance - people can pass through borders into different states without going through any sort of check point...there are no walls between states so what is to keep refugees from spilling in from a neighboring state? Prior to watching this episode I had very little knowledge as to of how the refugee process in America worked. Naturally, as with many Americans after the attacks on 9/11 and the more recent Parisian attacks, I have been very skeptical of the Syrian refugee crisis and its potential threat to America; however, being more familiar with the process by which they are admitted (granted that it is strictly followed) eases the concern a little...this is a process that mainstream media outlets should be more apt to take: Educate your viewers with legitimate fact based evidence and then allow them to form their own opinion of the topic rather than expressing opinions based on assumptions and then broadcasting it on every outlet. Nearly every clip I have watched where politicians discuss this crisis there is no reasoning or facts behind their words - regardless of party affiliation.

Typically shows like Last Week Tonight with John Oliver fail to provide quality journalism revolving around "hard news" but he does so in a very interesting and amusing manner and its almost always on a topic one would never even read if written otherwise. He has done specials on the IRS, the tobacco industry, sex education, and televangelists - all of which I would likely skip over in an article posted by Fox News or CNN; but his delivery keeps the show on my DVR every week.

Did this segment improve your knowledge for how Syrian refugees are admitted into America? Have you heard any other descriptions for the process on other media outlets? How do they compare?

Would you pay for online news?

Article: "Can We Be Persuaded to Pay for online news?"

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-34943524

As I scrolled through my BBC newsfeed app on my phone, this article title caught my attention. My first thought was "Um, no." So I decided to click on the link and read.

The article is about a young Dutch journalist who has created a means by which readers may select an article topic that interests them and pay up to $.90 to read it. If they are unsatisfied with the article, they are given a refund. His idea is called Blendle and it is a subscription based service that all of the Dutch newspaper outlets have opted to use as a forum. Currently about 500,000 readers have signed up for the service while only a one fifth of them have paid to read an article. To me, this doesn't sound very promising or lucrative, despite the founder's optimism. Although the Dutch and American news outlets are presumably very different, I wouldn't pay anything for what Graber describes as "soft news". Evidently Blendle subscribers are opting to pay for opinion and background pieces rather than "hard news". Blendle hopes to reach the United States, but how successful could it be? Would readers who are seeking gossip pay to read it? Readers who seek gossip articles tend to be younger with less disposable income. What about people who prefer to seek informative fact based journalism without the opinion of the author?

However, if all of the news outlets who provide news via apps chose to charge for the app, would you pay for it?

What do you think? Would you pay to read articles if they were more opinion based or fact based?

SNL on Politics at Thanksgiving Dinner

Well, good luck getting that song out of your head for the next couple of days (seriously, I can't stop singing it).

Saturday Night Live is known for doing political skits that make politicians look like total buffoons but this skit, in particular, really highlights how people (viewers) jump to conclusions over things they've "heard" (seen on television). It's quite easy to presume that the skit not only makes fun of the ignorance that many Americans unfortunately exhibit but it very much insinuates that the joke is on the conservative media. It also is an excellent example of the media's power to make people think a certain way - as the conversation between the white lady and her sister's African-American boyfriend portrays. Although Adele's song is not symbolic to the message SNL is really trying to relay, the performances of all the members at the table just further exemplifies the idiotic ways people rationalize things and how certain intolerance is still so prevalent today. Strongly opinionated perspectives are further justified through strongly opinionated political media.

SNL is a comedy show and its intent is to make people laugh - however, a comical platform seems to be a very good way to send a political message to viewers.

What do you think about the skit?

Review: "News No Longer Breaks, It Tweets"

In the book about politics and social media, Friends, Followers, and the Future author Rory O'Connor discusses how Twitter (at the time of publication in 2012) is fundamentally changing the way in which people see or hear about news. He exemplifies his argument in a story about a person who witnessed the plane landing into the Hudson River in New York back in 2009, took a video of the people getting out of the plane and into the water, and then Tweeted the video. Followers knew about the incident way before any, what he calls "legacy media" outlets had even gotten a tip of the story. By then giving a pretty thorough background on the history of Twitter, one of the most interesting tidbits O'Connor mentioned about Twitter was that 70% of its traffic are outside the United States (p. 125). I found this to be quite remarkable and unexpected. The job of the cameraman is undoubtedly in jeopardy as cell phone users are now equipped with high quality cameras - so much so that an adaptive measure taken by legacy media has since been to report the news and share the video. Reporters are known for jumping on a story and can be seen in films racing to be the first at a crime scene or car accident. Each legacy media outlet has always historically made significant effort to be the first to report on a story - now that Twitter and other social media sites have essentially "stolen their thunder" legacy media outlets are harping on the opportunities to dissect and correct any news broken by a social media user. O'Connor talks about how rumors of celebrity deaths send legacy media running for evidence. The problem with reporting the news first and then backtracking to legitimize the story is fact checking...after the fact. Part of the reason why information travels so quickly on Twitter is because it isn't fact checked (p. 126). The Editor in Chief of PC World suggests that followers should allow ten minutes after a Tweet announcing breaking news is posted to fact check it via the Web. Although this poses a threat to the credibility of breaking news, stories are usually quickly corrected by the wisdom of the crowd. Although people are being informed of events by social media users, readers are still heavily reliant on legacy media for affirmation and dissection of breaking stories.

Since the publication of this book three years ago, legacy media seems to have successfully made the transition of reporting instantly via social media platforms by first announcing the story and then promising and following up with details shortly after the fact. Although not everyone is on social media, it is likely that legacy media outlets will seek to develop similar platforms by way of apps and other Internet based methods of communicating news to readers.