Media News Values:
Which news values
apply in the story?
The thought that news reports should be true dawned on
journalists only recently. Until well into the twentieth century, most American
and British newspapers propagandized on nearly every page. Instead of
developing ethical views, most newspapers only consider their biased opinion,
which can get certain newspapers into some trouble such as the one I have
chosen. However certain “laws” have been put into place in the theme of media
such as “News values” in order to prevent untrue articles. News values
are general guidelines or criteria used by media outlets, such as newspapers or
broadcast media, to determine how much prominence to give to a story. They are
fundamental to understanding news production and the choices that editors and
other journalists face when deciding that one piece of information is news
while another is not.
The Sun is a tabloid newspaper published in the United Kingdom and
Ireland with one of the largest circulation of any daily newspaper in the United Kingdom with
an average circulation of 1,686,840 according to
March 2014. Meaning it has a large effect on the news spread around the
country, whether it be good or bad. In the example I have chosen The Sun have
published an Article about Muslim Jihad’s however they misrepresented
poll results, saying 1 in 5 supported British Muslims supported people who have
gone to Syria to fight for jihadi groups such as Islamic State when in fact the
coverage presented as a fact that the poll showed that one in five British
Muslims had sympathy for those who left to join Isis and for Isis itself. The
Sun did not accept that the meaning of the question was ambiguous. The paper
argued that previous questions in the survey had referred to Isis
explicitly which created a lot of controversy and had many complaints
towards the newspaper, arguing with Galtung and Ruges
theory that believed that our perception of what constitutes an event is
culturally determined and not a natural occurrence. However the Sun is a very
common newspaper that reports false and incorrect accusations especially
towards the Muslim community, they have been found guilty of perpetuating a
biased and negative opinion of British Muslims, and are shown to want to spread
this opinion.
The article
goes against news values as they have attempted to spread a negative view on
British Muslims as they explain 20% of Muslims support the Isis crisis, not
only is this damaging the reputation of these individuals but creates a social
tension between audiences as they feel obligated to feel negatively towards the
Muslim Community. This is a common theme in Britain as it has been reported British newspapers have been accused of
publishing a “consistent stream” of inaccurate stories about Muslims, reporting
that 20 different findings have been reported that spread false and negative
allegation towards the Islamic religion which causes a rising hostility.
In my example of the sun, many complains were made towards
IPSO and fortunately the article was removed however in many cases the articles
are investigated and seen to be innocent. IPSO is the independent regulator
for the newspaper and magazine industry in the UK. That holds newspapers and
magazines to account for their actions, in order to protect individual rights
and In my example Ipso said
the paper had been accused of conflating “important distinctions between those
travelling to Syria and those already fighting in Syria; between ‘sympathy’ for
these individuals and ‘support’ for their actions; and between individuals
attracted by the ideology of Isis, and the ideology of Isis itself”. Which In conclusion is positive as the
article was later removed.
