Communication professor Cara Finnegan talked about photojournalism in the case of the Syrian Refugee Crisis and other similar cases.  One of the main themes she went over was commonplaces in the pictures.  The first picture is of a Jordanian teenage girl who is getting ready for her wedding.  This picture was one of the more unique ones out of the ones we looked at.  However, the second picture was very similar to many of the other pictures that came up when we google image searched “syrian refugees”.  Commonplaces in that subject in the photos included children, big groups of people, and people walking around outside with no shelter to return to.

Although I have enjoyed this class, Journalism 200 made me realize I don’t want to become a journalist.  What I like about journalism is the way the news is conveyed.  News stories are succinct and to the point; there’s no fluff or extra words to fill up space.  Because of so many years of being trained in essays and writing somewhat unnecessary sentences or paragraphs, I’ve struggled with the writing style for this class, even though I like it more.  Something I learned I didn’t like about journalism was going out and getting the news.  It wasn’t so much that I’m so introverted I can’t interview strangers on campus, but it’s more that I don’t want to invade their personal opinions.  Some of the best news stories are the ones that are controversial and sometimes I felt uncomfortable asking people I didn’t know about them.  For example, for one of the assignments I wrote about a death caused by bullying in a Champaign high school, a topic that was very sensitive to most people in Champaign.  It was very difficult asking students about how it affected them because I knew they didn’t want  to talk about it, especially to someone they barely knew.  However, because of this I gained respect for journalists who have such a passion for writing that they are able to step out of their comfort zones and get as close to the truth as they can.

Panelists Lynn Sweet, Stephanie Craft, John Nerone, and Ann Heiser discuss the “War on Facts”.  This includes everything from fake news to lying to straight up bullshit, as Ann Heiser called it.  This picture is from when Stephanie was comparing the War on Facts to bringing a knife to a gunfight.  Fighting back with facts means we are bringing something to the table, but it’s not going to be enough.

Recently in El Paso, Texas, five elected court officials underwent investigation in a case connecting to violation of the Open Meetings Act.  According to an El Paso Times article published April 6, 2017, multiple officials were supposedly discussing plans for a new multipurpose arena with opponents of the city.  A judge in southeast Texas ruled that part of the state has an unconstitutional Open Meetings Act, but it likely won’t affect this case.  The author of the article, Victor Martinez, also mentioned a similar occurrence in Wharton County, Texas, involving officials that also supposedly bended the Open Meetings Act.  Because of the vagueness of the Act, the Wharton County case was dismissed.  However, Bill Aleshire of the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas said that the Wharton County case and the El Paso case are completely separate and therefore may not have the same results.