Journalism has played a large part in shaping the history of America since the 1760’s. According to the book Mightier than the Sword, journalists that “fearlessly break from the pack” are the type that produce work that either goes down in history forever or that shape history itself. Reporters write pieces that urge people to join with or rally against causes as well as investigative pieces that provide readers important insight and answers on otherwise uncertain or unknown stories. Journalists helped rally colonists to Revolt against the British, they reported on the injustices of the KKK and found the answers for the public regarding high profile cases such as Watergate. Without these journalists, who knows what America would look like today. These are journalist and news media that lead society rather than just reporting it, as stated in Mightier than the Sword.

The news and how it is reported is a controversial subject, especially now with President Trump constantly accusing different mainstream news outlets of reporting “fake news.” I personally feel that the reporters and journalists that are talented and successful enough to be hired by a company like the New York Times or CNN, for example, have worked their way to the top by being reliable and interesting. If a journalist is caught constantly lying, they would never be successful enough to be hired by the New York Times. Since mainstream media is being reported and written by the best in the business, I believe that the news is reported in the most truthful way possible and should be trusted for the most part. There is no discernible reason to believe mainstream, dependable news outlets are reporting “fake news.”

Everyone knows that New York City is an expensive place to live, but recently it has been getting even worse. It is starting to get impossible for families who have been living in New York City for decades to continue living there. According to an ongoing report by Cezary Podkul for ProPublica, some landlords in NYC are supporting gentrification in the city by using leasing law loopholes to hike up their tenant’s rents considerable amounts for no discernible reason. Not all landlords are running middle-class families out of the city, though. Dimitrios Paliouras, a landlord in the city says he will not use that loophole to make more money for himself because he is happy as long as his tenants continue to pay their agreed upon rent amount every month.

By now, everyone has heard of the United Airlines public relations disaster that resulted in  Dr. David Dao being dragged off the flight with a bloodied face while horrified passengers looked on. After the incident blew up on the internet, details of David Dao’s personal life were being reported on. But, some people were concerned that news outlets were reporting unsavory information about Dr. Dao that was not true. This is because it was found through a Google search that there is also another Dr. David Dao that lives in Louisiana, not Kentucky. If this were to be true, many news outlets and reporters would be in major trouble because of libel and defamation laws. According to a news article by Matt Pearce for The Los Angeles Times, no, the news reports were correct. The reporters had the right information about the right Dr. David Dao so Twitter social justice warriors can rest easy knowing the news is being reported correctly.

This week, Dr. David Dao, was forcibly removed from his paid seat on a United Airlines flight from Chicago to Louisville. The senior was filmed being dragged off the flight with a bloodied face as passengers gawked at the unbelievable scene. As if the action of forcibly removing a random customer and having it caught on tape was not bad enough for United Airlines PR, the way the CEO responded made it worse. Oscar Munoz, CEO, stated a very unconcerned and short apology for having to remove the customer due to overbooking rather than apologizing for the way the customer was removed. Joseph Gerth, a columnist for The Louisville Courier-Journal, wrote an opinion piece for USA Today, stating his disbelief that Munoz was somehow named PR Week’s communicator of the year last month; ironically right before this detrimental PR mistake that made the United stocks drop 4%.

“No child of God should ever suffer such horror,” President Donald trump said in response to the chemical attack on war torn Syria. 26 children were among the 80 people reported to have suffered traumatic deaths in Idlib, a rebel held city in northern Syria on Tuesday, reported CNN. President Donald Trump has reportedly changed his mind on not taking action against the president of Syria after seeing photos of the most recent attack in Syria. He has ordered the US military to strike an airfield in Syria with more than 50 cruise missiles. What were the pictures that changed President Trump’s mind? Many of them came to us from a 7-year old girl, Bana Alabed, who gained a huge following on twitter after live-tweeting the attacks on her city of Aleppo, Syria in December of 2016. Alabed has since been evacuated, but she continues to tweet the sobering photos of the events taking place in her home country. After spreading the photos of the chemical attack, she tweeted a plea to the UN, among others, to end the war in Syria now.

I watched the CBS Evening News from Thursday, March 23. Based on this newscast, the values that seem to define the news include anything that is urgent and anything that will evoke emotions of some type. The news talked about the urgency for security and the danger of the attack that happened outside of The British Parliament. It also talked about the proposed GOP health care bill, and on a lighter note, how a little girl grabbed off Pope Francis’ skullcap when she was giving him a hug. The Pope Francis story was definitely the most light hearted story; I believe was added into the news cast to lighten the mood and give people something to laugh about with everything else going on. Conflict and prominence were huge in this news broadcast. Conflict is always on the news because it is reported on a need to know basis (timeliness). Proximity is not as important because the news cast I was watching is a national news broadcast. Almost everything on the news seemed to be high energy because all the stories were highly emotional in one way or another, almost getting the audience worked up about what is going on around us.

Hi! My name is Victoria Grove, but I just go by Tori. I am currently a sophomore in communication. I have minors in leadership studies and public relations- that is why I am in this class! I am technically a sophomore, I am 19 and live in my sorority house, but I am graduating in December 2017! After graduation I plan to attend graduate school for public relations. I am super exited to move to the city and start this new chapter of my life but I will miss the University of Illinois and all my friends here so much! Here at school I am the house manager for my sorority, work at a sushi restaurant and write for the PanHellenic blog, so I do not have much free time. When I have free time at home I love watching Netflix and playing with my dogs. Tank is my 8 year-old Miniature Pinscher and Jack Jack is my 8 year-old Chihuahua. Tank’s middle name is Anthony (after Anthony Rizzo) and Jack Jack does not have a middle name but he has a prefix- Captain! My dogs were both adopted from shelters at an older age; they are my babies. I hope to incorporate small dog rescue into my life as much as possible in the future.