Do Video Games Encourage Violent Behavior?

With video games becoming so popular in the last 10 years there as been a number of concerns about how they affect people. One of the main concerns that people have with video games is that it may encourage violent behavior. In my opinion, I do believe video games encourage violent behavior. When I was a kid growing up I remember playing on the playgroud and we used to imitate Power Rangers and fight each other. Now-a-days though video games like Grand Theft auto and Call of Duty all involve violent behavior with guns. These games reward players with points the more they kill. Obviously, from an older person perspective I know the difference between whats right and whats wrong, but when younger generations from the ages of 13 and younger start playing these games they might see it and think that these acts of violence are ok. Think of it in a different way. Kids watch their parents do certain habits such as the way they speak, the way they drive, the way they dress and kids then pick up on these habits and start doing them thinking that is right. With this in mind what will kids start to do if they believe that what they see in video games is acceptable? It is a natural habit for us to see something and follow and obtain the same habits and when it comes to kids who are absorbing information like sponges it is crucial that they stay away from video games because they can be influenced easily and pick up on the violent behavior.

A study for the American Psychological Association's Journal of Personality and Social Psychology concluded that video games can increase a persons aggressive thoughts, feelings and behavior. Their findings were that students who reported playing more violent video games in junior and high school engaged in more aggressive behavior. The study concluded that video games are more harmful than than violent television and movies because they are interactive, very engrossing and require the player to identify with the aggressor. I believe no matter how much people see video games as encouragment to violent behavior, video game makers will still make violent games and people will continue to play them. Hopefully, parents of kids will limit or even ban their kid's from playing any video games because of the negative effects it could have. It may sound like a stretch to do this, but I think kids should read books or enjoy the great outdoors rather than sit in front of a TV all day that encourages violent behavior. Either way video games are here to stay and we must cope with what it brings to our society.

Is Advertising Good for Society?

This week we were asked about advertising and if it is good or bad for society. This was a tough question to answer because there are so many different forms of advertising and also both sides of the argument have legitimate reasons for why advertising is good or bad. After thinking about how advertising has affected me I came to the conclusion that advertising is good for society. The reason I say advertising is good is because it informs us of what products, businesses, places, technology and other things that the world has to offer us. For example, when the iPhone first came out there were a ton of commercials about it letting us know of its capabilities and how the technology of phones has changed forever. If it wasn't for advertising the iPhone wouldn't have been able to be successful as it is know and because competitors wouldn't have known about it either they wouldn't have been pushed to make a similar or better product. By having advertising in our society it creates competition between businesses and brands. When a certain company advertises their new latest and greatest product, competitors will see this and start on building or marketing a new product that will be similar if not better so that they do not fall behind. With businesses going back and forth like this trying to make the products they have even better it helps grow the world to be even better than it already is. The majority of things we see and use today would have never came about if it wasn't for advertisement because businesses would have never strived to make better products since they wouldn't know about competitors and their products. Advertisements do get us to buy products we don’t need, but at the same time it does give us a choice or at least a sense of having a choice. Advertising is essential for businesses because it helps get there products recognized and bought buy consumers, which in turn means more money flow and a better economy. Advertising helps people to spend their money on goods and products which then helps business to pay their employees who then go back out and spend it on goods and services. It is a never ending cycle and advertising is at the center of it all. Without advertisements people wouldn't know what to spend their money on and if you thought the economy is bad now just think if there were no commercials. Money flow would be stagnant and businesses would fall apart and eventually the economy wouldn't even exist!!!(little over the top, but you get the point). Because we as a society rely on T.V. and other media outlets so much that if there was no advertising at all we would be completely lost. As you can see from the examples above advertising is essential for our society and we cannot live without it.

Are People Better Informed in the Information Society?

This week we were asked the question, are people better informed in the information society? Well first off when they say the information society they are referring to the Internet and other sources of media that we use everyday. After thinking deeply about this question and reading the two sides of the argument I would have to say that people are much better informed in the information society. The reason I sided for the information society is because when you look at how far we have come in the past 20 years it is amazing. Kids are learning algebra in elementary school, People know the latest news around the world with a click of a mouse, and colleges are receiving record amounts of applicants. As we read in the article, Linda Jackson does a test with students from the ages of 10 to 18 seeing how there test scores are affected when they use the Internet more often. The results showed that kids who used the Internet more had higher scores on standardized test of reading achievement and higher GPA's. From these test results how can you argue that the Internet and media have a negative effect on people? However I do agree that Internet usage should be limited to a certain amount of hours each week because kids do tend to abuse the privilege of the Internet. Also another reason people are more informed in the information society is because instead of people sitting around asking themselves questions and wondering about the answer, people can get on their computers and research anything they want. With the way technology is constantly growing and expanding I think that the Internet will be essential in the future for our youth and no matter how much you may argue that were better off without the Internet, the Internet will still grow and over power any objections you have towards it. The future will be a very technology savvy era and I think it will go down in history as one of the greatest and most important times that the world has ever seen.

RA #1

Dear to whom it may concern at BBC,

                I am writing to you today to inform you of the great job you guys have been doing with your online website BBC.com. I would like to compliment your online broadcastings work on the clear and relevant stories you cover every day. BBC covers a vast range of different news from all over the world, which I thoroughly enjoy because not only can I know the latest issues going on in the U.S., but also I can follow foreign news and affairs. Plus instead of just focusing on one country BBC has equal amounts of new stories and information from countries all over, which shows there is no favoritism or side taking in BBC’s reporting. For example, on your website each country has their own link that allows me to see and read the current news headlines for that country, which I love because to me foreign affairs are just as important as U.S. news. I would also like to compliment BBC for the honest and unbiased reporting you have on each of the stories you cover. It is tough now-a-days to keep audiences interested when other news outlets will lie and exaggerate stories to spice up the news in an attempt  to draw more viewers, but you guys do a fantastic job of covering the truth and still keep it interesting. Another thing that I really like about BBC is the fact that you guys report on stories that are actually news worthy. For example, while CNN is writing stories about what celebrity just got caught for drugs or drunk driving you guys are reporting about possible presidential candidates in the U.S. and the latest updates from the war. I also really like how BBC’s homepage is filled with a variety of different topics other than the news. You guys cover sports, business, entertainment, art, science, gardening, food and the list goes on. I find it amazing that BBC can cover such a large volume of topics and information and be straight forward and unbiased about the majority of it. In my opinion the key to BBC’s unbiased reporting is the choice of words that is used in each of the stories headlines. For example, one of your headlines states, “Israeli cabinet backs Jewish oath” (BBC.co). By using the word “backs” it makes it seem that BBC is just reporting the news rather than reporting an opinion. Other news websites would have probably said words like, strongly agrees or taking sides, which makes it seem more of a biased and untrue reporting.  With BBC reporting about news from all over the world in a neutral manner it is easy to say that you guys report in a democratic way giving people what they want  and in a truthful way. If there was one thing that I would have to criticize BBC for it would probably have to be the occasional irrelevant story being covered. Every once in a while BBC will cover a story that most people don’t even care to look at or read, but I understand that some days there just isn’t enough important news to put up on the homepage of the website so you guys have to fill in the gap with some secondary news stories. Even with these occasional random news stories I still believe that BBC is one of the top rate online news stations to follow and I would recommend everybody to try and take a look at your website. Thank you for your time and continue with the great work!

Your loyal follower,

Brendan Jin

BBC For RA#1

For this weeks assignment we were assigned to critique one of the online news sources that we have been looking at and I decided to look at BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation). BBC in my opinion is one of the more realistic and factual new sources out there, but even still they have some over exaggerated articles and headlines that just seem to be more of an eye catcher than actual good news. BBC has the best of both online news reporting with some very true and accurate stories, and also some fake news focused on attention and not accuracy, which will be great for my letter because I will be able to criticize as well as compliment BBC and give a thorough and detailed critique of how I view there corporation. BBC is Europe's largest online news source and I think it will be a lot of fun to to write this letter and let them know how viewers in the U.S. truly see their online page.

International perspectives on local/global issues

For this weeks assignment we were to spend at least 2 hours reading/ watching news from different international presses online and report about the different perspectives that each of them have about a certain issue. After looking at a few of the different international presses I decided to focus on the latest U.S. drone attack in Pakistan that supposedly killed 8 Germans that were part of a group called Jihad Islami. All of the international presses had similar facts, but there reactions to it were much different. For example, when I looked at the article that CNN had posted about it they said how this group of people was very dangerous and possibly on the verge of starting a terrorist attack. "The strike comes a day after the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the FBI issued a joint bulletin warning that terror attacks were being plotted against targets Europe. European intelligence officials said Monday that a group of jihadists from Germany were at the heart of the plots...." (CNN). While the U.S. viewed the Drone attack as more of necessity countries like Qatar saw it as more of a killing spree.

The Qatar news called it a raid on a mosque, while the U.S. called it a strike on a building holding terrorists. Obviously the Qatar news makes it sound like a tragedy that was uncalled for while the U.S. makes it sound like they were coming to save the day. For example, the Qatar online news had this quote about the attack, "What is raising the alarm bells here is that despite the fact that there may be some evidence to suggest that these people are indeed militants, Germans in this case ... there is, of course, this apprehension that most of the time these strikes are taking place not caring about the civilian casualties." CNN had only mentioned killing potential terrorists/ extremist, while the Qatar news talks about innocent civilians being victims.

When I looked at Russia's online news they had absolutely nothing about the attack and they seemed to have plently of their own problems that were more important.

It amazes me how so many different news outlets can report about the same topic, but yet have completely different views about them. This just goes to show us that what we see in our evening news may not be the truth and that the U.S. media is oblivious to some of real facts, but will neglect to report them because of the negative image it may give the United States.