Joe Paterno and SNL

The other night when I couldn't fall asleep I decided to watch this week's episode of Saturday Night Live. One of the skits featured a topic that has come up several times in our class discussions: the Penn State scandal.  The skit was Seth Myer's Weekend Update.  When he first mentioned the Penn State scandal I was really curious as to what he was going to say about it.  In the Weekend Update Seth Myers always satirizes the most recent events in the public sphere, so I was left wondering how he was going to talk about such a serious topic.  There really isn't a way to joke about child molestation that isn't offensive or inappropriate.

Here is a link to the skit for anyone who wants to watch it:  http://www.hulu.com/watch/299647/saturday-night-live-weekend-update-the-devil-on-penn-state

In the skit Seth Myers interviews the Devil about the scandal.  The Devil has no idea about what is going on and as Seth Myers tells him more and more about what happened, the Devil freaks out.  The point of the skit was to show how ridiculous the whole situation was and that Joe Paterno did not do his part in helping to put a stop to the molestation and and also in a way shows how ignorant the students of Penn State are for being so upset about Paterno being fired.  I thought that the skit was funny and also highlighted some good points about the whole scandal.  I understand that Joe Paterno was a legendary coach who was an important part of Penn State but that does not change the fact that he was enabler of the molestation of 8 boys.  I believe that he is receiving the punishment that he deserves.  I also think that Penn State students need to realize this and stop portraying Paterno as the victim instead of the children who were molested. 

ps. if anyone has time I recomend you watch the entire episode because there were other funny skits.  The opening skit about the Republican debate was my favorite of the episode. 

Still No Power

   I came across an article on the Hartford Courant website about the aftermath of the snowstorm this weekend.  According to Connecticut Light and Power, 46% of Hartford residents are still without power.  Although that seems like a lot of people, that number is smaller than the 70% of people who were without power at the peak of the storm.  I cannot imagine how difficult and frustrating it must be to not have power for so many days.  Knowing that there are people who don't have heat, food, electricity or hot water really makes me appreciate the fact that Trinity didn't lose power during the storm. 

   Not only has the storm affected residential areas, it has also affected the greater city as 60 streets in the city were closed due to fallen trees and wires.  Due to all of the people who don't have power, Pope Park Community Center and Parker Memorial Community Center have been turned into shelters for citizens who still don't have power.  Both shelters have house a combined total of over 100 people.  Hartford Public Schools have been closed as well because almost all of them have remained without power.        

Armed Robbery at Trinity

    As the local news ambassador, I decided to blog about an event that has been on all of our minds: the armed robbery on Monday night.  On Monday night, Campus Safety Office Assistant Jorge Lugo sent out an email stating that "at approximately 9:45 pm, an armed robbery occurred on the upper  longwalk, near the Northam arch."  Although we have already received numerous emails from campus safety informing us about robberies, car break ins and other disturbances, this robbery was by far the scariest to hear about.  I can personally say that after reading the email I was terrified!  I cannot imagine the stress and fear that must have been running through the guy's mind when he was being robbed.  Because I'm from a small town, living in Hartford and constantly hearing the sound of sirens and receiving these emails about crimes has been a huge change for me.  I am accustomed to always feeling safe in my environment, and I believe it is something that we as students all deserve.  

   Since my arrival to campus, I have seen many Hartford residents on campus. I see kids ridding their bikes and people walking around on campus on all the time, and for the most part all of the people I have encountered have been friendly.  I'm from a college town, and the three colleges in town are open for the public.  Townspeople definitely utilize the availability of the colleges to walk around on the campuses, eat meals at the dining commons and use the libraries.  The relationship between college students and locals is very good.  I know that relations between Trinity and Hartford are strained and that the college strives to strengthen their relationship with the city through community service groups.  However, I think that incidents like the armed robbery is what makes Trinity students hesitant about leaving campus and dislike the are surrounding campus.  It's sad for us to have to fear being robbed when we're walking around campus at night, because this is our campus where we will be living for four years and we deserve to feel safe and comfortable.  I hope that campus safety finds a way to better monitor our campus at night so that fewer instances like this robbery occur.  But until then, stay safe guys!!!  Use the buddy system!!!         

Presentation Link

http://www.courant.com/videogallery/65423198/News/HTFD-Public-LBG-play

True Enough and Advertising

                I was most interested in the last chapter of True Enough about “Truthiness”.  It was eye opening to think about how consumerism has affected our lives so much.  In this chapter of the book Manjoo talks about how news stories can be tainted by endorsements.  In stories presented on the news, many times the anchors find ways to casually embed product endorsements in the news.  The first example presented in the chapter was about Robin Raskin’s crusade of telling everyone about how video iPods are dangerous for children to own because she claimed that they would be a gateway for children to watch porn, or as she put it, “a pedophile’s playground” (183). 

                Raskin continued to bash video iPods and her views were expressed on several news stations.  In her news story, she suggested several “kid friendly” tech products better suited for children.  Suddenly her anti-iPod campaign became less about children pornography and more about endorsing products for other companies.  In approaching news stations to run her story, she had the goal of finding more outlets to promote the products of her sponsors.  What was most concerning to me was that Raskin wasn’t even hiding her endorsements.  She herself said “I actually joked with my own colleagues that, ‘Hey, I’m off to go do Whore TV’…I was fully aware that that’s what it was.  And yet it’s such a commonplace thing.  I mean, there are people hawking drugs, guns, war.  The worst that could happen to someone watching my segment is that you might buy a game you don’t like” (188).  Although by reading True Enough we have learned a lot about how it is impossible to be totally unbiased and that people naturally (and sometimes by choice) perceive things differently, but the fact that the media has taken a step further to shove advertisement in our faces just seems so disconcerting to me.  Already, we are constantly surrounded by advertisements and companies are trying to find more ways to reach consumers.  Allowing advertisements to be finagled into the news adds more bias to the information we are receiving. 

                Incorporating advertisements into the news is making information even more biased and takes away from the important information and focuses it on the endorsements.  Manjoo also talks about how the government uses money to sway people’s opinions as well.  He talks about how people were paid off to promote No Child Left Behind and a platform focusing on strengthening American marriages during the Bush administration.  By paying people to promote these ideals, the promotion becomes a conflict of interest and it is hard to trust that the person endorsing the idea; because all they care about is making money, not supporting an idea they strongly believe in. 

                Although it is important to have a critical eye when evaluating the credibility of information, it is apparent that there is another thing we should keep our eyes open for: advertisement.  Our society has become too focused on spending and making money, and this is evident in the fact that when watching the news and trying to learn about what is going around in the world we cannot escape advertisements sneakily telling us to buy stuff.       

News Sources

I thought that it was interesting to read about how people hear news and which news sources they find most credible.  I was surprised to read that in a survey conducted in 2006 that 80% of people surveyed said that they read/watch/listen to news.  I think it is generally assumed that most people, especially people in my age group, don't really pay attention to the news.  I think it would've been interesting if the survey included the ages of people who were surveyed.  It's also interesting to think about how news sources have changed.  In the past most people depended upon TV and newspapers to find out the news, but now more people get their information off of the internet.   

I also thought it was interesting to read about the news sources that Democrats and Republicans find most credible.  Because I personally don't watch TV news that much unless I'm with my dad, I didn't know that Fox is typically favored by Republicans and Democrats typically favor CNN and NPR.  Thinking about it now though, when watching the news with my dad (who is pretty liberal), we don't really watch Fox News often, but he does always listen to NPR on the radio.  Manjoo says that most Democrats don't believe much information heard on Fox News, and most Republicans don't believe what they hear on CNN.  I wonder if more people started listening to different news sources with an open mind, if they would find some overlap or maybe even begin to form different opinions on the news.    
 

Selective Exposure

To be honest, I find it very hard to read True Enough.  I get pretty bored while reading the book and often find myself reading for a long time only to suddenly realize that I haven't absorbed anything that I've read.  I don't really enjoy reading about politics which makes reading True Enough difficult, but I did come across a concept that I found very interesting.  

In the second chapter of the book, Manjoo talks about a study conducted to learn more about selective exposure.  Although I had never really thought about it before, I think that it really makes sense and is very accurate.  People (generally) don't like to hear about things that contradict their beliefs.  I thought the example of the study in which people chose to listen to static rather than someone on the radio talking about something they don't believe in was really interesting. Also, I was interested by the story about the cult who thought that the apocalypse was coming but then when it didn’t come the leader claimed that God told her that he decided to spare the planet. 

On page 30 Manjoo says “But changing your beliefs isn’t easy, and it isn’t fun.”  I think that this is a very accurate statement because most people don’t like criticism and can’t stand being told that what they think is wrong.  I consider myself to be a flexible person, but when it comes to the opinions that I strongly believe in, I don’t think that even a very persuasive person with a strong argument could sway me to change my beliefs.  And when it comes to someone who I don’t find credible or whose opinions I don’t want to believe in, I really don’t want to hear their argument.