Sociology theorists Flashcards
Stocks and Share Prices
are often featured on news bulletins. Marxists believe this is an example of the media only presenting whats important and relevant to the ruling classes
Logic of Capitalism
Means that institutions in society will always be used as instruments of power by the capitalist class . i.e. the media is a instrument to serve capitalism
Advertising
Marxists argue that this creates the demand for goods produced in the capitalist economy.
Advertising is an illusion
Marxists believe advertising gives the impression that theres a wide range of choice for consumers but in reality theres only a few companies that own the vast amount of products
Marcuse
A marxist who reckoned the media promotes consumerism and gives people “false needs”, the belief that they “need” things when they actually dont
Miliband
This Marxist believes the media keeps the poor quiet as they think the system is working to serve their needs by providing all these products
Curran and Seaton
Found evidence that media owners did interfere and manipulate newspaper content at the expense of the independence of journalists and editors . Rupert Murdoch in 2003 strongly wanted a war with Iraq and its NO COINCIDENCE that all his 175 newspapers around the world that he owns supported this view in their articles
Harold Evans
Was the editor of Murdochs newspapers “The Times” and “Sunday Times”, suggested that Murdoch had continued to press editorial staff to adopt his right wing views. This was supported by findings during the Leveson Inquiry
Leveson Inquiry
This inquiry discovered of how desperate owners are with profits, they will adopt unethical methods such as phone hacking to gain juicy headlines,
GMG
Argued that media control access to the knowledge that people have on what’s going on in the world and they encourage them to accept the unequal society they live in
Instrumentalist Approach
Often what many Marxists views are, it assumes the media is passive and the ruling classes can easily control them. It assumes audiences are robots and are fed on dumbed down media and don’t think about serious issues
Philo
found that media coverage of the global banking crisis of 2008 onwards. He found that the media focused attention predominately on the views and solutions offered by the main political parties and the bankers themselves. Rather than ordinary people- this meant the only ones asked were thise apart of the ‘establishment’ and were very support of the system that caused the problems in the first place
GMG on gaza reporting
Philo found Palestinians were always seen as initiating violence, and Israelis as responding. Reporters used words like ‘retaliate’ and “pay back time” when referring to Israeli conflict however ‘atrocity’, ‘murder’ and ‘cold-blood’ were only used to refer to Palestinian action. A huge majority of the British public thought that Israeli land being occupied by Palestinians which is incorrect. Palestinian action was never understood as a ‘response’ to occupation and repression and loss of land.
GMG on Immigration reporting
Philo et al discovered Coverage of migration, asylum and refugees is often partial, inaccurate and hysterical – as in the tone of this headline from the Daily Express: “UK message to migrants: you are not wanted”, the combination of hostile media coverage and “tough” government policies is counterproductive. They produce fear, attacks upon individuals, depression, anxiety and suicide
