Summary
1 What is the story/ event
I have chosen to write about the event of George Floyd's death. on May 25, 2020, after former Officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on Floyd's neck for 9 1/2 minutes he died due to police brutality. Based on the video that recorded the incident we can see a police officer pressing his knee on top of George as he says “I can’t breath” multiple times. This incident triggered huge protests against police brutality worldwide and I am going to go over how differently news CNN/ Fox News/MSNBC covered this particular incident.
What facts were included in all three stories?
The fact that accrued was documented by all channels. What happened and how or when George died? Because of the existence of the actual footage of what happened, it would be very hard for any channel to even shift the reality a little.
Was there one news source that contained facts the other two did not?
BBC news as well as MSNBC focused more on the topic of brutality. They shifted viewers' attention to the protest and wanted to underline the fact that the police were trying to break up the protestors with a violent methods. They also focused on how horrible this event was and asked questions regarding the reliability of law enforcement.BBC news in particular Played the recording of the president where he seems to be saying “you have to dominate”.They trying to hint at the fact that President Donald Trump was unfazed by the issue.
Fox News on the other hand showed Trump’s interview which focused on avoiding these douts. Trump is underlining that even though some police officers will do such a cruel thing that does not include the entire police force. He talked about the impotence of having strong law-informed officers and their need for the general public.
Why might that be?
I believe that is due to the bias of the channels themselves. From what I observed fox news was concentrated on shielding the president from negativity and blame, therefor they might be politically biased in favor of Trump. The other two changes on the other hand did not shy away from all the criticism and judgment. They confidently questioned the competence of the police force.
What did you notice about the language/word choice? Was there leading or subjective language to favor one point of view over another?
I noticed the use of Negative emotive language and hyperboles.BBC news and MSNBC reporters had a negative outlook and examples of that can be;” security forces have come down here like a hammer to restore order”.Fox news used emotive language as well in favor of the president and his perspective. The reporter described his pinion as “interesting and understanding”.This shows the manipulation of the viewer using different language forms by all three channels based on their own bias.MSNBC and BBC seem to be against Trump and their bias is very clear. Fox news seems to be in favor of him and we can see that as well.
Can you detect any examples of bias? Explain.
I can detect different biases but most importantly I see belief bias in all three channels reporters (If a conclusion supports your existing beliefs, you'll rationalize anything that supports it). I believe this is the key bias that drives all these channels. All of them are only trying to get information and rationalize all the facts for them to fit their own bias. They can take the same interview and interpret it as well as represent it very differently.
