Hedges vs. Thompson

For this latest post, we were assigned to read articles by both Chris Hedges and Clive Thompson, both of which assess the impact the Internet has on society, but both portray largely contrasting ideas.

To preface, I found Hedges' last article so personally upsetting that I almost want to boycott all of his ideas just to spite him. (Cause that'll really break him, I'm sure.) But his most recent article we were assigned to read, "Bad Days for Newsrooms - and Democracy," actually had some ideas that were not completely fabricated and seemed to me to be pretty legitimate. Reluctantly, I'd even say I agree with some of them...

The whole idea of his text is that news reporting, particularly from newspapers and television news networks, is dying and being replaced by a lesser, Internet-based form of journalism. To Hedges, newspapers "keep citizens engaged with their cultural, civic and political life," or they're supposed to at least. Lately though, he argues, news reporting is not presenting "real news," but instead "another form of mindless amusement and entertainment." I'm not sure I completely agree with this, but then again, I'm not exactly sure what he means by this statement either. Of course, all things in society evolve, news reporting is no exception. Today's methods of reporting are not the same as they were 20 or even 10 years ago, but I think the news is still educating us on the important and greater issues at hand, and more importantly, is being heard by a wider audience. Hedges attributes this change in reporting to the Internet, saying it "defies the purpose of reporting." He claims that people who go to the Internet for their news, gravitate toward sites that will confirm their own beliefs, thus learning only one side of the story. "Facts for many bloggers," he points out, "are interchangeable with opinions." These, to me, are all very good points. I think that news is losing some of its raw legitimacy. Rather than simply presenting society with the facts and letting us form our own opinions, news seems to come with a built-in kind of decoder and biased undertone. It's good when journalists get to share their ideas, and even better when an audience questions and debates those ideas, but as we know, this last step does not always happen. To say it again, it's easy for people to confuse opinions with facts. And who can blame them with the opinions are appealing and easy to understand?

The other article we read, "Clive Thompson on the New Literacy," is much more approving of the Internet and its effects on society, particularly the effects on our writing and reading skills. Based on the studies of Stanford University's writing and rhetoric professor, Andrea Lunsford, Thompson offers that "young people today write far more than any generation before" and are "remarkably adept...[at] assessing their audience and adapting their tone and technique to best get their point across." (Finally, some respect!) It was very refreshing to read Thompson's article and know that not everyone looks at the Internet as the doom of the American people, or views today's youth as stupid and incapable. We are living in the "Information Age" and are sharing information and ideas more than ever, to wider audiences than ever before. I think both Hedges and Thompson would agree that this is a good thing we're doing and something we should continue doing. We just need to remember to think responsibly.