As CNN saw our growth in African-American viewership, they affirmed a fundamental truth of news coverage - people will watch you if they see themselves in what you report. It doesn't hurt if the people doing the reporting look like them, too.
Interpretation
Diverse representation in media can enhance audience engagement and connection.
In this quote, Soledad O'Brien emphasizes the importance of representation in news media. She asserts that when viewers see themselves reflected in the stories and faces of reporters, they are more likely to engage with the coverage. This highlights a broader truth in media: diversity among those who report the news can lead to increased viewership and a more authentic portrayal of the community's experiences and perspectives.
In practice
In a panel discussion about the representation of minorities in media.
I don't think journalism changes. It's about digging into stories and telling them well. The basic tenets of great reporting stay the same while things around it change. Technology has made reporting easier, but it has also caused job loss. Social media has increased discussion around topics, but it has its own challenges at times.
Americans born since World War II have grown up in a media-saturated environment. From childhood, we have developed a sort of advertising literacy, which combines appreciation for technique with skepticism about motives. We respond to ads with at least as much rhetorical intelligence as we apply to any other form of persuasion.
Media outlets that are exploiting Ebola because they want a sensational story and politicians using it to their own ends ought to be ashamed.
The reality is that the media are probably the most powerful of all our institutions today and they, or rather we [journalists], too often are squandering our power and ignoring our obligations. The consequence of our abdication of responsibility is the ugly spectacle of idiot culture!
The reporting of news has to be understood as propaganda for commodities, and events by images.
Television is simultaneously blamed, often by the same people, for worsening the world and for being powerless to change it.
The idea of a news broadcast once was to find someone with information and broadcast it. The idea now is to find someone with ignorance and spread it around.
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