In the United States, there are many citizens who are anti war but it seems to get suppressed in the media. The media refuses to cover most anti war movements despite their prevalence among Americans and big rallies. Rallies protesting the wars in Gaza and Ukraine have sprung up on college campuses all over the country recently but yet it is still pushed to the back burner on most major news outlets. There has been speculation that big news outlets such as CNN and Fox News are tied into pro war efforts. This could be credible due to the news relying on big tragic events to drive ratings due to humans' inherent infatuation to tragedy. As morbid as it may be, ratings always see a huge increase directly after a tragedy. The mass media conglomerates certainly profit from tragedies so it is not too far-fetched to believe that they suppress anti war activists in order to keep America thinking war is a good thing.
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Vietnam War Protest |
These rallies and protests were popularized in the 1960s when the Vietnam War sparked heavy controversy among Americans. While the protests themselves were covered, there was little context on exactly what was being protested. Instead news outlets used these protests to show how they hurt the war effort overseas and dampened the support for our troops. What our news outlets should've been focused on is Americans exercising their right to protest and criticize our government as it is one of the most coveted rights we are granted in America.
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Antiwar Advertisement |
The two websites we looked at for this assignment, Antiwar.com and The American Conservative, are websites that I had never heard of before this assignment. The amount of pro war propaganda I see everyday makes it hard for me to believe how much sites like the two mentioned, have been suppressed. Lots of Americans believe what the media tells them about war which usually demonizes the other countries to make it seem like we need to step in and ‘stop them’. When in reality we are attempting to occupy a country for ulterior motives such as political gain or simply control. The war in the Middle East is a great example of Americans being lied to about why we needed to spend billions in resources and over 15 years chasing a terrorist. We still occupy countries like Syria without having a real reason to still be there as we haven't had a conflict in numerous years.
The fact that Americans need to search for niche websites that cover antiwar topics and it isn't easily accessible says quite a bit about where our mass media outlets have gone. It is definitely an issue considering the pro war topics that flood the big media outlets on a daily basis.
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