Media's Role in Resolving Environmental Crisis

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In Media & Environment: Conflict, Politics, and the News, Libby Lester presents a comprehensive argument that examines how media generates awareness, impacts opinion, and stimulates debate. She writes that the state of the natural environment is a serious problem and by studying the politics and conflicts in the media, we can begin to find solutions to environmental decline. Questions regarding news media’s ability to produce these solutions are asked with a strong sense of urgency– and rightly so. Calling climate change a “crises of global proportions” (p.44), Lester’s claims remain consistent with my beliefs and despite our shared opinions; I did not take delight in reading this book. There were many limitations and I found it to be theoretically rich in the analysis of media practices to the point where I had to translate each sentence into plain English. By no means am I undermining the points that Lester made, but I found it tiring to make sense of all the verbiage in-between. For all that, there are definitely several noteworthy themes from Media & Environment: Conflict Politics, and the News that are worth reflecting upon. I will weigh in on …show more content…

First, let me present an eye opening definition of news from Lester, stating, “[news] is defined firstly by those who have privileged access to the media […] it is then aimed at attracting and entertaining an audience for advertisers, and fitted into a general framework that suits corporate owners” (p.60). It is frightening to think that most of the media we consume depends on a system that is regulated by producers of news affiliated with society’s elite. In furtherance of this idea, I would like to look towards Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky’s Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (1988 p.1) that

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