In a time of crisis and overall political tension, being a journalist has become even more stressful than ever. On November 8, 2016 people around the world saw America at its wildest. As I've graduated from high school and began college within the first two years of 45's presidency, being a journalism major during this time made me rethink if I really wanted this anymore.
When I walked into my first journalism class at UT, it covered the basics. The history of journalism, watchdog journalism, yellow journalism, and multimedia influence. The deeper I got into my studies the more I realized how skewed the American media was/could be. I was tired of turning on my TV or checking into Twitter and seeing Trump's face or his tweets plastered all over my timeline.
Eventually, I found myself disconnecting from media, I stopped watching the news, I didn't check into Twitter as often, I turned off the breaking news notifications on my phone. There was just a period where I was, exhausted. I was tired of the arguments, the fake news outbursts, the constant back and forth between government and the media.
I felt like as a journalism major, I was about to walk into this mess at any given moment, granted I wasn't going into political journalism it still felt like I was going to be involved somehow.
I became so disconnected to the point where I was bombing current events quizzes. I was just tired. The whole idea of being a journalist was to bring the truth to the people, or that's what young Courtney thought it was supposed to be.
As I grow older and continue my degree and pick up different disciplines within my major, I remember that only the strong can put up with all this and still try and bring the news to people day in and day out. Despite the incoherence that America seems to be trapped in and despite the animosity that Americans have towards each other, I still have hope in us. I still have hopes that despite what has happened in the past two years, it will get better. It might take a while. Some things might have to burn to the ground but I know that there is hope.
So, if you're a journalism major or a political science major or whatever, and you feel personally obligated to fix our country, don't worry. We'll get our chance and we're going to get it right.
