This Friday the 45th President of the United States will be inaugurated as the leader of our nation. This important event will be seen amidst much controversy, some created by the media itself and others created by everyday people.
I am not here to tell you who to support, what party to belong to, or who should lead our country. I do believe, however, that above all things we as Americans need to have an unbiased media.
In times like these, it’s important to have a news that lacks an opinion, something that can be difficult to find nowadays.
Children, students, and even adults often base their opinions solely off of the things they see online or on their televisions, without fact checking or forming their own opinions.
Media needs to be able to accurately portray all sides of all arguments, something that most strive to do but do not always achieve.
It’s hard not to have an opinion, which is understandable. It’s a journalists’ job, though, to be able to share the news without their opinion seeping into the story. Through my journalism classes, I have learned the importance of being unbiased, one of the most important traits of journalists everywhere.
Biased media goes two ways. There are conservative news stations such as Fox, but also liberal outlets including the New York Times. Not one party is to blame for this, but both parties can work to fix it.
The news writes the history we see later on in our textbooks. Students can visit libraries to read newspapers for their reports, and their views of the past will be based on what was written about events such as these. Our opinion of this president along with our future presidents will be written about in newspapers, with biases on both sides.
In such a tumultuous time as this, we need media outlets that rise above the controversy and speak the truth. The two parties have become even more polarized, with the election of President-Elect Donald Trump. Newspapers and television news alike report negativities of both candidates, depending on the opinions set forward by each outlet.
When we look back in the future, we need to be able to see media untainted by the biases of both political parties. We need to be able to share with our children an outlook of the country that accurately portrays the events of the time.
I do not care who you voted for. I do not care what party you’re a part of. I just care that we have a chance to see all sides of America’s future. America needs to change, and I think media needs to be the first to start. The media is a window to our past, and we need it to be crystal clear.
