Time to hand the rest over to the big guys

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Time does fly doesn’t it, yesterday I remember enrolling for classes, and today, I’m finishing up my first ever university assignment. Not going to lie, I can’t wait to get this over with and see what’s next in store for BCM110! Before I go on, I’d like to personally thank our lecturer, Professor Sue Turnbull and our tutors for being such a great help in completing this assignment. Looking back, we’ve covered various aspect of the media in our everyday life from discussing about the media effects model, semiotic readings, the importance of authoritative media controller, the public sphere to the term “moral panic”.

Before I’ve taken this subject, I’ve never wondered about significant connotations embedded in an advertisement and how cunningly marketers were able to influence our mind as consumers. I’ve taken an interest in semiotics readings on how we understand what we understand and why we understand it, how there’s always a signifier and signified in a sign and how we interpret them with our mental concept. For instance, I did a blog on semiotic readings using an advertisement from BMW selling their premium used cars, on analysing the piece, I manage to identify its denotations and connotations which brought me to my understanding of why marketers used sexualities as a technique to attract customers in buying cars. Since then, I’ve definitely gain a deeper understanding into what it means about marketing, and how semiotic readings play a huge role in creating a successful marketing campaign

Last but not the least, one of the major help I’ve gotten was from reading fellow student’s BCM110’s blog on WordPress in order to give me an idea about the topic of the week. Furthermore, these blogs are all unique in their own ways talking about the same topic but phrasing and portraying them differently, it gives me the opportunity to challenge their ideas by commenting on their post, gain more knowledge from the readings and act as a platform of support. All in all, I look forward to the rest of this session and can’t wait to get back into blogging again even after this assignment is due!

 

Isaiah Washington’s anatomy

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If you are like me, a hardcore fan of Grey’s Anatomy, well then you must’ve heard of the dramatic exit of Doctor Preston Burke, played by Isaiah Washington, from the series when he was fired for insulting co-star T.R Knight with a Homophobic slur. His exit came so sudden viewers were confused and upset and up until now, this controversial issue never came to a close because all three co-star involved in this issue had different version of their own recount of what exactly happened. However, after months of suspense from producers whether or not to continue his role, Washington was ultimately fired even after “executive counselling” and his issue of statement apologizing for his “unfortunate use of words during the recent incident on-set”

The first hand recount of the story, by Washington himself, stated that he was in an argument with his co-star, Patrick Dempsey, regarding punctuality of the set, the argument started heating up and he finally said “a lot of things I’m not really proud of”, he recalled directing the line “there’s no way you’re going to treat me like the B-word, the P-word or the F-word” towards Dempsey. Knight was merely just a spectator and had no involvement whatsoever, his claim on this issue may just be a stunt for gaining more attention from the media.

Knight called Washington a “liar” and that “everyone heard it”, so here’s another side of the story that doesn’t match up to Washington’s. On top of all this turmoil of rumour, they’ve been speculation that there was a triangular love affair going on between Ellen Pompeo, Patrick Dempsey and Isaiah Washington, the fight between Washington and Dempsey started because of Ellen therefore pushing Washington to his limit and saying things he regretted.

Fans of Grey’s Anatomy at first was reluctant to accept the exit of Dr. Burke however after much debate, Washington does look like the “bad guy” among this issue. The story doesn’t end here though, Washington is set to return for a cameo part in mid season 10 to serve as part of a farewell storyline for Sandra Oh’s character, Dr. Christina Yang. This is sure to create some controversial spark in the media!

Reference:

Fleeman, M 2007, Isaiah Washington Explains Why He Used Slur, People, Viewed 7th April 2014, <http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20044381,00.html>

Who says?

When I think of media, the first thing I can think of in my mind is the television. It pretty much broadcast every aspect of our life from advertisement, news and documentary to dramas, lifestyle and history. The wide array of media that are being bombarded directly in our faces daily dictates what we know and understand in our everyday life. But here’s the bigger question, who controls these media? And why does it matter?

Every time you watch a news segment, there’s always a higher authority calling the shots in the background, and on top of that another higher authority had made sure that the media that are being broadcast are credible and reliable. But can our facts and knowledge be controlled and fed by someone in the higher power? Questions such as bias judgement, left sided opinion and preferences can be factors that stirs someone toward their own personal beliefs, perspectives and understanding. Now, this is totally respectable but just because someone decided to broadcast their opinions and justifies themselves in a respectable manner, it doesn’t mean that everybody’s opinion and understanding of that particular issue are similar and agreeable. And that was how debates were originated, by people with different opinions and understanding defending their own beliefs.

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Take this news headline that was published on day two of the Federal Election campaign in Brisbane for example, it very clearly shows Mr Murdoch, who whereby is the owner of The Daily Telegraph, egotism to publicly criticise his disagreement for Kevin Rudd’s government. As readers, this opinionated front page news was obviously focused on a biased viewpoint  of Mr Murdoch and if I were to support Kevin Rudd, this headline would be seem as offensive to the public party. Nonetheless, we live and feed on these news in order to keep us up to date on the current affairs, so an article like this, would in fact feed us bias opinions of people who are in control of the media, information like this raises ethical issues among the public.

Therefore, in my point of view, it is important to know who controls the media and how they control it because informations transfer at the speed of light and if an inaccurate rumour has been circling around the community, someone’s reputation will be tarnished in the unfair conduct of media broadcasting.

Reference:

Morrison, A 2013, News Limited Wearing Its Bias On Its Sleeve For Murdoch, The Queensland Times, viewed 3rd April 2014, <http://www.qt.com.au/news/News-Ltd-wearing-its-bias-on-its-sleeve-for-Murdoc/1973674/&gt;