FREE ESSAY ON DIVERSITY AND MASS MEDIA

DIVERSITY AND MASS MEDIA

Diversity and the Mass Media
The question of weather the media's role in establishing racial and ethnic equality is
not only very easy to answer but needs to be answered. People need to think of how
important it is. People tend to under estimate this power and hate to admit that the
media shapes our opinions about people. Most of us will not stand the idea that we
stereotype and classify people, let alone that we do that involuntary based mainly on the
media. 
The media's bias in America hasn't taken any specific direction in the con direction. It
has just cared always about being pro white. Most of the different major minorities in
the US have somehow been attacked at some point by the media. I can't think of an ethnic
group that escaped that suppression. African Americans, Latinos, Arabs, Italians,
Russians and lately the Chinese. Perhaps the only group that somehow ended up with a good
positive image are the oriental people, however I don't see the origin of this stereotype
originating from the media. That positive image is a sort of thing that goes around
people seeing a lot of oriental people in nice cars, successful at jobs and school. Sure,
the media have set a stereotype that each and every one of them is a martial art master,
but still I think most of the real positive image is from the daily life not the mass
media.
Perhaps as an Arab, I can totally relate to what Shaheen has written in his article about
the media's image of Arabs. Not only was I furious when I saw Arabs portrayed in movies
as primitive, camel riding nomads, but I had always asked my self why? Although Shaheen
is from the small minority Christian Arabs, his comments are valid for all Arabs. Arabs
have never been treated fairly in the media
Lationos,