Kyle Carey

Mrs. Cramer
Comp Pd. 4
7 December 2018

Media of the Masses

Every article of news that has ever been viewed has been censored in one way or another.

Censorship is something that happens on a day to day basis in the media and has a tremendous

effect on what is seen and heard in any news that is published to either a magazine, a newspaper,

a website, or even television. Overall, the American people benefit from having censorship in the

media, with the government censoring more important things, though mostly the choice of the

media, blocking out gore and sensitive information regarding the safety of others, the sensitive

information mostly being blocked by the government, thought only in extreme cases, as well as

helping the people stay protected from the horrors of the world.

One way that censorship benefits the people would be that blocks out gore and other

violent images that could affect the viewers. For example, people don’t typically like looking at

gore because they are squeamish and could potentially get sick if they were to see an image that

has gore in it. (Halbrook) Also, some people are afraid of gore, seeing it could drastically scar

those that are afraid of it, it could even cause repeating nightmares for those that are extremely

afraid of it, for example, if somebody opened a news website and the front page was of detailed

war casualties, such as a soldier riddled with bullet holes, or a convoy that got ambushed and

torn to shreds by enemy gunfire, they could potentially have nightmares for weeks on end

because of it. Another way that censorship benefits the people would be that it protects the

sensitive minds of children. The minds of children are extremely volatile, they could be scarred

Logos – Logically, peopl

by the simplest experiences that their minds can’t comprehend, such as a car crash or a

kidnapping, and society doesn’t want that to happen. (Anderson) Say that a child was browsing

the web looking for funny videos to watch and they came across a news article that has gore or

violence that could cause them to either be horrified or cause them to want to copy what they

saw. Overall, gore and violence are something that people don’t want to see, regardless of their

age.

In addition, censorship can be a matter of national security if it puts the lives of citizens

or even soldiers into harm's way, this comes into effect for several reasons. News sources should

be prevented from reporting on active duty operations during wartime. Any journalist could

accidentally report on sensitive battle plans, such as a planned attack on a terrorist compound in

the Middle East, or aggressive ship movements in the ocean, especially with the recent Russian

attack on a Ukrainian ship, that the Russians still have captured, both ship and crew. (Anderson)

Giving away these battle plans could put the lives of the soldiers in the operations in extreme

danger given the circumstances and could give the enemies of the United States a chance to get

away and live to harm another day. Also, the media should be barred from reporting an active

shooter event, the reason for this being is that the live news feed could give away police and

even civilian locations to an active shooter. (Anderson) For example, say a news broadcast is

streaming live footage from a school that has an active shooter in it, and the shooter is checking

the news for the movements of police officers, the shooter would know if the police were going

to be breaching into the school and could prepare for the assault, or the shooter could even figure

out an escape route to get away from the school without being detected. In conclusion, the media

should be censored to protect the lives of those that are innocent civilians and of those that are

active duty law enforcement or military.

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 On the other hand, censorship is something that the government cannot force upon the

people of the United States without violating their rights. (U.S. Const. Amend I) While it may be

true that censorship of the press goes against the Constitution and is, therefore, illegal to do, it is

a necessity to keep the innocence of those who view the media safe from harm and traumatic

experiences. For example, in 2008 there was a vicious murder on a Greyhound bus in Canada, a

man named Vincent Li boarded the bus and rode for three hours before brandishing a large knife

and repeatedly stabbing a sleeping passenger on the bus, the bus was quickly evacuated and

locked down, with Li locked inside creating havoc; Li managed to decapitate, dismember, and

even cannibalize some of the man that he killed, eyewitnesses report seeing Li hold up the head

of the man and parade around the bus as if the head were a trophy. Now, imagine if any videos or

photographs of the incident were to be published in the media, an insane man prancing around

with the head of his kill in his hands, it would be an absolute tragedy if the media published

them1, especially to the family of the innocent man who was viciously murdered on that bus. 2 If

this even wasn’t censored as it was, it would have scarred anyone who viewed imagery of it,

those who saw the event in person have stated that they are scarred for life.

Furthermore, people could argue that since they are tax paying Americans that they

should be able to view anything that they please, no matter how graphic or sensitive the subject

is, essentially, they believe that they are entitled and deserve to know the knowledge.3 (FOIA)

While the previous sentence is true to an extent, in that the citizens pay taxes, it must be realized

that some information is way too sensitive for the public to handle without causing chaos. During

1 Logos – Is a logical appeal to someone, logically, people don’t want to see a dead body in the news.

2 Pathos – Pathos is an appeal to emotion, the family wouldn’t want to see their dead son in the media, evokes pity
for the family.
3 Ethos – An appeal to ethical emotions, such as credibility, the FOIA citation is a government website, therefore it

is credible.

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World War Two, it was largely frowned upon to talk about the war in public or even in private,

for fear that the person that was being spoken to was a spy for one of the countries that the U.S.

was at war against; there was even propaganda against talking about the war with racist cartoons.

In conclusion, sensitive information is best not to be given to those that are not capable of

handling it in a conservative and professional manner, as the information could easily fall into

the wrong hands, and even if a citizen pays taxes and contribute to society, the citizen doesn’t

automatically get the right to know sensitive information.

All in all, censorship of the media protects the viewers from graphic images, the

spreading of sensitive information, and from letting information fall into the wrong hands of

people that want to do harm. Censorship blocks out the gore of wartime and other graphic

images, from either war or even an accident that happened on the highway that was particularly

gruesome, that could hurt people. Lastly, censorship is something that happens to nearly

everything that has ever been published, whether it be something small such as blocking out the

location of a murder and the name of the victim, to something that is so big that it could get a

president impeached or topple foreign governments around the globe.

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 Works Cited

Anderson, Terry. "Terrorism and censorship: the media in chains." Journal of International

Affairs, vol. 47, no. 1, 1993, pp. 127-136. Academic OneFile,

http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A14469310/AONE?u=pl1949&sid=AONE&xid=baa

1b947. Accessed 19 Sept. 2018

“Defining Censorship.” OKstate, Oklahoma State University,

http://media.okstate.edu/faculty/jsenat/censorship/defining.htm Accessed 21 Sept. 2018

“First Amendment to the United States Constitution.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 24

Nov. 2018, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution.

(FOIA), Freedom of Information Act. “FOIA.gov (Freedom of Information Act) Home Page.”

Freedom of Information Act, www.foia.gov/.

Halbrooks, Glenn. “How Media Censorship Affects the News You See” TheBalanceCareers,

Dotdash, 27 February 2018, https://www.thebalancecareers.com/how-media-censorship-

affects-the-news-you-see-2315162. Accessed 21 Sept. 2018

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