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Hugh Hewitt pic by JDLasica, Al Jazeera logo image from Roobee, Control Room DVD image by xeeliz, all via Flickr, licensed through Creative Commons |
So... consider this extra credit (1% of final grade),
and be advised that the final will include questions relating to the film.
Here's what the homework was supposed to be:
Channel Hugh Hewitt (yes, that's him in the picture), and write a two-paragraph review of the film, from his perspective: First paragraph should sum up his point of view on the film, and the second paragraph should have him single out one scene from the film that he thinks best illustrates his point. (You don't need to write in his voice, just his political perspective and his ideas about media.)
Then, from your own point of view, take a paragraph to say whether you agree, disagree, or partially agree with Hewitt (as you've imagined him)-- and why.
Due Monday, if you're going for it. Use the comments below.
Due Monday, if you're going for it. Use the comments below.
Anjel Saez
ReplyDeleteControl Room Extra Credit
PART 2/2
To turn off Hugh Hewitt’s voice in my head, I thought Control Room was an insightful view into a media station trying to simply conflict and giving another view against a major media machine that was willingly consuming misinformation during a significantly dark time in American journalism. We often joke about how the big government isn’t interested in controlling our individual perceptions but the scary issue is that is 100% true. What people as a whole seem to lose sight of, especially in the hustle and bustle of everyday living, is that the government we vote into office act on our behalf. We like to point fingers and say, “That isn’t us waging this war! It is our government!” The truth of it is: we are the ones waging this war. We allowed, as individual members of this country, things to go way too far. Many allowed the media to shape their perspectives, when the whole point of news from its origins was to incite thinking, not complacency. Al Jazeera, and specifically Hassan Ibrahim, recognized this and sought to bring this back to the forefront of our minds. Our job is not to consume the news but to absorb it, rather to absorb it and make use of it. That is something I think, or maybe hope with hindsight, we as a nation are coming back to thinking. However, Samir Khader put it excellently with this quote: “History tells us that human beings have short memories. Who thinks now in the United States about what happened in Somalia in 1993? Nobody. Who thinks about what happened in Bosnia/Herzegovina? Nobody thinks about that. History is written by the victors. All that will be left from this war are just scripts and some history books, and that's it. Life will continue. We'll go on. There will be other problems, there will be other things to think about. There will be one single thing that will be left: victory, and that's it. People like victory, they don't like justifications. You don't have to justify it, once you are victorious, that's it. “ Personally, I hope that’s not it.