This has been one of the most
valuable courses I have taken to improve my personal and academic writing and
reading habits. I have learned the ease
of staying up to date on the current events around the globe and now truly
enjoy using the news sites to continuously search for more information on
current events. I have really seen the ways that news stories differ from site
to site and over time. The last paper of this course was an eye-opening
experience looking at how events can shape political debate and create a
national call to action. I am certainly now in the habit of reading the news
and looking at specific stories from different points of view. These changes in
the way I read and write have given me confidence for future courses at DU. Talking
about the news in every class was incredibly useful and engaging and I will
continue to look at the news but I will also find other students to engage in
conversation about current events and news sources.
Monday, March 11, 2013
Saturday, March 9, 2013
Extended Essay 2
Sandy Hook Elementary: A Tragedy We Will Never Forget
On Friday,
December 14th, 2012, a catastrophic event in a small town of
Connecticut, colored the nation with devastation. Twenty young children and six
innocent adults were murdered at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut.
This tragedy is now the second deadliest school shooting in US history and was reported
throughout news stations and across the globe. From the moment the first
responders were on the scene, news reports have covered every aspect of this
story, and will continue to report and develop well into the future as a result
of the momentum this event has created in gun law reform. The ways that this
story has adapted and evolved over time can be seen throughout many media and
news sources.
Every major news
establishment in the nation covered this incidence, and among those that were
the first to communicate details about that horrible day was CNN. One of their first published
stories on the event included the brief testimony of a parent inside the school
at the time but not much else. The information had come from a woman who had
concealed herself under a counter and immediately alerted the police after she
heard the first gunshots. Many other news stations picked up this story as well,
speculating on the death toll and the status of the shooter. The next day, CNN was able to give a description of what
the shooter was wearing, how many people had died, and a short history of the
town. The article explained that this tragedy was bound to leave a huge wake in
this small, close-knit community that had only had one homicide reported in the
last ten years (Candiotti and Aarthun) . The article
described that the shooter, Adam Lanza, was “heavily armed” and dressed in
“black fatigues”, but could not yet specify on the types of guns he used or his
motivation for the attack. Saturday, December 15th, an article also came
out in The Economist, and Britain
based news magazine, that declared that Adam Lanza’s mother was found killed in
her home in Newtown as well, supposedly killed by her son before he travelled
to the elementary school and later killed himself as police were closing in on
him.
Students and
faculty regarding the events of that day have given testimonies and eyewitness
reports to numerous news agencies. The Economist
cites a nine-year old boy who was in the school’s gym during the time of the
shooting; he said, “We were in the gym and heard loud bangs” (R.W.) . The student
explains that they hid in the gym’s closet and waited for police to escort them
out hours after. Later stories also indicated that students reportedly heard
screams and gunshots over the intercom at the start of Adam Lanza’s rampage
that sent a surge of terror through each person in the building that day. One
other student who spoke with reporters said, “I saw bullets going past,” before
he and another student were pulled into a classroom by a teacher who protected
them during the attack. A few days after the shooting, stories of heroic
teachers began to emerge into the public media sphere as well. On December 17th,
three days after the shooting, Matt Lauer on the Today Show interviewed three courageous teachers from Sandy Hook
Elementary that exemplified that heroism. Connie Sullivan, a third grade
teacher continuously told her terrified students “that they were loved, that
their mommies and daddies would be there soon” (Sullivan, Feda and Vollmer) . In her
interview, one can clearly see how much she deeply cares for her students and
the pride she had in them for supporting each other throughout the terrible event.
It is teachers and other individuals like Connie that will act as inspiration
and support in the healing process of this tiny town.
An
article in The Hartford Courant the
day after the shooting articulates that the Chief State Medical Examiner was
working to identify each of the victims. Each victim was shot between three and
eleven times, making the autopsies and the positive identification by parents a
difficult and painful process. The six adults and 18 of the 20 children who
died that day left the school in body bags, the two others died at a near by
hospital due to the extensive wounds. The article also communicates the heroic
actions of first grade teacher, Victoria Soto, who finished hiding all of her
students before being brutally killed by Adam Lanza (The Hartford
Courant) .
The week following
the shooting, NBC News began to
address the issue of gun laws because many of the victims continue to feel a
responsibility to protect other innocent families from awful events like this
one. In his address to the nation on the day of the attack, President Barak
Obama also opened the doors to a on-going debate regarding the control of guns
across the country. He said, “We’ve endured too many of these tragedies in the
last few years” (The Washington Post) , alluding to
recent events in Wisconsin, Colorado and Virginia. About two weeks after the shooting,
John Rosenthal wrote in the Huffington
Post, “We Are to Blame for the Sandy Hook Elementary School Massacre” (Rosenthal) . He claims
that, as citizens of the US we should take more responsibility for the laws our
Congressmen are passing, and each person needs to take an active role in
preventing future attacks like this. Even pro-gun rights advocates have begun
to reevaluate the ease of access that citizens have to assault rifles within
the US. Regardless of the proposed laws’ potential to prevent attacks like
Sandy Hook, change in gun laws will still decrease a high number of gun-related
deaths each year. However, an article in U.S.
News states, “Some also suggest that other issues aside from guns should be
the forefront of the national debate in the wake of the tragedy, including
violence in video games and access to mental healthcare in America” (Did the Sandy Hook Shooting Prove the Need for More Gun Control?) . Regardless
of what side a person is on in this on-going debate, the media has played a
huge role in causing people to act on the current laws. Gun control debates are
still continuing today.
Several weeks
after the shooting, an article in the Wall
Street Journal explored the reasons and motivation behind Adam Lanza’s
attack. The article indicates that a contributing factor to his behavior was a
snowballing affect of severe social isolation from all family and friends aside
from his mother, with whom he lived. It was reported that she took him to
shooting ranges in order to bond with him and it was her guns that he used to
kill her in her bed that morning and that he used at Sandy Hook Elementary.
However, his anti-social behavior is also proving to be troublesome in fully
investigating the last few years of his life before December (Audi, Kesling and Shallwani) . Further
investigation into Adam Lanza indicates that he felt he was in a direct
competition with Anders Behring Breivik who was responsible for brutally
murdering 77 people near Oslo, Norway in 2011. Lanza is said to have believed
Sandy Hook to be the easiest target with a concentrated group of people in
order to more efficiently kill a larger number of people in his effort to
challenge Breivik’s heinous record (Payne) .
Since the
shooting, many news sources including the Wall
Street Journal and CNN have
dedicated interactive webpages that pay tribute to each victim with a photo and
brief profile written by his or her loved ones. Media has played an important
role in giving a face and a name to each victim, making it much harder for
individuals to separate themselves from those who suffered in this terrible
event. News sources function as a call to action for people to begin a
much-needed change within the country. We must remember that there were more
than 27 victims that day. In addition to the family and friends of those that
were killed, this was also an incredibly traumatizing experience for the other
400 plus students and staff at Sandy Hook. The community will take time to
heal.
News stations and
sites divulge information about current events as it becomes available. With
events like the mass murder-suicide at Sand Hook Elementary School in December
2012, we can see these events play out at an hourly rate. The story has and
will continue to transform and progress over time, as new information is
uncovered. Reports of the event on December 14th will continue until
the official investigation is completed, likely in the summer of 2013. The
evolution of this story includes the accounts and reports of policemen on the
scene to the overwhelming support for the families of victims and even to the
heated debates on gun control as a result of the attack.
Works Cited
Audi, Tamara,
Ben Kesling and Pervaiz Shallwani. "School Gunman's Downward
Spiral." 22 December 2012. The
Wall Street Journal. 28 February 2013
<http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324731304578193890
846892734.html>.
Candiotti, Susan and Sarah Aarthun. Police: 20 children
among 26 victims of
Connecticut School Shooting. 15 December
2012. 25 February 2013
<http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/14/us/connecticut-school-
shooting/index.html?iref=allsearch>.
"Did the Sandy Hook Shooting Prove the Need for More
Gun Control?" U.S. News. 27
February 2013
<http://www.usnews.com/debate-club/did-the-sandy-hook-
shooting-prove-the-need-for-more-gun-control>.
"Newtown Families Grieve As Medical Examiner Works To
Identify Victims In Sandy
Hook School Shooting." The
Hartford Courant 15 December 2012.
Payne, Ed. Report: Sandy Hook shootertried to emulate
Norway massacre. 19
February 2013. 26 February 2013
<http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/19/justice/connecticut-newtown-
shooting/index.html>.
R.W. Democracy in America. 15 December 2012. 25
February 2013
<http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/12/guns-
america>.
Rosenthal, John. "We Are to Blame for the Sandy Hook
Elementary School
Massacre." 28 December 2012. Huffington
Post. 26 February 2013
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-rosenthal/united-states-gun-
violence_b_2375393.html>.
"School shooting: President Obama’s remarks on the
shooting at Sandy Hook
Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
(Transcript)." 14 December 2012. The
Washington Post. 26 February
2013
<http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-12-
14/politics/35846745_1_parent-children-transcript>.
Sullivan, Connie, Kris Feda and Janet Vollmer. Sandy Hook
teacher told students
'they were loved' Matt Lauer.
17 December 2012.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
EE2- Sandy Hook Elementary
Sandy Hook
Elementary: A Tragedy We Will Never Forget
On Friday, December 14th,
2012, a catastrophic event in a small town of Connecticut, colored the nation
with devastation. A total of 20 young children and six innocent adults were
murdered at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut. This tragedy is now the
second deadliest school shooting in US history and was reported throughout news
stations and across the globe. From the moment the first responders were on the
scene, news reports have covered every aspect of this story, and will continue report
and develop well into the future as a result of the momentum this event has created
in gun law reform. This paper will explore the ways this story has adapted and
evolved through time in the media.
Every major news establishment in
the nation covered the incidence. Among those that were the first to
communicate details about that horrible day was CNN. One of their first published stories on the event included the
brief testimony of a parent inside the school at the time but not much else. The
information had come from a woman who had concealed herself under a counter and
immediately alerted the police after she heard the first gunshots. Many other
news stations picked up this story as well, speculating on the death toll and
the status of the shooter. **The next day, CNN
was able to give a description of what the shooter was wearing, how many people
had died, and a short history of the town. The article explained that this
tragedy was bound to leave a huge wake in this small, close-knit community that
had only had one homicide reported in the last ten years (Candiotti and
Aarthun) .
The article described that the shooter, Adam Lanza, was “heavily armed” and
dressed in “black fatigues” but could not yet specify on the types of guns he
used or his motivation for the attack. Saturday, December 15th, an
article also came out in The Economist
that declared that Adam Lanza’s mother was found killed in her home in Newtown
as well, supposedly killed by her son before he travelled to the elementary
school and later killed himself as police was closing in on him.
Students and faculty regarding the
events of that day have given testimonies and eyewitness reports to numerous
news agencies. The Economist cites a
nine-year old boy who was in the school’s gym during the time of the shooting;
he said, “We were in the gym and heard loud bangs” (R.W.) . The student
explains that they hid in the gym’s closet and waited for police to escort them
out hours after. Later stories also indicated that students reportedly heard
screams and gunshots over the intercom at the start of Adam Lanza’s rampage
that sent a surge of terror through each person in the building that day. One
other student who spoke with reporters said, “I saw bullets going past,” before
he and another student were pulled into a classroom by a teacher who protected
them during the attack. A few days after the shooting, stories of heroic
teachers began to emerge into the public media sphere as well. On December 17th,
three days after the shooting, Matt Lauer on the Today Show interviewed three courageous teachers from Sandy Hook
Elementary that exemplified that heroism. Connie Sullivan, a third grade
teacher continuously told her terrified students “that they were loved, that
their mommies and daddies would be there soon” (Sullivan, Feda and Vollmer) . In her
interview, one can clearly see how much she deeply cares for her students and
the pride she had in them for supporting each other throughout the terrible event.
The week following the shooting, NBC News began to address the issue of
gun laws because many of the victims continue to feel a responsibility to protect
other innocent families from awful events like this one. In his address to the
nation on the day of the attack, President Barak Obama also opened the doors to
a on-going debate regarding the control of guns across the country. He said,
“We’ve endured too many of these tragedies in the last few years” (School shooting: President
Obama’s remarks on the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown,
Conn. (Transcript)) , alluding to recent events in
Wisconsin, Colorado and Virginia. About two weeks after the shooting, John
Rosenthal wrote in the Huffington Post
“We Are to Blame for the Sandy Hook
Elementary School Massacre” (Rosenthal) . He claims
that, as citizens of the US we should take more responsibility for the laws our
Congressmen are passing, and each person needs to take an active role in
preventing future attacks like this. Even pro-gun rights advocates have begun
to reevaluate the ease of access that citizens have to assault rifles within
the US. Regardless of the proposed laws’ potential to prevent attacks like
Sandy Hook, change in gun laws will still decrease a high number of gun-related
deaths each year. However, an article in U.S.
News states, “Some also suggest that other issues aside from guns should be
the forefront of the national debate in the wake of the tragedy, including
violence in video games and access to mental healthcare in America” (Did the Sandy Hook Shooting Prove the Need for More Gun Control?) . Regardless
of what side a person is on in this on-going debate, the media has played a
huge role in causing people to act on the current laws. Gun control debates are
still continuing today.
Several weeks after the shooting, an
article in the Wall Street Journal explored
the reasons and motivation behind Adam Lanza’s attack. The article indicates that
a contributing factor to his behavior was a snowballing affect of severe social
isolation from all family and friends besides his mother, with whom he lived.
It was reported that she took him to shooting ranges in order to bond with him
and it was her guns that he used to kill her in her bed that morning and at
Sandy Hook Elementary. However, his anti-social behavior is also proving to be troublesome
in fully investigating the last few years of his life before December (Audi, Kesling and Shallwani) . Further
investigation into Adam Lanza indicates that he felt he was in a direct
competition with Anders Behring Breivik who was responsible for brutally
murdering 77 people near Oslo, Norway in 2011. Lanza is said to have believed
Sandy Hook to be the easiest target with a concentrated group of people in
order to more efficiently kill a larger number of people in his effort to
challenge Breivik’s heinous record (Payne) .
Since the shooting, many news
sources including the Wall Street Journal
and CNN have dedicated interactive webpages that pay tribute to each victim
with a photo and brief profile written by his or her loved ones. Media has
played an important role in giving a face and a name to each victim that makes
it much harder for everyone to separate himself or herself from this terrible
event. News sources function as a call to action for people to begin a
much-needed change within the country. We must remember that there were more
than 27 victims that day. This was also an incredibly traumatizing experience
for the other 400 plus students and staff at Sandy Hook in addition to the
family and friends of those that were killed. The community will take time to
heal.
News stations and sites divulge
information about current events as it becomes available. With events like the
mass murder-suicide at Sand Hook Elementary School in December 2012, we can see
these events play out at an hourly rate. The story has and will continue to
transform and progress over time, as new information is uncovered. The evolution
of this story includes the accounts and reports of policemen on the scene to
the overwhelming support for the families of victims and even to the heated
debates on gun control as a result of the attack. Reports of the event on
December 14th will continue until the official investigation is completed,
likely in the summer of 2013.
Works Cited
Audi, Tamara,
Ben Kesling and Pervaiz Shallwani. "School Gunman's Downward
Spiral." 22 December 2012. The
Wall Street Journal. 28 February 2013
<http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324731304578193890
846892734.html>.
Candiotti, Susan and Sarah Aarthun. Police: 20 children
among 26 victims of
Connecticut School Shooting. 15 December
2012. 25 February 2013
<http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/14/us/connecticut-school-
shooting/index.html?iref=allsearch>.
"Did the Sandy Hook Shooting Prove the Need for More
Gun Control?" U.S. News. 27
February 2013
<http://www.usnews.com/debate-club/did-the-sandy-hook-
shooting-prove-the-need-for-more-gun-control>.
Payne, Ed. Report: Sandy Hook shootertried to emulate
Norway massacre. 19
February 2013. 26 February 2013
<http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/19/justice/connecticut-newtown-
shooting/index.html>.
R.W. Democracy in America. 15 December 2012. 25
February 2013
<http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2012/12/guns-
america>.
Rosenthal, John. "We Are to Blame for the Sandy Hook
Elementary School
Massacre." 28 December 2012. Huffington
Post. 26 February 2013
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-rosenthal/united-states-gun-
violence_b_2375393.html>.
"School shooting: President Obama’s remarks on the
shooting at Sandy Hook
Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
(Transcript)." 14 December 2012. The
Washington Post. 26 February
2013
<http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-12-
14/politics/35846745_1_parent-children-transcript>.
Sullivan, Connie, Kris Feda and Janet Vollmer. Sandy Hook
teacher told students
'they were loved' Matt Lauer.
17 December 2012.
Tuesday, February 26, 2013
Photos in the News-Short Essay 2
Images add an element to news
stories that cannot be fulfilled otherwise, and as a result news stories act as
a large caption describing events and opinions within photos. Frequently,
photos are needed for the reader to get a more full idea of what the article is
describing. Photos work with an article to tell a story and often educate
readers on current events around the world. Particularly, in politically
tainted events abroad, photos are integral in showing the tangible impacts of foreign
affairs. Images can both work to benefit the argument of an article but can
also belittle the authenticity and reliability of the article as well. In this
paper I will outline the ways that supplemental photos to news articles can
both help and hurt the evidence surrounding a story concerning long-lasting
conflict in Syria.
This photo is positioned at the top
of an article in the New York Times
that describes recent events in Syria. The caption of this photo describes
that; “People gathered to search for
survivors under rubble after what activists said was a Scud missile hit in
Aleppo's Tariq al Bab neighborhood on Friday” (Gladstone & Saad, 2013) . The
authors further articulate that rebel districts in Syria have been attacked by
the government regime using scud missiles that are both inaccurate and brutal.
These attacks have killed several innocent civilians and wounded and trapped
even more. The dark colors and unidentifiable people in the foreground of this
image help to give the article as a whole, an ominous tone at first glance. The
smoke and ruble in the background also help to set the stage for a story that
articulates desolate events occurring remotely from the US. The events that
have recently been taking place in northern Syria are illustrated in this photo.
This photo, in conjunction with the title of this article, “Scud Missile Attack
Reported in Aleppo”, help to set the stage for the reader to feel sorrow for
the victims of these attacks and identify themselves with those that were
targeted.
The Washington
Post uses this photo in another article concerning the Syrian regime’s
attacks against rebel forces. The way this photo is taken from below the
missiles gives the reader a very specific first impression. The intimidation
factor that this photo possesses creates an oppressive tone, and because this
image is placed at the top of the article it introduces the story to its
audience with predisposed thoughts of tyranny. However, the caption that The Washington Post places under this
photo is fairly inconspicuous and reads; “A South Korean museum
displays replica Scud-B missiles somewhat similar to the Scud-Ds fired in
Syria. (JUNG YEON-JE/AFP/Getty Images)” (Fisher, 2012) . This caption makes these
missiles seem much less threatening and even out of place to the reader. They are not even real missiles or in the same
country as the news story, and this simple fact change the perspective
drastically on the legitimacy of the article. Knowing the context of this photo
works against the mission of the article to educate American readers about the
oppressive regime within Syria.
Images leave a trace on all stories
in and outside of the news. However, news articles greatly benefit from photos
that can help to tell the story as well as attract an audience. Unlike the almost
effortless and unrelated photograph within the article in The Washington Post, the photo imbedded in the article from the New York Times does an impeccable job at
bringing out emotion within the reader. By using a photo depicting civilian
people, the New York Times is able to
create a connection between its intended audience and the people in Syria being
affected by President Assad’s regime. These photos are in conversation with the
text of the article to bring about a new perspective and an element of reality
within the readers.
Washington Post
article:
Works Cited
Fisher, M.
(2012, December 12). What Syria's Scud missile launches tells us about
the regime's thinking. The Washington
Post , p. 1.
Gladstone, R., & Saad, H. (2013, February 22). Scud
Missile Attack Reported in
Aleppo. The New York Times , pp.
1-3.
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