Yellow Journalism Essay, Research Paper
YELLOW JOURNALISM
Yellow journalism is a moneymaking tactic that started a war and a new brand of reporting. Yellow Journalism has effected a lot of lives over the past one hundred years hat it has been around. It has brought out the worst in many people and it can really expose a person s life. On the other hand it can be of some good, I mean who are we to know that everything that is printed in the newspapers. Most of the time Yellow Journalism is not a positive act, it is most commonly used in a negative manner.
Yellow journalism started in New York because two newspapers needed more circulation. The war for more circulation was between the Journal and the World newspapers of New York. More, importantly the war was between two people: William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer. Hearst worked for the
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Journal and Pulitzer for the World. (Joseph Pulitzer)
The comic strip named The Yellow Kid was how yellow journalism was named. The strip written by Richard Felton Outcalt was a comic strip that sensationalized news topics of the time. It became a hit in the Sunday edition of the Journal because it was the first colored comic strip in a newspaper. (Joseph Pulitzer)
The war between these two men was labeled bloody even though the
only blood shed was in the wars they talked about. At the time of this so-called war in journalism, there was a real war happening in Cuba. The Spanish and the Cubans were fighting and the two newspapers thought they could get more readers by writing about the war. (Spanish American War)
They sensationalized about battles and told of reports that the Spanish were brutalizing the Cubans. These reports even caught the attention of President McKinley. He was really against sending anyone into Cuba but the public was so caught by the story that he was almost forced to send troops. So, McKinley
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waged war against Spain. This war was really caused by two newspapers that needed more circulation. At the end of the war however, the World had been accused of false reports. Also one of it s reporters was kicked out of Cuba after his first story came out. This lowered the World s reputation and put the Journal on top. From then on people would run to newsstands to read the
accounts of the Journals reporters in Cuba. In the end, yellow journalism was responsible for the American Empire in Cuba and paved the way for how guerilla war was reported. (JosephnPulitzer)
A form of Yellow Journalism was also used in a documentary on the Vietnam War which ended up causing a $120 million lawsuit against CBS. In 1982, CBS decided to make a documentary about the Vietnam War and how they believed that President Johnson knew there were more enemy fighters than he was letting on. They cut corners in the investigative reporting and made it seem that General William C. Westmoreland knew there were more enemies than he told about. CBS said that he and the President were part of a Conspiracy. The General
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then filed a $120 million libel suit against CBS and won. (Kowet, Don)
Today there are many kinds of yellow journalism and it is used everywhere. There is a whole magazine that is just yellow journalism. In the movies, yellow journalism is at large as well. The movie Jacob the Liar is all about how yellow journalism can inspire people. In the movie, Robin Williams makes up inspiring news just to keep the soldiers of his country in good spirits. This is a great parallel of Yellow Journalism. (Jakob the Liar)
Tabloids are probably the biggest users of Yellow Journalism today. A tabloid is a magazine that holds only sensational news stories about celebrities, murder and religion. They are very popular because people like hearing the gruesome accounts that are in the tabloids which are not in more reputable newspapers or in newscasts . Tabloids started as newspapers that were about half the size of regular ones. They printed short news stories and some of them were fake. The New York Post was the first successful tabloid. After that follow The Sun. Today tabloids are large magazines with color photos and big headlines, often
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about celebrities. (Tabloids)
Although people love reading tabloids, they do cause some unrest with the celebrities they attack. Liz Taylor was one of the most attacked celebrities of the tabloids. She has tried getting back at them, but they say they have reliable sources so the article can stay. Also there are always headlines about people seeing Elvis. This makes some people angry because those stories are just attempts to get into the paper. (Tabloids)
The reason people have made the tabloid industry so big is because they like the grim facts and dirty details. The tabloids come right out and give people what they want. Today tabloids sell 2.4 million copies a day on the weekdays and 4.2 million copies on Sundays.(Tabloids) They will bring yellow journalism into the next millennium.
Yellow Journalism started in the 1890 s with the war between the Journal and the World. Now it is the 2000 s and Yellow Journalism is still reported. It has caused a war between newspapers and countries. When corners are
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cut in reporting, that too is Yellow Journalism. It can be helpful though, as illustrated in the film Jakob the Liar. Now, 100 years later from when it first came about, it is helping to sell millions of magazines this year and helping to bring out people s most private secrets to the newsstand.