Never Stay Silent

  I found all of the presentations to be incredibly enlightening and enjoying to watch. I found myself learning a lot about journalism heroes that I never would have otherwise known about. They were all such prominent figures in that they each paved the way for new journalists to come. They each set the bar high with their achievements and some even risked their lives in order to better the world around them through mass media storytelling. Nellie Bly is one of the most iconic journalistic risk-takers to date. She was a young woman that desperately wanted to get her foot in the door with a story that no one wanted to share. To exploit how mental patients were treated in an institution at the time, she faked symptoms of a mental illness and got herself checked into a mental hospital to explore undercover, the torture and mistreatment that the most vulnerable of society had to endure on a daily basis. Her work was revolutionary and helped shed light on a story many would benefit from...

  Ellen Browning Scripps is one of my absolutely favorite journalism hero of all time because she was one of the founding mothers for multiple different newspapers and was one of the first true successful businesswoman of that time. She was savvy, invested and budgeted her money properly, and was endlessly devoted to her philanthropic work, which would benefit the society surrounding her for generations to come.  She serves as a selfless, hopeful, and brilliant role-model for most woman and spent her days contributing to public service and making the world around her a better place. She was an avid supporter in the endeavors of young individuals and donated much of her money to public funds for more schools and organizations that would create a positive and enriching experience for the most impressionable among society.  She was born on October 18, 1936 in London, England to a family with an abundance of children but lost her mother at a very early age. Shortly thereafter...

  I quite enjoyed making political memes because I find it to be a nice, creative outlet to conveying my political views to a tumultuous society. I made this one concerning bipartisanship because I honestly feel that, now more than ever, we are a completely divided nation - in terms of politics, ideals, and morals. This makes me truly wonder if the Democrats and the Republicans are ever going to establish some common ground and work together as opposed to against each other.  I find this to be another political meme that a lot of people in this day and age would be able to relate to in a bit more of a light hearted manner. I have a lot of intelligent friends who are either a steadfast Democrat or Republican and have no desire to be in the same room together without an argument of some kind to discuss the presidential election and whether or not it was rigged, President Biden’s competency, Covid-19, and the overall state of our country - I have heard it all! I hardly ever inser...

This year, in particular, has seemed to evoked a certain kind of sensitivity in our society. The American society is one that hyper focuses on the concept of freedom as one of the primary founding ideals of this country - for this to be a place of free speech, press, religion, and assembly.  It is up to society as a whole to uphold and carry on this constitutional tradition. In this modern era, advancements in technology and the social media platforms that have ensued from them are what we would expect people to use as tools to better express their views in way that is both dignified and respectful. A lot of people have used these powerful tools in counterproductive ways for harm while corporate leaders of these platforms take it upon themselves to remove these apps from society’s grasp so that there are no more personal playgrounds for debate, to most of the time appeal to a certain extremist political agenda.  A primary example of this type of groupthink is when Parler, an i...

                                                                                                             From my own ethical standpoint, I find it quite difficult to condone Julian Assange’s actions, yet I also understand why there is such a significant amount of controversy concerning the overall effects a ruling conducive to his extradition back to the US would ultimately have on press freedom. If extradited back to the US, the Wikileaks founder could find himself facing up to 175 years in federal prison - essentially a life sentence.  Although I may appear to be resolute about my beliefs concerning the brilliant and innovative computer hacker, I found that...