1) To what extent do you agree with Alain de Botton's views on the News?
I greatly agree with Alain De Botton's views on the news as the news has so much power over audiences as it essentially "guides us" and informs us as to what is important and what is not, previously decided massively by religion. With this great power, it is essential that the youth must be educated on how to interpret and consume the news, especially as this generation is not only the generation who will be enormously influenced by the news but it is also the generation that would be motivated to take power and action, thereby helping "the nation flourish" with news. Despite this, I completely agree with his beliefs that "media has a short attention span" making the news laking variety at times proving his point of "neutrality [being] impossible".
2) How can you link Marxism and Hegemony to de Botton's criticisms of the News?
Alain de Botton clearly has a Marxist perspective of the news as he greatly believes that the news is dominated by an elite class of the society, making everyone else below the elite, completely exposed and liable to any status quo or dominant ideologies forced upon us. With this perspective, he believes that the audience are passive and ideologies are injected into us, rendering us powerless and unable to voice and alternative viewpoint.
3) How could you use Pluralism and new technology to challenge de Botton's views on the News?
A pluralist perspective would actually argue that the advancements in technology have greatly improved and we are now able to easily access our own choice of news as well as produce news as well. With new and digital technology, we have options of doing this anonymously which ultimately means that we , to some extent, are protected from the repercussions of voicing alternative ideologies while still challenging the 'norms' that the elite has imposed upon us.
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