I’ll start: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dX_1B0w7Hzc&list=PLQ-7WiWmOuK-55mfcd_tdcvy-57VMCkOW&index=2&feature=plcp
Thanks to videos like these, the emergence of twitter as a campaign season mainstay, and the increased political connectivity of our generation, we’ve become immersed in the manifestation of the election most of us can actually participate in: the media aspect. We’ve become well versed in what times our news feeds will be flooded with debate spam statues, we all know about Romney Girl and @PaulRyanGosling, and we’ve seen the election through the lenses of memes and Mean Girls themed political statues.
Before I began Honors Politics, all I learned about the election was primarily through Facebook, for better or for worse. On Facebook, it’s just as possible to have access to The New York Times as it is to click on someone’s hellyeahbarackobama tumblr, so I read equal parts of both. Yet, even though the caliber of my news sources were pretty balanced, the opinion wasn’t.
As Anthea’s article points out, Latin is an extraordinarily liberal environment. Therefore, most of the posts made by Latin students were pro-Obama, and any other posts I was able to see were from my friends outside of Latin, and since the opinions of my friends have generally tended to at least somewhat reflect my own, my news was heavily partisan without me having to do anything.
The result: a way, way more liberal-leaning political opinion before I started to search elsewhere for my news and information.
I’m not saying this to preach, and I’m not trying to defend my pre-Politics class ignorance. I’m saying this because, for better or for worse, information is so much easier for us to find than it was before -the only problem is that the information we tend to receive the most easily is the most tailored to our own existing political beliefs.
Now, what does everyone else think about the election? Please comment below!