Today, Michelle Obama “strolled with 15 schoolgirls and took turns holding each one’s hand during a field trip” (Daigle). This was the first sentence of an article from the Associated Press. In my opinion, this is an example of the media playing the role of the junkyard dog. According to the textbook, “The junkyard dog exemplifies the reporter as aggressive and intrusive and suggests that gossip may be perceived as newsworthy” (pg. 71). I feel like this article is silly and holds no true relevance or importance. It is just another story the media thinks people should know about. The article continues to talk about how Michelle delivered ‘a strong message’ about how she likes to exercise because “women have to stay strong” (Obama). This confirms my thoughts about the lack of significance in this article. The story then continues on by talking about how the group of girls sat under a tree with Michelle and shared mango juice. And…the final sentence of the article puts the icing on the cake. It goes as follows, “Mrs. Obama smiled at a giant statue, and pumping both hands in the air, told the girls ‘women and power’” (Daigle). Although I understand the point of her message, I don’t think it was important enough to post everywhere online and in the news. I also think this could be an example of agenda setting. Here, the media is not really telling us what to think, but rather what to think about. It kind of annoys me to see a story like this in the news. It was sort of a waste of time to read the darn thing.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101108/ap_on_re_us/michelle_obama_asia
Haha, this is a very weird article. That is pretty odd that that is actual news. Maybe some people are huge Michelle Obama fans? I agree that this is an example of the junkyard dog as well because their are people that love knowing what famous people are always doing. Something like the show TMZ. They really want to just show her actually doing things instead of just showing her at President Obama's side all the time. That she is an independent woman. But yes, I do not know how anybody can be interested in knowing that the first lady is hanging out with school girls. I bet she is a huge feminist.
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