by Annie Zhang, editor-in-chief

I’m a pretty big proponent of journalism, free press and media in general. But as the party primaries draw nearer and politics grow more divisive, I’m starting to get a little peeved by the same trend in news writing, but specifically, in headline writing.

Facebook is definitely not the place to get your daily dosage of news, but on the right hand side of the page, there’s a “Trending” section where anyone (and any news organization) who posts about a particular topic can have their two seconds of input before disappearing into who-knows-where. My most distinct memory of that section was clicking on something titled “Washington State Capitol” to find these two alternating headlines strewn over the page:

TEA PARTIERS TEAR DOWN CHINESE FLAG AT WASHINGTON STATE CAPITOL – HUFFINGTON POST

DEMOCRAT FLIES COMMUNIST FLAG AT WASHINGTON-STATE-CAPITOL UNTIL PATRIOTS COME TAKE IT DOWN – FOXNEWS

I get it. I’m a journalist too. Headlines sell, political propaganda to your fellow party members sells and money and advocating your political agenda is good. (No.) But the stark contrast in these headlines really makes me angry.

I don’t like either of these headlines very much. Huffington Post’s headline does nothing but reaffirm to its mostly liberal audience the ideas that the South and all Tea-Partiers are stupid, further polarizing the gap between our political parties. On the other hand, at least HuffPost acknowledged that the flag was the flag of China, a nation of about 1.2 billion people (where roughly 95% of the people are just your average, non-politically affiliated citizens) and not purely a symbol of Communism.

(A top comment: Wooooo hooooo!! Maybe we can all jump in our 4x4s and do doughnuts on the capital lawn, firing our guns out drivers window (sic) while holding a beer in the other with a giant Don’t Tread on Me flag flying from the back of the truck. )

But obviously FoxNews doesn’t do much better: focusing on the political party of the governor does exactly what HuffPost does to its liberal audience, except vice versa: they’re saying that all the Northerners hate America and are socialists.  China is a Communist nation, but there is a difference between flying the flag of a country out of respect (after reading the actual story, one will understand that the flag was only flown during the time that the Chinese ambassador was there) and flying a symbol of Communism to protest democracy. Governor Enslee knew which one he was doing. Also, China is much more than its government and much more than Communism. If you don’t agree with China’s political stance, at least consider that behind this flag stand a good quarter of the world’s humans, who deserve the same respect we show to the citizens of other nations.

(From a very passionate Facebooker: I AM CALLING FOR AN IMMEDIATE APOLOGY FROM JAY ENSLEE & REMOVAL OF THE COMMUNIST FLAG IT DOES NOT BELONG NOT ONLY (sic) NEXT TO STARS & STRIPES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA OR FOR THAT FACT NEXT TO THE STATE OF WASHINGTON FLAG.)

The problem is that the majority of people, from any party, don’t read the story itself. They’ll read the sensational headline (that a good portion of the time is just exaggerated clickbait), then write a scathing comment/post about how much the other political party is lowering America’s reputation and ideals. Media has become such a propelling force in politics in both wonderful and terrible ways. Regardless, it certainly has become very polarized, especially with elections coming up in the next year. Just check your Facebook feed.

By the way, here’s what was in the actual story: Conservative activists stand by as a state worker lowers the Chinese flag at the end of the day. Some conservatives protest the flying of the Chinese flag. Then the Internet erupts into debate as political parties throw names at each other and bemoan the fate that has become of America.

It’s not just in your Facebook feed. It’s everywhere. We all know that FOX leans to the far right, CNN leans to the far left and BBC is the closest we have to an unbiased news source. It’s just so frustrating to see how politics affects our perspective of news, and even more so how news affects our politics.

So I suppose what we learn is this handy-dandy formula for writing headlines:

(Insert your political party) does something WONDERFUL (can be rephrased eloquently and in a manner that will attract your party readers and lead them to applaud your political party) OR

(Insert the other political party) does something ABSOLUTELY ATROCIOUS (can be rephrased eloquently and in a manner that will attract your party readers and lead them to heavily criticize that other political party)

Don’t believe me? Check these out, too:

MISSOURI REPUBLICANS ARE TRYING TO BAN FOOD STAMP RECIPIENTS FROM BUYING STEAK AND SEAFOOD – WASHINGTON POST

MISSOURI ABOUT TO MAKE SOME BIG CHANGES TO FOOD STAMPS… WELFARE LEECHES DON’T LIKE IT ONE BIT – CONSERVATIVE TRIBUNE

Oh, politics.

But in all seriousness, I encourage everyone to really  think about more than just what a Facebook feed claims, or for that matter, any news source. Let us be your guides and providers, not your eyes and mind.

(Although The Roar does not have any political agenda to advance…)