This phenomenon [news broadcasts] has a different effect on different types of people. If the bad news is about some malefactor who is disturbing the civic tranquillity, it will stir—as if from primordial ooze—fears, judgements, and subterranean myths in the mind of the readers or viewers. (2, Slick Spins and Fractured Facts: How Cultural Myths Distort the News )
James Fox states that: "…fears about crime have less to do with actual crime rates than with the perception of crime we get from the news. The technology of reporting has changed dramatically in the past fifteen years, with live minicams and satellites; it is possible for any local news outlet to lead every night’s newscast with a crime story, including good video.” (3, Slick Spins and Fractured Facts: How Cultural Myths Distort the News)
As stated by Bill Nichols; “Network news oscillates vividly between sobriety and spectacle…Network news may well be said to present the news of the day as attractions offered by anchor/show people, but the news does not invite our assessment of its rhetorical operations or of the events it reports." (49, Blurred Boundaries: Questions of Meaning in Contemporary Culture)
More specifically; “…most sentencing stories were very brief and made no mention of the purposes of sentencing in general on the reasons for the particular sentence…[however] it is clear that the vast majority of the Canadian public relay almost exclusively upon the news media for information about criminal justice issues in general, and in particular sentencing." (1, Sentencing in the Media: A Content Analysis of English-Language Newspapers in Canada)
W.W.B.S.: What would Bill say?
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Bad News Syndrome
More information with regards to News and its' persuasion
