Question 9

9) Find a “news” story from the Onion News Network, and compare it to a contemporary news story or clip from a “real” news source (a TV channel, newspaper, etc.). Discuss them both in terms of gatekeeping and agenda-setting functions, as well as the breakdown and reevaluation of discourse that Baym talks about in his article. Citing Baym will help (100-150 words).

Gate-keeping and agenda setting are both things that are associated with Critical (or Responsive) Post-Modernism. When you examine something for Critical Post-Modernism, you see that the media examined is making a critical statement about the aesthetic. So, instead of just mentioning or alluding to the aesthetic (like intertexuality), you actually make a statement about it in a critical light. Gate keeping and agenda setting are two very similar approaches that are used to filter the news. Gate keeping is when a news station lets some things enter the news, but keeps others out. Agenda setting is when the news picks and chooses what they want to talk about, dictating what news you hear and thus what you can worry or think about.

Geoffrey Baym, in his article about the Daily Show, discusses the concept of discourse. He says, “This is not simply the move toward “infotainment,” although the fundamental blurring of news and entertainment- a conflation that cuts both ways- certainly is a constituent element. Rather, it is a more profound phenomenon of discursive integration, a way of speaking about, understanding, and acting within the world defined by the permeability of form and the fluidity of content. Discourses of news, politics, entertainment, and marketing have grown deeply inseparable: the languages and practices of each have lost their distinctiveness and are being melded into previously unimagined combinations. Although some may see this as a dangerous turn in the realm of political communication, it can be seen as a rethinking of discursive styles and standards that may be opening spaces for significant innovation.” (Page 262) From this I gather that Baym is making a statement about how the Daily Show (and other “fake” news sources) not only alludes to different discourses (like news, entertainment, etc.) through the style in which the content is displayed, but does so in a way that is critical of both the form and the content itself. He argues that the Daily Show isn’t more comedy than news, but rather both discourses are “complimentary arrangements” (262) of each other, that it is both a late-night talk show and a nightly newscast simultaneously.

Baym discusses the Daily Show’s use of gate keeping, that because they constitute themselves as a “fake” news station, they can pick and choose sound bites in order to manipulate them to make the point they are arguing. He says, “Drawing on live broadcast coverage of public statements and government proceedings, the content of The Daily Show resembles much of the mainstream news media. Empowered by the title of “fake news,” however, The Daily Show routinely violates journalistic conventions in important ways. For one, while it covers the same raw material as does the mainstream news, its choices of sound bites turn contemporary conventions on their head.” (264)



Police Seize More Than $50 In Wire From Nation's Wealthiest Crystal Meth Dealer


The Onion uses a few of the discourses that Baym describes. The very opening scene is an obvious allusion to a news channel, panning and focusing on a pretty news anchor with a camera station background and the “news” logo in the bottom right hand corner. It also makes an allusion to a mode of discourse like a documentary with the “King of Meth” title and the various scenes of the man. Gate keeping is obviously used here when the policeman is giving his speech and when they pull out news headlines as to have you only read the title, not the content of the article. There was also a reference to the discourse of television shows, ending the newscast about the “King of Meth” with a very similar sound to that used on Law and Order. It then ends with an incorporation to the discourse of daytime talk shows, discussing a new dating website.



This news clip has many of the same elements as the other “fake” news source, which I guess is the point of the fake news clip in the first place. This ABC news clip also has the logo in the bottom right hand corner with a strong anchor voice in the background. This video also has elements of gate keeping, where the anchor speaks over some “less important” phrases and then is silent for other. This allows the news station to splice audio to better address the video’s argument. We also see the element of day-time talk show discourse where the doctors are sitting in chairs to the left of the news anchor, making it more like a conversation. With video film that was created for this newscast, like the sepia toned school scene, this clip has elements similar to documentaries, just like the “fake” news source.