Class Assignments

The comic shown above was my creation for the Gen Z Voter Challenge Activity. I chose this since I really enjoyed making it. I was taught as a kid to always vote no matter the candidates, and I still agree with this sentiment to this day. While there may not always be a "good" candidate, one is almost always better for you and the American people than the other. I can understand why elections with unpopular candidates, such as the past two, would make voters feel alienated from the country's political system, but everyone should always engage in political participation to ensure that their voices heard, especially young people.

I chose my reflections on the coverage of BLM with Anika Reed since I felt that it spoke to an issue larger than BLM itself. Ever since watching Jon Stewart on TV as a little kid, I've been somewhat skeptical of certain 24 hour news networks. Since their inception in the 1980s, they've been forced to compete not only with each other, but with all TV networks regardless of genre. This has led to an increase in excessively sensationalist style of coverage that sometimes (not always) can neglect certain aspects of reality in favor of ratings. This phenomenon slithered its way into many networks' coverage of the BLM movement, which they referred to as being comprised of mostly rioting and looting prior to major public backlash.

Works Cited

Howley, Kevin. “‘I Have a Drone’: Internet Memes and the Politics of Culture.” Interactions:

Studies in Communication & Culture, vol. 7, no. 2, Sept. 2016, pp. 155–175. EBSCOhost,

doi:10.1386/iscc.7.2.155_1.

“Meme.” Merriam-Webster, Merriam-Webster, www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meme.

WIGGINS, BRADLEY. “Digital Dispatches from the 2016 US Election: Popular Culture

Intertextuality and Media Power.” International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics,

vol. 13, no. 1/2, Mar. 2017, pp. 197–205. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1386/macp.13.1-2.197_7.