Newsworthiness

Write about what you’ve learnt about newsworthiness. Are the factors that make a story newsworthy the same factors that would arouse your interest in a story?

I have learnt that news articles are carefully picked before they are published in a newspaper. These articles should include one or more of the following factors:

1. Tragic (Pathos)

2. Human Interest

3. Conflict

4. Timeliness

5. Conflict

6. Shock factor

7. Sleaze factor (Titillation)

8. Proximity

9. Number of people involved

10. Future impact

11. Uniqueness (Extraordinary)

12. Prominence

I am going to talk about some of the more significant factors that would be more related to us. First of all, I would like to talk about the element of sadness, or pathos. Let’s admit it, we as humans, take pleasure in the misfortunes of others. Either we curb it, or we live with it. Regardless of the case, a tragedy never fails to evoke feelings of compassion, empathy, grieve or pity. For example, a natural disaster occurs and tens of thousands of people are killed and thousand others missing will definitely make us feel sorrow and hope and pray for these people involved.

Lust, as one of the Seven Deadly Sins, lives in each and every human body and soul. Whether we want to admit it or not, the sleaze factor is something we all look out for in the newspaper. More often than not, whenever we come across an article with the sleaze factor involved, like a sexual scandal, we are more prone to reading the whole article and stir up a debate over the issue. A leopard never changes its spots; it will be a long time before lust is no longer present in the human soul.

Soft news, or news that relate to human interests, are deeply rooted within ourselves. As humans, we engage in healthy and recreational activities to free ourselves from the monotony and stress of life. Soft news, which range from gardening to cookery, engages our heart by appealing to us to relax and play.

Conflict, an element essential in literature which engages the audience, is another factor found it news articles. Conflict may be racial, religious, physical or emotional. Conflict can occur between the audiences with an opposing party if the audience feels strongly against something. This makes a piece of news newsworthy as it stirs up a heated debate or conflict.

Last of all, uniqueness, which is something that happens out of the ordinary appeals to the readers as well. If a news article is about something that happens every day, or is familiar to the audience, no one would bother to read the article as there would be no purpose and no feelings evoked from doing so.

In conclusion, a good news article should have as many of these factors as possible, in order to be newsworthy. An article in one part of the country may not be as good as it is in another country on the opposite side of the globe. When deciding on how newsworthy a piece of news is, we have to be sure of the target audience we want and report the news accordingly.

Side Note

With regards to Nathan's comment, I would like to clarify my point as follows:

First of all, I agree with the comment on babies not being able to think rationally, and not be tempted by lust or greed. However, these children will grow up over time and the world will be opened before them, temptations will definitely get into the way due to the friction between human and nature.

Next, regarding man taking pleasure in the misfortune of others, and this being natural from birth, whether we live with it or we control it, is all dependent on the perspective of an individual. From my perspective, 人之初，性本恶, that is to say that the nature of man is evil. This saying originated from Xun Zi 荀子，and differs from Mencius' 孟子 teaching of 人之初，性本善, the nature of man is good. His line of argument is that only the environment and nurturing of a person would be able to save him from being immoral. An example he had given was that man would eat when hungry, and that is human nature. However, when one is in the presence of elders, he will not take the food ant eat. This is because he has been taught since young to respect elders, and thus nurture outweighs nature in this case. Nevertheless, there is a flaw in making such a statement. Some have argued that if man's nature was evil, how did the ideology of goodness come about? In my perspective, this argument can also be used to as a rebuttal to Mencius' statement, in the sense that if man's nature is good, how did evil come about?

In addition, in two of the previous assembly sessions we had with 何老师 and 陈老师, they mentioned that every person has a 小人心态，and we should try our best to become a gentleman and not let these personal temptations get into the way.

So, is man's nature good or evil? This subject has been under debate for the previous two centuries. I believe that it is all a matter of perspective; there will definitely be people who oppose to my viewpoint and vice versa.