The recent killing incidents of Indian research scholars at Louisiana university campus apartment and another such incident of shooting public at a shopping mall in Omaha by a teenager, rekindles the thoughts about ‘freedom’ and security in US. Some months back, similar massacre incident happened in Virginia Tech University. Though many such incidents happened earlier also, this time it got more attention because of continuous such incidents. Many people in Andhra Pradesh (as the killed students belong to A.P.) especially elders worry about the safety of their family members in US.
Every time such incidents happen, security gets beefed up. But we cannot have the same kind of security maintained at airports at each and every shopping mall. In fact, it’s not a feasible solution. The system of handing over the guns and licenses has to be analyzed and screened thoroughly.
Nobody really understands why gun licenses are required in this century for common people, as 911 is very much active for emergency situations. If you see the origins of gun culture, they were required during early years of US formation, to protect from hostile Native Americans and also for hunting. And it is also tied to independence and freedom and respect. So it seems many US citizens feel that restricting gun licenses is a threat to ‘freedom’ and self-defense. But it should not be at the cost another citizen’s freedom. In fact, the guns are utilized by ant-social elements rather than needy (?) common man.
Even when it comes to security threats by illegal immigrants, one side there are thorough checks while entering US, but inside there are a lot of illegal immigrants!! And some states especially New York state used to issue driving licenses even to illegal immigrants. How can the terrorism be controlled in such cases? Of course, now they realized the need to check the visa status for issuing driving licenses.
I came to know that till now the law restricts to have gun licenses to only the people who have mental illness and who got jail sentences for at least a year and of course to minors. The good news is now the authorities realized the need to revise the law to give gun licenses. It’s a good beginning and obviously good news for the common public in US.
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Saturday, December 1, 2007
Manipulative Media!
Right from my childhood, I was very much interested in reading news papers, watching news/events in TV etc. If I don't get a chance to get news papers anyday (for e.g. on the next day after Diwali etc.) I used to feel that I missed something on that day. And I used to think that media (mostly) is perfect, they care for the people and only politicians are the worst. I was under this "myth" for almost till my completing education and getting into job.
But if we observe today's media - both print and electronic media, they are just like any companies who work for their business and profits. They have the powerful 'media brand' and constitutional support and they just use it for their gains; they try to project their views as the views of 'all people'. This may not be the case of all news papers and electronic media, but more and more are becoming like that, may be because of stiff competition among them. Anybody who follows them regularly may find this.
I can give a lot of instances for these manipulative acts of media. Some news papers are politically motivated and some others try to gain on youth’s inner interests to improve circulation. Those who reside in cities like Delhi and Bangalore may know that the most circulated English daily in those cities – Times of India. The good quality of it is it publishes the required ads for job seekers esp. of software jobs and classifieds more than any other news paper. It doesn’t write much in favour of any political party also. In fact, it doesn’t concentrate much on detailed news itself. Their concentration is mainly on page 3 people, cine stars and their photos and gossips etc. They want night life more than the general public’s facilities etc. When Bangalore had a rule that the pubs should be closed by 11 PM (don’t remember the exact time), TOI made it a big issue, as if everybody in Bangalore is bothered about it. Everyday they used to write a lot of news and stories about it, that even foreigners are not showing interest to visit Bangalore because of early closure timing of pubs and it may affect software industry etc. etc. And they publish some articles to promote the acts of page 3 and rich people are becoming common in society, like live-in relationships! They give some common names like xyz expressed like this….etc. (an example). I am not just criticizing TOI in particular. These are some examples. There is another major English news paper in South India, especially very much popular in Chennai. No need of telling the name as everybody understands that it’s The Hindu. It does act exactly opposite to TOI. In fact, very good news presentation, good articles. But this news paper tries to write either in favour or against to one political party always. There are some news papers (for e.g. Deccan Herald in B’lore) which are somewhat reasonable to be read, but they are lacking to attract the ads from software companies and so people generally try to buy the already ‘most circulated’ (obviously which publishes more ads and classifieds) news papers.
In Andhra Pradesh, we can’t believe a single Telugu news paper, because of biased news. Each news paper is in favour of a political party. Everybody knows the biggest media group in AP (Eenadu and ETV) publicly supports a political party and they admitted in Supreme Court also that they always write against Congress. Despite of knowing this, still it’s the largest circulated daily in A.P. Recently one of the popular Telugu TV News Channels also concentrated on film actor Chiranjeevi’s daughter’s eloping issue more than any other issue/news for many days.
It seems more and more such news groups are increasing, as some political leaders are directly or indirectly investing in them.
When compared to print media, electronic media is somewhat better, as we can see the video clips directly (if they show) instead of relying on ‘said’ news.
But if we observe today's media - both print and electronic media, they are just like any companies who work for their business and profits. They have the powerful 'media brand' and constitutional support and they just use it for their gains; they try to project their views as the views of 'all people'. This may not be the case of all news papers and electronic media, but more and more are becoming like that, may be because of stiff competition among them. Anybody who follows them regularly may find this.
I can give a lot of instances for these manipulative acts of media. Some news papers are politically motivated and some others try to gain on youth’s inner interests to improve circulation. Those who reside in cities like Delhi and Bangalore may know that the most circulated English daily in those cities – Times of India. The good quality of it is it publishes the required ads for job seekers esp. of software jobs and classifieds more than any other news paper. It doesn’t write much in favour of any political party also. In fact, it doesn’t concentrate much on detailed news itself. Their concentration is mainly on page 3 people, cine stars and their photos and gossips etc. They want night life more than the general public’s facilities etc. When Bangalore had a rule that the pubs should be closed by 11 PM (don’t remember the exact time), TOI made it a big issue, as if everybody in Bangalore is bothered about it. Everyday they used to write a lot of news and stories about it, that even foreigners are not showing interest to visit Bangalore because of early closure timing of pubs and it may affect software industry etc. etc. And they publish some articles to promote the acts of page 3 and rich people are becoming common in society, like live-in relationships! They give some common names like xyz expressed like this….etc. (an example). I am not just criticizing TOI in particular. These are some examples. There is another major English news paper in South India, especially very much popular in Chennai. No need of telling the name as everybody understands that it’s The Hindu. It does act exactly opposite to TOI. In fact, very good news presentation, good articles. But this news paper tries to write either in favour or against to one political party always. There are some news papers (for e.g. Deccan Herald in B’lore) which are somewhat reasonable to be read, but they are lacking to attract the ads from software companies and so people generally try to buy the already ‘most circulated’ (obviously which publishes more ads and classifieds) news papers.
In Andhra Pradesh, we can’t believe a single Telugu news paper, because of biased news. Each news paper is in favour of a political party. Everybody knows the biggest media group in AP (Eenadu and ETV) publicly supports a political party and they admitted in Supreme Court also that they always write against Congress. Despite of knowing this, still it’s the largest circulated daily in A.P. Recently one of the popular Telugu TV News Channels also concentrated on film actor Chiranjeevi’s daughter’s eloping issue more than any other issue/news for many days.
It seems more and more such news groups are increasing, as some political leaders are directly or indirectly investing in them.
When compared to print media, electronic media is somewhat better, as we can see the video clips directly (if they show) instead of relying on ‘said’ news.
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