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About Hugo Chavez Essay

Decent Essays

The media has influenced personal beliefs, opinions, and judgments of Hugo Chavez by negatively portraying him. He is shown as a totalitarian leader that is terrorizing the people. The media gives one side of the story and does not show thing whole thing. He is shown as a person that does things for selfish reasons and does not take care of his country. Connie Mack, a candidate for Florida’s U.S. Senate, just recently referred to his regime as, “the corrupt, terrorist supporting Chavez regime” (Gomez 1). He also argues “drug crime, gun violence, and especially kidnappings have risen dramatically” (Gomez 1). Mack is the front-runner in the Florida race, making him a public figure. With statements as strong as these, it is very difficult …show more content…

The media manipulated coverage of the 2002 coup by not giving the whole story, and arguing that it was a pro-democratic coup. The media stated that Chavez told his people to shoot at protestors (Reilly 1). A statement like this makes Chavez look like he is using violence to stay in power and that the people do not support him. This is the type of leader that most people in the world fear. After hearing there is a leader like this in Venezuela, many Americans would believe that the coup is a good thing, and that he should be taken out of office. However, this was not the case. It was never confirmed that Hugo Chavez told anyone to fire at protestors, and many of those that died were actually supporters of Chavez (Reilly 1). If this were stated in the media, then the coup would have been shown as the problem terrorizing the country rather than Chavez. Also, the way the media presented the coup insinuated that the people did not want Chavez in office. However, shortly after he was taken out of office, many protested to bring him back into office. (Reilly 1) If the people did not want him in office, then there would not have been a large enough protest to bring Chavez back like they did. Moreover, the United States newspapers argued that the coup was pro-democratic. The New York Times stated that “Chavez's ‘resignation’ meant that ‘Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a

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