Yellow Journalism In The Early 1900s

Yellow Journalism is the use of sensationalized and exaggerated reporting by newspapers or magazines to attract Readers (Ch 18. section 2). The writers would make the stories a lot worse than what it really was. People did not respond well to what they were reading.Two journalist, William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer, sparked war with their embroidered and overblown articles, that poisoned the mind of Americans. so while the journalist instilled a false sense of

Sinclair 's The Jungle is one of the most important examples of early twentieth century muckraker journalism, muckrakers sought to expose the corruption within business and government. Journalist did this by publishing articles and books often describing in

In the Progressive Era, influential journalists wanted to expose the government and big business of their flaws to American citizens with using factual and proven evidence against them. Muckrakers, who are journalists that seek out the truth of corruption among the government and business leaders, became well known due to how many people were amazed by the revealed injustices and dishonesty in the

Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle was published in 1906 and was an eye-opening revelation of the workingman’s experience in the Chicago stockyards. Sinclair describes the horrible work conditions the workers endured and the unsanitary ways in which the meat was made and processed. Sinclair uses an immigrant family from Lithuania to help bring attention to the hardships and unfairness that the working class had to go through.

According to the Merriam Webster Dictionary a muckraker is someone who “searches out and publicly exposes real or apparent misconduct of a prominent individual or business” (“Muckraker”). During the 1890s to the 1920s, muckrakers were a group of American journalists who exposed the corruption in society and informed the public about important social issues. The term muckraker originally came around when President Roosevelt gave a speech about reporters who exposed political and corporate corruption ("Who Are the Muckrakers?”). There have been so many muckrakers in American history whose works have been the cause of new laws and changes; some of the most important and famous of these muckrakers were Upton Sinclair, Samuel Hopkins Adams, and Jacob Riis.

Upton Sinclair is one of the most well known muckrakers from the Progressive Era(1890-1920). He was a writer who wrote about 100 books and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1943. In 1904 he was sent to Chicago by the socialist newspaper,Appeal to Reason,to expose the meatpacking industry and created it into a novel called The Jungle. According to “Upton Sinclair's The Jungle:Muckraking the Meat-Packing Industry” it states, ‘“Almost as an afterthought, Sinclair included a chapter on how diseased, rotten, and contaminated meat products were processed, doctored by chemicals, and mislabeled for sale to the public. He wrote that workers would process dead, injured, and diseased animals after regular hours when no meat inspectors were around. He explained how pork fat and beef scraps were canned and labeled as "potted chicken."’ This is what Sinclair would write about in The Jungle. It became very

The term caught on, and many journalists were proud to be considered muckrakers. Muckrakers presented problems to the American public in such a way as to invoke moral outrage and prompt citizens to take action (Click, n.d.) The term was meant to be highly derogatory, it became very

     While the works of Upton Sinclair are not widely read today because of their primacy of social change rather than aesthetic pleasure, works like The Jungle are important to understand in relation to the society that produced them.  Sinclair was considered a part of the muckraking era, an era when social critics observed all that was wrong and corrupt in business and politics and responded against it.  The Jungle was written primarily as a harsh indictment of wage slavery, but its vivid depictions of the deplorable lack of sanitation involved in the meatpacking industry in Chicago resulted in public outrage to the point where Congress passed the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection

Thesis Statement: Upton Sinclair was a muckraker who wrote, “The Jungle”, which exposed the problems of the meatpacking industry.

Muckrakers - the name given to writers during the Progressive Age who investigated and reported on and exposed corruption, abuse of power, and injustices. They were very influential writers who wanted attention from Congress to remedy the issues they wrote about. They provided accurate details. Because of muckraking Acts and laws were passed to help the people. Ida Turbell,Jacob Riis, and Upton Sinclair are known for being muckrakers. Muckraking ended between the years 1910 and

The early 1900s marked the rise of investigative journalism. Articles exposing corruption and greed within the government and businesses were extremely popular among the American people. In Theodore Roosevelt’s speech, “The Man with the Muck-rake,” he explains his thoughts and position on the pros and cons of muckrakers. Roosevelt demonstrates why the job of a muckraker is necessary in society, but also discusses how playing fast and loose with the facts can be an evil act that leads to damaged reputations and false misconducts. Through the use of metaphor, repetition, and enthymeme, he is able to convey to the audience exactly where he stands on the topic of investigative journalism.

Jessica Mitford, investigative journalist, believes that muckraking is a n act of “searching out and publicly exposing real or apparent misconduct of a prominent individual or business.” However, this is not always the case. Whilst it is true that they (the media) go out to expose events that could be potentially dangerous, they are often trying to grasp at straws that may not even exist.

During the late 19th Century yellow journalism was a popular way for publishers to sell newspapers. Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst would use the sensational reporting known as yellow journalism, that all started with a cartoon character, to drive profit-selling headlines. This all started with a cartoonist named Richard F. Outcault and his cartoon strip called Hogan’s Alley, his cartoon strip was very popular with Pulitzer’s newspaper, New York World. To drive sales Hearst hired the cartoonist to work for his newspaper and a bidding war soon ensued. This battle would coin the term yellow journalism, due to Outcault’s character “the Yellow Kid”. Due to the fierce bidding war between Pulitzer and Hearst the term yellow journalism

Yellow journalism was a major issue in the late 1890s during the Spanish-American War. The purpose of yellow journalism is to use headlines and report sensational events that draws the attention of the audience in order to sell more newspapers, even if the facts used were not legitimate. Yellow journalism came to an end with the development of objective journalism, which reports facts that are not biased. With the rise of social media, yellow journalism and “fake news” are making a comeback and becoming a “norm” in modern society. The rise of social media is contributing to the amount of yellow journalism and fake news that is occurring, which is ultimately leading to party polarization.

Mass media has the power to manipulate millions of minds of masses. Over 82% of Americans receive their news from TV sources and about 62% of them use cable networks, such as Fox News, CNN etc., as the source to gain knowledge about current events occurring across the nation or the world. Since the majority of Americans get news from the cable TV sources, it is important for them to give an accurate report without any bias. Since last two years, racial issues in United States have revived. Many accuse media, especially Fox news and CNN, of fueling these issues with their bias approach to the problem. (American Press Institute). Fox news is the cable TV channel targeted towards conservative, right-wing, Americans and CNN proclaims itself to be neither liberal nor conservative. Because these news channels have the ability and power to control the minds of millions of Americans, I am disappointed by their bias in reporting similar incidents involving different races. Fox news showed their bias approach towards racial issues by showing the difference in their report describing the white and black violent protestors. Fox news called Baltimore rioters thugs and criminals but described the pumpkin festival rioters as an unruly crowd. CNN described a group of ranchers taking over a federal building and threaten violence if removed, as a peaceful armed protest. At last, both stations showed minimal to no coverage of million-man march, which was one of the largest peaceful