Exploitation of a Human life.

Since becoming a student at the Gaylord college, I have learned a lot about what the word "journalism" means. My definition no longer consists of writing stories in the newspaper and doing on camera interviews. Its a much broader version of what I thought. Multimedia journalism is taught along with public relations and advertisement-and they all find their counterpart in each other. A very important aspect I have learned from all my classes is portrayal of a person or an event. When writing personal interest stories or profiles, we always have to remember what light we are placing the person in. Public relations is all about keeping up a certain image and advertisements aim to appeal to certain publics. However, an important aspect of the media is exploitation. Where is the line drawn between hard news with entertainment value and the exploitation of another life. The media spends and earns an insane amount of money each year feeding the publics about high profile celebrities, political figures, etc. When does the job of a media professional compromise morals or compassion. This brings me to a point I am trying to make..

The recent death of Michael Jackson has covered television, tabloids, radio-basically any kind of media ever since Thursday when he was pronounced dead. While tributes, record sales and feature stories are very important to remember this man by-we have to remember that is what he was. A man, with a family and children and a fast. He was no doubt one of the most influential musicians of all time. He broke barriers, not only racially but musically. He was talented to no end and there is no doubt his music will play years after he is now gone. However, how fair is the exploitation he endured during his lifetime? We all know about the Michael Jackson court cases, but now after his death we learn all of his personal details about his debt, his prescription drug use, etc. The media is making money off of someone else's personal struggle. Where is the justification in the breach of his privacy. Would anyone of us want our messy lives-because we all have them- splattered on internet and paper after we are dead? Is it because he is famous that the media feels they owe the public? Michael Jackson, like I said, was a man with a family. To see papers say he is "worth more dead than alive" based on his recent debt problems is dehumanizing to his death. 

I have always been a Perez Hilton fan, until now. If you do not know who he is, Hilton is a blogger that focuses on celebrities ups and downs in life. If you read this article (at the bottom is Hilton's scandal) it shows the exploitation of a celebrity first hand and is the backlash to Hilton's comments about Jackson's death

http://mashable.com/2009/06/25/perez-hilton-michael-jackson/