Politics, News and Public Opinion
Politics is one subject that everyone can agree upon as being a ‘touchy’ one where it is probably best not to bring up in social situations since everyone has their own opinion and viewpoints. I know from personal experience not to bring up the topic on politics when my family is around which can sometimes lead to a heated debate, or whenever I did recruitment for my sorority and they tell us this is one conversation that should not be brought up which makes totally sense. I was never really involved with politics until my junior year of highschool when we had to watch debates and do certain things to earn points for AP Gov. and when taking Political Comm last year it really boosted my memory of the terms and concepts we have learned about this week.
Given that we just elected a new president and had one of the highest voter turnouts in a long time, my artifact for this week is the Election Poll Map of the 2020 presidential election of Joe Biden and Donald Trump. The reason why I selected this as my artifact is that it deals with two of the main topics discussed in this week’s lecture, which are Spiral of Silence and Game Schema Theory.
The way this poll tracker relates to Spiral of Silence is by influencing people on who to vote for based on seeing how other states are voting for a certain candidate. When you first see the map of the US it has different color shades to see which states are all Democratic, Republican, or in between where it has the possibility to go one way or another. In lecture Professor Davis strongly repeated this definition of “people in an issue minority less likely to voice opinion” (Davis). This quote proves that once the American people see that other people in their state are voting in favor of someone else it can cause that one person to feel like a minority. In relation to Game Schema Theory, this is mainly focused on who is ahead of the ‘game’ and why so many journalists focus on the election map results during this time. With the uproar of media and television, it is a lot easier for the American people to gain information about current elections and who is winning or losing because almost everyone has access to a TV, smartphones, radio, etc. Seeing how come election time this all over the news because people have a natural competitive edge and use this time as a ‘game’ to prove that they are better than the other person.
An article written by Aalberg et. al, dive deeper into the idea of Game Schema Theory and how it is “marked by features such as winning and losing as the central concern and a focus on how candidates or parties are doing in opinion polls” (Aalberg et. al). Including that the effects of this outcome negatively impact a voter’s decision. Constantly seeing an election poll map does have the power to cause a change in someone’s point of view of a certain candidate or person since they view this as a ‘game’ and compete to win it all.
To wrap all this up it is clear to see that our current use of technology and being able to live track election poll numbers for everyone to see can influence a voter’s choice. Using the Spiral of Silence in influencing how people can feel like they are in a minority just based off of a picture online, and reports and candidates using this media as a ‘game’ piece to further their chances of winning. In my opinion, I feel like this is something that will continue for the time being since it is such an easy way for someone to check and see who is winning or losing. The messages that come from this also affect us because when you hear someone talk about who they are voting for and it’s against your views then it causes some conflict between you two because each of you will feel like either you are right and they are wrong or vise versa. Overall, politics will be a tough subject to bring up and it’s best to know when it is the right time or place.
Aalberg, T., Strömbäck, J., & De Vreese, C. H. (2011). The framing of politics as strategy and game: A review of concepts, operationalizations and key findings. The Framing of Politics as Strategy and Game: A Review of Concepts, Operationalizations and Key Findings, 163–174. Retrieved March 16, 2021, from http://jonathanstray.com/papers/The%20framing%20of%20politics.pdf
Tsfati, Y., & Walter, N. (2019). The World of News and Politics. The World of News and Politics, 36–46.
