i^_cc[ho - Teens in Print

Photo by: Leon WhitseyAs a single mother coming out of adomestic violence situation, I wouldlike to provide a better future for my 2-year-old son, Abraham. I do not want toworry about where we are going to liveor how we are going to survive. I wantto do something I am passionate about,something that makes a difference in theworld and the lives of others, and mostimportant, something that will make a differencein my son’s life. This is the reasonI am aiming to go to college. I want to bea good role model for Abraham. I do notjust want to tell him to be a successfulperson. I want to show him, by doing itmyself.I grew up in Venezuela surrounded bypoverty. I remember how difficult it wasto survive. I watched my mother struggleto take care of her family and I saw howhard it was because she had no education.It broke her heart when my brothersstopped going to school in order to helpmake ends meet at home. I will not allowthe same thing to happen to me. Or toAbraham.I am proud to be the first one from myfamily to graduate from high school andgo onto college and I know my family willbe very proud to see me achieve my academicgoals and a college degree.I am passionate about education.Knowledge brings wisdom and a senseof responsibility into a person’s life. Themore educated a person is, the moreaware a person becomes of issues in theworld. Going to college is a way to learnwhat issues affect our society and whatwe can do to help. This is why attendingcollege is vital for me.[PREZ CANDIDATES, FROM PAGE 1]climate, and tells mostpeople, teens included,everything they knowabout politics and politicians.Of course, thismeans media has a hugeeffect on the knowledgeof the average Americanand on the way she orhe votes. Media hasshaped much of thedissatisfaction youngpeople feel with the currentadministration. Witha presidential electioncoming up, it’s importantto examine the effect themedia will have on theNovember race for theWhite House.Media coverage ofthe presidential race isless focused on issuesand more on candidates,according to MelissaThreadgill, director ofcommunications forMassEquality, who spokewith T.i.P. in a recentphone interview. “Theydon’t spend nearly asmuch time on the actualissues. They cover theraces in terms of campaigns,not substance.”With cameras presenteverywhere the candidatestravel, media imag-Artwork by: Artists for Humanityes play an important rolein the way a candidate is perceived, and actual issues seemto be placed on the back burner when compared with howa candidate looks on TV. Television made this the new realityin 1960, when the public saw a handsome, calm JohnF. Kennedy debate a nervous, sweaty Richard Nixon. Theelection went to Kennedy; many believe the media has hada huge influence on politics ever since.“The media’s portrayal of presidential candidates, or anyperson of political power, has always been a way of distorting[them] into images that the public either wants ordoesn’t want,” says Zach Page, 17, of Boston.This kind of publicity is comparable to the publicitygiven to someone like Britney Spears. Even with her nameall over the tabloids, the sales of her latest album weredisappointing in comparison to her former efforts. Thiscan happen in politics, too. In 2004, when former Vermontgovernor Howard Dean became overzealous during one ofhis presidential campaign speeches and made an unusualnoise during his speech, the cameras caught it and playedit frequently, until it essentially ended his shot to be theDemocratic nominee.Threadgill says because the media is always there,“Things like that happen in any race and these things getmagnified. [Candidates] gain more attention. People hearmore about them.” And when media is present, all publicitydoes not turn out to be good.The media can create a mold of someone’s identity withouttheir control, but candidates, like pop stars, can usethe cameras to their advantage. When Spears wants to sellperfume, she shoots a commercial and makes sure it isaired on heavy rotation on several TV channels. Candidatesdo the same thing, buying heavy blocks of advertisementsso they can criticize their opponents. Some candidates choosenot to run negative campaigns but they are in the minority.Another component of media’s effect on politics is pollingand publishing the results. “[The media] focuses on what’sknown as the horse race, or who’s up in the polls,” saysThreadgill. But sometimes the polls are wrong. For example,polls predicted that Hillary Clinton would lose the NewHampshire primary, but she ended up winning. When Clintonabandoned her usually stoic persona and began to cry whilethe cameras were rolling, pundits were sure it would cost herthe primary.“The first major piece of media that was involved was whenClinton had her sensitive moment,” says Derrick Jackson,columnist with The Boston Globe, who has covered the campaignsof many presidential candidates during his career.Despite the media’s power, people tend to be more affectedby meeting candidates or attending their speeches. “For manypeople, the deal was sealed by the last candidate they saw. Themore that there is human contact, the less often that someone’spre-set stereotypes come into play,” says Jackson.The catch, of course, is that most people don’t end up meetingcandidates in person. The impression voters have of candidatesis formed mostly by their media image.As in the entertainment world, where everything we knowabout celebrities is based on what the media captures, adultsand teens who follow politics are growing more dependent onthe media for information.i.