Fake News and Satire: Annotated Bibliography

TV shows like John Stewart, the Daily Show brings attention to how effective the use of satire in The Daily Show is and the positive political effect it has on people. Some people might define political satire as something you gain entertainment, some also might define it as something used with subversive intent, where political speech and dissent are forbidden by the government. TV shows like the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, the Colbert Report, and Saturday night live are prime examples of satire. Satire is being used for current political events and other events in a comedic and humorous tone to prove its effectiveness and they prove just that. Recent research has proven not only how effective the use of satire is but many authors and writers proved that as well. This research discusses the impact satire has on people's views on political issues and how much people rather watch television shows like the Daily Show talk because it educates them as well as entertain them. It shows the impact comedy shows have on popular culture today. They are tuning in more on recent elections and political issues. Comedians like John Stewart, The Daily Show segment “Catching Racism” gives you this image of how satirical expression helps encourage people to comment on real controversial issues and the image they are trying to give their intended audience. Also, it proves the values the communities have on fake news.

In the Daily Show's recent segment “Catching Racism” the author Jon Stewart effectively convince the emotional appeal of how his audience people learn more about political issues and other real controversial issues to get a better understanding of things. The Daily Show segment “Catching Racism” uses satire to show people how wrong it is to use native culture for mascots and logos being used in today’s football. The short clip from The Daily Show shows an enormous amount of satirical expression being used as a rhetorical choice seen in the clip to prove their point. Satire is the use of humorous and joking expressions or freedom of speech.

In this segment, the author Jon Jones gives the audience a view on how you can take a serious topic, turn it into something that will entertain people, and get a debate out of them. Debates that turn into a real discussion where people of different opinions, change their opinion within the discussion. Jones comically gives you something so serious and sensitive and makes it be more humorous to lighten the audience's mood up so they won't feel so uncomfortable with talking about real issues like racism and he did just that. The short clip of The Daily Show shows two groups of people being interviewed by Jones. One group was the Redskin fans and the other group was the native activists. They talk about how Washington's Redskins' and how the name should be changed because it's very degrading and racist to the Native Americans. These groups were given an opportunity to explain their opinions on what they think about this particular topic and what can be done to change how people view things. Actually, think about things, and come to a perspective on showing some emotional appeals to the situation. Throughout the interview, there were tons of examples showing the rhetorical use of satire.

During the interview, the segment had tons of examples that were seen in the short clip. One example was when one of the natives spoke about 'The Annenberg' report. He said, 'It was conducted in Pennsylvania by self-identifying indigenous people, which means it could have been anyone of the streets that say, oh my great great great grandmother was a Cherokee Princess” followed by him saying “come on who would do that?”(4:08-4:19) as seen in the next clip, Redskins fan doing just that. The Redskin fans respond to that by saying “My great great grandfather was full blood Cherokee” and Jones asks, well “Show of hands, who has Cherokee? Any native Americans”.(4:22-4:26) The whole group of Redskin fans raised their hands as high as they can, to prove that in some form or way they were partially Cherokee. It was funny to the audience because they knew that was a lie.

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Another example would be during the interview, when one of the natives said, 'Redskins is a bounty' and follow by that another native says, 'It meant proof of Indian kill.” Jones responded with “Well when you put it like that, it sounds terrible.”(2:29-2:35) With this hilarious expression on his face, where he didn’t think of something in that way and now that he rethinks on it, his perspective changed. The Daily Show has a ton of credibility that shows the satirical side of this segment and how you can take something important and turn it to be comical. That’s the whole point of The Daily Show and their whole concept for this segment. Jones doesn't want people to feel attacked while talking about a serious controversial topic like racism.

Amarnath Amarasingam the Stewart/Colbert Effect discusses the issues in politics and how using satire to bring entertainment and comedy gives the audience a much more effective way to understand the significance of political communication. This book gives an economic and social view of how today's pop culture views politics and how using sartorial expression is becoming more helpful for people to understand the real issues of the political world. An example of that would be “The Daily Show is both tentative and preliminary. We offer it as a way to encourage a broader discussion of how to analyze and hold accountable the expanding range of media which provide political information to Americans.” (pg.191) this relates to my thesis because it expands television by making it more in-depth, analyzing the important issues in a creative and hilarious way. Another example connecting to my thesis would be “There is reason to believe that The Daily Show in some ways does better than many traditional sources of political information” said, Amarasingam (pg. 191) proving how effective the use of satire in The Daily Show is and the positive political effect it has on people.

The sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live is another example show that gives you Fake news on real political issues comically. In Outi Hakola's Saturday Night Live article “Political Impersonations on Saturday Night Live during the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election” published in the European Journal of American studies in 2016, platforms the use of impersonating and joking about political views influences communities to see the whole point of the humor is to have a decisive impact on political issues. The article describes how satire is used for crises and the main reason they use it is to help improve humanity by criticizing its follies and Imperfection. Hakola argues how important it is to use satire and how communities are now getting more involved in political issues and actually acknowledging the value of it all. Hakola proves that by saying, “exposing communities to political satirical use provokes the negative emotion to disappear, which give these communities a political reason to participate.” This relates to my thesis because it talks about the effects it has on these communities and young pop culture today. My research shows a great number of examples to prove just that. Joking about political topics puts pressure on misinformation on issues and gives communities valid purposes to go out and do more, like taking part in elections or political discussions as well as marching and giving people your opinion on events and things that happen worldwide. Another proven point to my research would be how “It gives the communities motivation to want to know more about different political controversial issues” said, Hakola. Manifest that using satire to get a message through to communities does impact them in many ways.

Getting the communities in tune with government/political issues has always been something very important. People like Joanna Doona whose article 'Political comedy engagement: Identity and community construction' discusses communities and political issues on how satire is used in today's pop culture. Doona's article gives you an insight into how influential comedians can be. Comedians intend to use a positive effect to get their point across by using satire. It also discusses the role of these satirical news shows and how it puts a positive effect on the public. Doona's article expresses the values the communities have on fake news. This article relates to my thesis because of its relevance to my primary source on how pop culture focuses more on fake news than real news.

Sarah Burton's “More than Entertainment: The role of satirical News in Dissent Deliberation and Democracy” article deliberate how significant satirical is when it comes down to a debate or discussion on politics. It discusses the impact and how much people talk about recent elections and political issues. Burton argues on how it helped encourage people to comment on real controversial issues and the image they are trying to give their intended audience. This relates to my thesis because it gives specific detail about its effective use of satire and how it helps people feel compatible enough to comment on political discussion.