I decided to go back to the stories that were going around during this past spring. As you all know, our university featured a Springfest that ended up in a riot. I chose two university articles (JMU & UVA) and one random media article from NowPublic.com.
In the article by JMU’s The Breeze, it stated more than 30 arrests, a stabbing, extensive property damage, and injured police & partygoers were due to the riot. More than 8,000 people appeared at the event, compared the approximate 2,000 people that normally attend. The Breeze stated as officers approached the riot, they threw grenades of tear gas at the crowd of more than 1,000, focusing on those people who were still loitering at 6:45 p.m. It also stated that some partygoers were sprayed with pepper spray or hit with rubber bullets and beanbags. The article then goes on to express Lt. Boshart’s one sided opinion about the riot. Towards the end of the article, it includes a mixed responses section where people stated their experiences during the riot. One of the student’s named Laura claimed that the police presence is what stopped the bottle throwing, whereas others believed that the police presence worsened the situation.
In the article by NowPublic, it stated that a large crowd of approximately 8,000 people near JMU turned into a full-scale riot when normally the party draws about 4,000 party-goers. Local police reported rioters throwing bottles and rocks at police, so they were forced to use pepper spray and tear gas in attempt to bring the riot to a halt. The NowPublic articles brought up at 30 people were arrested and several were injured by broken glass. This article stated that the riot was most likely started by people from out of town and that Facebook may have led to the large crowd that attended.
In the article by UVA’s The Cavalier Daily, it states first off that 20 to 30 people were arrested. They mention that the party normally sees in-between 1,000 to 2,000 attendants. The article then goes on to say that people were throwing and and bottles at each other and then throwing bottles at houses. Due to the riot, dumpsters were set on fire, and car windows were shattered. The Cavalier Daily then went on to say that it was possible that the presence of the police officers who were fully dressed in riot gear could have provoked more violence. A couple people were mentioned in the article that mentioned their views of the riot and one person stated, “It’s sad that the actions of a few people can affect the image of the university.”
From reading all of these articles, they seemed to all have the same story line about the riot outbreak here at JMU and how people were throwing bottles, and damaging property. All three articles seemed to show no bias from the author, although some of the people interviewed did express their viewpoints.
Even though they all had the same story line, they all included different details and facts, which may have been due to the authors excluding or exaggerating the truth. One thing I noticed that was different about the articles was that they all didn’t have exact numbers for those people who got arrested. In the Cavalier Daily article, it stated that 20 to 30 people were arrested. This clearly shows to me that they probably heard a lot of their information by word of mouth that traveled to the University of Virginia. The two other articles stated that up to 30+ people were arrested. Also, they all stated that approximately 8,000 people attended Springfest, but the NowPublic mentioned that the normal attendance was about 4,000 while the other articles stated the approximate normal attendance was about 2,000 or lower. Some else different was that the NowPublic article said the rioters threw rocks at the police officers. None of the other stories mentioned students throwing rocks, so it may be that the NowPublic article made up some of its information to make their story stick out. The two other articles only mentioned rioters throwing things like beer bottles.
I can conclude that the Breeze article is the most factual article because its news is from within the radius of JMU. None of the information had to travel far to be reported. Also, the Breeze included a lot of details and facts that I am familiar with because I myself was an attendant of the Springfest(but didn’t take part in the riot). If someone wanted a good factual story about the riot, they should read the Breeze. The last articles I would turn to for information about Springfest would be NowPublic and the Cavalier Daily because their information seems to be thrown together. Information had to travel to these places, and when you think about it, the truth normally doesn’t get too far before it’s flip-flopped around.
From doing 3 story comparison, I saw that even though the storylines are the same, but the details and facts within them tend to always be different.
Personally I didn't read anything about what happened at spingfest and all the information that I received was from other people. I found that all the articles were biased and due to that fact that there is so much information that was not available when the event first transpired the facts were skewed some. As you stated with every story sometimes the main points are the same but the details are different.
ReplyDeleteGreat analysis Tyrone!
ReplyDeleteI never read one thing about springfest. I was out of town when it happened and I got all of my information about the incident from professors, other students, and from watching the youtube videos. But I know I had relatives from Texas and California calling me asking about the riots and they had such crazy information about people dying and cops shooting students. So I am not sure what news source they had access to but that just shows how information gets changed as the story travels. But I agree that if you want the facts of the story, the news source that actually did the reporting on the subject has to be the most accurate.
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