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2.2: Hurricanes and Agenda Control


1. What news events are being covered by major outlets as the same time as Hurricane Maria?
 Other issues were a health care bill that failed to pass, Alabama's primary elections, and Trump's argument with NFL protests.
2. Use the first chart to estimate about how many fewer times Hurricane Maria & Puerto Rico are mentioned online than the hurricanes that hit the mainland US.
It was mentioned about 5-6 times less than Hurricanes Harvey and Irma.
3. Use the second chart to estimate about how much less time was devoted to  Hurricane Maria & Puerto Rico in TV coverage than the hurricanes that hit the mainland US.
 Hurricane Maria received less than about a third of the times or Harvey and of Irma.
4. Which two networks mentioned Hurricane Maria the most?
 CNN and BBC
5. What do some cite as the reason for Puerto Rico being treated differently by the media?
 Puerto Rico is a US territory rather than a state.
6.  Given what you know about agenda control by the media, what will the impact of this news coverage be on people's attitudes about the hurricanes?
 People will not think Hurricane Maria was as destructive or urgent as Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, which were better covered.
7. Why do you think that the media spends less time covering Hurricane Maria & Puerto Rico?
 I agree with the suggestion that the territorial status of Puerto Rico is the reason that there is low coverage. While disaster does attract attention, disaster in unknown places is difficult for many people to care about, and as Puerto Rico is isolated from the contiguous United States, many people forget that it is part of the U.S. and thus care less about the people there.
8. Why would the National Society of Hispanic Journalists call for more coverage in the media?
 Puerto Rico's population is largely Hispanic.
9. What do they think the impact of more media coverage would be?
 Hopefully, more people would be concerned and call for the government to respond faster and with more aid. However, it is possible that people continue to be indifferent because they feel removed from the situation, and they choose to watch other programming instead of news about Hurricane Maria.
10. If more people thought Puerto Rico was the most important issue, why might the government respond differently than it has so far?
The government would probably have sent more aid to prevent deaths and work harder to have power restored to the island so that people can get back to their normal lives. However, the government is not always responsive to public opinion, so it is possible that the news coverage would have been discredited for scaring people and that the government response could be unchanged.

article: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-media-really-has-neglected-puerto-rico/

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