War Journalism & Ethics - Brodie Foster

Artist Statement: For the project, I'm using a film analysis alongside real-world examples and professional studies for my research. These will be compiled into a PowerPoint examining war journalism through the common good lens, justice lens, care ethics, and virtue ethics. These four bases of ethics have interested me the most throughout the course and relate heavily to discussing war journalism. While Civil War sparked my interest in war journalism, I believe that only using fictional (and often sensationalized) documentation doesn't reach the core of war journalism; it's a helpful tool to pair alongside real, genuine war journalism. However, coupling what the film presents alongside real examples gives multiple perspectives to draw a final conclusion. Also, using four distinct types of ethics helps provide a stronger final conclusion, as narrowing in on just one doesn't consider all possibilities that arise.

Journalism is everywhere. Not only in news and published articles but in social media as well. Every TikTok, Instagram post, or tweet relating to war or politics is journalism, and with consistent feeds updated daily, looking for misinformation is crucial to understanding world events. This doesn't just apply to me but to every student in our class as well. War journalism is nearly non-existent in the Christian ethics curriculum; however, it applies to everyone within the class. I hope to shed light on this topic to those willing to listen, as not only can I provide research, but that can be taken to those that students know, and so on. Media illiteracy is a serious problem in the social media age, and it's my goal to provide a thorough understanding of war journalism as an opposition to the 'all news is biased and bad' stance that many take by relating it to topics learned throughout the course.