Which Bad News to Choose? The Influence of Race and Social Identity on Story Selections Within Negative News Contexts

2019 ◽  
Vol 97 (3) ◽  
pp. 644-662
Author(s):  
Lanier Frush Holt ◽  
Dustin Carnahan
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Racial Group ◽  
Bad News ◽  
Media Environment ◽  
The Past ◽  
Negative News ◽  
Group Members ◽  
Media Choices

This study provides a clearer understanding of how audience members’ race influences their media choices. It finds that in today’s overwhelmingly negative media environment, people prefer reading negative stories about persons in their own racial group over stories about racial out-group members. This suggests social movements seeking to change the attitudes of people of different races using media (e.g., Black Lives Matter) might not be as successful as those in the past (e.g., Civil Rights Movement). Today, people tend to ignore such news when there is other bad news that affects people in their own racial group.

scholarly journals When we enjoy bad news about other groups: A social identity approach to out-group schadenfreude

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 214-232 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaap W. Ouwerkerk ◽  
Wilco W. van Dijk ◽  
Charlotte C. Vonkeman ◽  
Russell Spears
Keyword(s):  
Social Identity ◽  
Social Identity Theory ◽  
Emotional Response ◽  
Group Identification ◽  
Negative Word ◽  
Bad News ◽  
Coalition Government ◽  
News Reports ◽  
Negative News ◽  
Social Identity Approach

Two studies investigate schadenfreude (pleasure at the misfortune of others) as an emotional response to news about out-group misfortunes in a political and consumer context by analyzing reactions of voters for opposition parties to the downfall of a Dutch coalition government (Study 1), and of BlackBerry users to negative news reports about Apple’s iPhone (Study 2). Consistent with social identity theory and intergroup emotion theory, both studies demonstrate that affective in-group identification increases schadenfreude reactions to news about an out-group’s misfortune, provided that this misfortune occurs in a domain of interest to news recipients. Additional findings show that this interaction effect attenuates when a misfortune instead befalls the in-group (Study 1) and is still observed when controlling for affective dispositions towards the out-group (Study 2). Moreover, results suggest that schadenfreude reactions strengthen subsequent intentions to share news about the out-group’s misfortune with others or to engage in negative word-of-mouth (Study 2).

Foundational Invocations

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angélica Maria Bernal
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Radical Change ◽  
Tea Party ◽  
Founding Fathers ◽  
Normative Authority ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Us ◽  
Constitutional Thought

This chapter examines appeals to the authority of original founding events, founding ideals, and Founding Fathers in contemporary constitutional democracies. It argues that these “foundational invocations” reveal a window into the unique, albeit underexamined function that foundings play: as a vehicle of persuasion and legitimation. It organizes this examination around two of the most influential visions of founding in the US tradition: the originalist, situated in the discourses of conservative social movements such as the Tea Party and in conservative constitutional thought; and the promissory, situated in the discourses of social movements such as the civil rights movement. Though they might appear radically dissimilar, this chapter illustrates how these two influential conceptualizations of founding together reveal a shared political foundationalism that conflates the normative authority of a regime for its de facto one, thus circumscribing radical change by obscuring the past and placing founding invocations and their actors beyond question.

The Science and Law of School Segregation and Diversity

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger J.R. Levesque
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Legal System ◽  
Ethnic Disparities ◽  
School Segregation ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
The Past ◽  
Legal Foundation ◽  
The Law ◽  
The One

The law does not square with people’s experiences of segregation and diversity. An empirical look at the legal system’s effectiveness in addressing school segregation reveals, from a practical perspective, that segregation persists and even surpasses levels before the civil rights movement. Yet, the legal system continues as though segregation is a thing of the past. Even more bizarre, the negative effects of racial and ethnic disparities in schooling are well documented, and the legal system compels itself to ignore much of them. To exacerbate matters, legal analysts increasingly interpret the law as a system that operates in a different world than the one documented by researchers who describe disparities and what could be done about them. For their part, researchers pervasively continue to document experiences without considering the legal system’s basic concerns. This book details the source of these gaps, evaluates their empirical and legal foundation, explains why they persist, and reveals what can be done about them.

scholarly journals The Meanings of Black Power: A Comparison of White and Black Interpretations of a Political Slogan

1970 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 367-388 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel D. Aberbach ◽  
Jack L. Walker
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Racial Discrimination ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Black Power ◽  
Public Life ◽  
Civil Rights Organizations ◽  
The Past ◽  
Black Protest ◽  
True Meaning ◽  
American Cities

Angry protests against racial discrimination were a prominent part of American public life during the 1960's. The decade opened with the sit-ins and freedom rides, continued through Birmingham, Selma, and the March on Washington, and closed with protests in hundreds of American cities, often punctuated by rioting and violence. During this troubled decade the rhetoric of protest became increasingly demanding, blanket charges of pervasive white racism and hostility were more common, and some blacks began to actively discourage whites from participating either in protest demonstrations or civil rights organizations. Nothing better symbolized the changing mood and style of black protest in America than recent changes in the movement's dominant symbols. Demonstrators who once shouted “freedom” as their rallying cry now were shouting “black power”—a much more provocative, challenging slogan.The larger and more diverse a political movement's constituency, the more vague and imprecise its unifying symbols and rallying cries are likely to be. A slogan like black power has no sharply defined meaning; it may excite many different emotions and may motivate individuals to express their loyalty or take action for almost contradictory reasons. As soon as Adam Clayton Powell and Stokely Carmichael began to use the phrase in 1966 it set off an acrimonious debate among black leaders over its true meaning. Initially it was a blunt and threatening battle cry meant to symbolize a break with the past tactics of the civil rights movement.

Civil Wrongs and Religious Liberty

1994 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-86
Author(s):  
Steven Yates ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Affirmative Action ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Equal Opportunity ◽  
Religious Liberty ◽  
American Founding ◽  
The Past ◽  
Civil Rights Movements

The civil rights movement has broken away from its religious roots which once provided it firm support and, indeed, it has become a threat to those roots. In fact, the past thirty years evidence two civil rights movements. The original civil rights movement promoted equal opportunity and presupposed a constrained vision of human possibilities compatible with Christianity, The revised civil rights agenda, which had replaced it by 1971, promoted preferential policies dubbed "affirmative action" based on an unconstrained vision incompatible with both Christianity and the American founding. The most visible threat to religious liberty is the expansion of civil rights protections to include homosexuals despite the overwhelming rejection of homosexuality as a lifestyle by the majority of Americans, including Christians.

The Past & Future of American Civil Rights

Daedalus ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 140 (2) ◽  
pp. 37-54 ◽  
Author(s):  
Douglas S. Massey
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
The United States ◽  
Racial Formation ◽  
First Century ◽  
Present Moment ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
The Past ◽  
Two Generations ◽  
American Society

Although American society will not become race-blind anytime soon, the meaning of race is changing, and processes of racial formation now are quite different than those prevailing just two generations ago. Massey puts the present moment in historical perspective by reviewing progress toward racial equality through successive historical epochs, from the colonial era to the age of Obama. He ends by exploring the contours of racial formation in the United States today, outlining a program for a new civil rights movement in the twenty-first century.

scholarly journals Post Slavery and the Plight of Black Americans: An Analysis of Langston Hughes’ “Not without Laughter”

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (Issue 3) ◽  
pp. 37-42
Author(s):  
Christopher Ncube ◽  
Alice Dhliwayo
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
Alice Walker ◽  
Langston Hughes ◽  
The Past ◽  
Talented Tenth ◽  
The Usa ◽  
The Government ◽  
To Receive

This paper discussed the lives of black Americans in the Post Slavery period. It was believed that black Americans who were former slaves were then free from being treated brutally by the slave masters and that the whipping of the so called offenders was a thing of the past. On the contrary, Black Americans were not free to receive education, have access to legal marriages, own properties and enjoy all other benefits that an American should enjoy. Life after slavery was still difficult. The reality was that black Americans were free only in a narrow sense as they were still discriminated by the government institutions. This gave rise to activism and movements such as Civil Rights Movement and Black Power Movement. Great Black scholars, The Talented Tenth, such as Alice Walker, Du Bois, and Langston Hughes emerged. Not without Laughter is one of the books that Langston Hughes wrote. This paper is an analysis of civil injustices that Black Americans had to endure according to Hughes in Not without Laughter. Today, the situation has not changed much as racism is still rampant as depicted by violence still perpetrated against the Blacks. The rise of the Black Lives Matter Movement worldwide against the death of Floyd in the USA gives evidence to such. One encouraging aspect, though, is that the current President, Joe Biden is against racism as he has ordered that those that killed Floyd should face the full wrath of the law.

A Political Companion to James Baldwin

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
James Baldwin ◽  
The Political ◽  
Individual Experience ◽  
Race And Gender ◽  
The Past ◽  
Political Implications ◽  
And Gender

In this text, a group of prominent scholars assesses James Baldwin’s relevance to present-day political challenges. Together, they address Baldwin as a democratic theorist, activist, and citizen, examining his writings on the civil rights movement, religion, homosexuality, and women’s rights. They investigate the ways in which his work speaks to and galvanizes a collective American polity, and explore his views on the political implications of individual experience in relation to race and gender. This volume not only considers Baldwin’s works within their own historical context, but also applies the author’s insights to recent events such as the Obama presidency and the Black Lives Matter movement, emphasizing his faith in the connections between the past and present. These incisive essays will encourage a new reading of Baldwin that celebrates his significant contributions to political and democratic theory.

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