Blog #3 - Marketplace of Ideas

The “marketplace of ideas”, or discovery of truth, was originally created to make sense of the freedom of speech amendment when it came to the truth. John Milton said, "when truth and falsehood are allowed to freely grapple, truth will win out. And the grappling makes the truth even stronger.” 

In today’s world smartphones, digital technology, and social media have made it easy to obtain access to information and news at anytime. Smartphones have also made it easy for prejudice cultural biases to impact the news and information that is put out into the digital world. John Milton believed that nobody knew the real truth. He thought that no singular idea embodies the truth. Throughout his life, Milton was convinced that the free competition of ideas was the best way to differentiate true from false. 

There are many examples of how people or companies have used fact checks to spread real information. One present day example of this is the information spread about the Covid-19 pandemic. There is so much information on digital media websites and apps about the pandemic including monitored and fact-checked information. Along with the fact-checked information, there is also a lot of misinformation out there. Misinformation and the ability to change things online can negatively alter what freedom of speech is supposed to stand for. One example of this is some Wikipedia pages that are available for anyone to edit. Many people look for fact-checked information when they are searching for the best answers to their questions. 

Another example of this can be seen when we look back on the most recent presidential election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden. Debates between the two candidates were broadcasted live on TV and Radio stations in order to help voters hear the opinions and ideas of both candidates. Every year, the presidential debates have a huge impact on how the election goes and how the voters view the candidates. The candidates of these debates proclaim information that has been fact-checked to ensure what they are saying is correct. After the debate, many people watching posted to social media apps backing up their favored candidate even if he was relaying false information. As John Milton said, “when truth and falsehood are allowed to freely grapple, truth will win out”.

The dictionary definition of freedom of speech is - “the right to express any opinions without censorship or restraint”. If information has to be fact-checked to be believable, how can we really have freedom of speech? This ties back to Milton’s belief of the truth, and it can also be tied greatly to social media. How does the first amendment protect us on social media? On social media apps, like Twitter and Instagram, people can - for the most part - post or say whatever they want due to the first amendment. 

Blog Post #2 - The U.S. Supreme Court

 The Supreme Court is the highest level court in the Judicial branch of the US government. Within the Supreme Court there is one Chief Justice and eight other Justices for a total of nine. For a person to become a Supreme Court Justice, they must be well qualified, well experienced and well educated in law. The President of the United States is charged with nominating Justices when there are vacancies in the Supreme Court, and the nominees must be approved by the US Senate. Vacancies in the court can be caused by the death, resignation or impeachment of other Justices. Once a Supreme Court Justice is confirmed, they can sit on the court for life, or unless they retire or resign. I learned that one of the main roles of the Chief Justice is to preside over the Supreme Court and set the schedule for the weekly meetings with all of the justices. After watching the video and reading the article, I found it interesting and important that the Supreme Court is expected to make sure that the American people are promised equal justice under law.

The Supreme Court will take cases that have made their way up from the lower courts due to appeals. The Supreme Court does not hear all cases that are presented to them because there are too many cases requested than can be heard by the court’s limited resources. Typically the Supreme Court will take about 80 cases per year out of the thousands of cases that are requested. I found this to be interesting. 

The Supreme Court must decide cases to the highest standard of the Constitution. Once a decision is reached, members of the court write an opinion which is reviewed and revised by other court members until they agree that it can be made public. Once a case is made public, it becomes part of Constitutional law forever.

Blog #1 - Where I Get My News

 As a 20 year old female who is attending college during a pandemic, finding quality and reliable new sources is very important to me. I like to keep up-to-date with current events that are happening in the world, and luckily there are many websites and apps today that provide updated news stories daily. A few of my most used apps for news sources are Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, Snapchat, and Spotify. 

Instagram

Instagram is a very popular app among people of all ages. Instagram is a great way to stay connected and share photos outward to friends and family whom you may not see daily. Along with a fun platform that is used to share personal photos, Instagram is also a great platform that can easily be used to find current news stories. Many news companies, like CNN, Fox News, ABC News, and more, have popular Instagram accounts that are used to post news stories and updates as they come. I personally think that it is more convient to get news from reliable Instagram accounts, like CNN, rather than watching it on television because if you have your cell phone within reach it is easy to quickly log onto Instagram and read the caption of the latest news rather than sitting through a 30-60 minute television episode. 

TikTok

Another popular app among all ages is TikTok. TikTok recently became popular around the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, with over 1 billion users, TikTok is a form of social media that produces a wide variety of information and videos. On TikTok, users are given the option to make a video between 15 seconds and 3 minutes of whatever content they would like to produce. With TikTok being such a fast growing and modern day platform, it is a great platform to obtain news from. Similar to Instagram, on TikTok there are also a variety of news companies that have accounts and share videos about current events. 

Twitter

Twitter is an application that I use daily. Along with being a funny social platform, Twitter also does a fantastic job of sharing news and keeping up with the current events that are going on in the world. On the Explore page of Twitter there is a News tab. It is easily accessible and it is updated everyday. There is also a separate tab for Covid-19 news on Twitter. I like this aspect of Twitter because it makes finding the news and current events so much easier when there is a direct tab to click. Similar to Instagram and TikTok, many news companies also have their own accounts on Twitter where they can tweet about the pressing news and current events going on. 

Snapchat

Whether you have an account or not, Snapchat is an application that almost everybody knows about. The app came out in 2011, and now it has 293 million active users daily. It is a fun platform that makes it easy to stay in touch with friends and family; however, it has also become a great source for news. Snapchat has a "Discover" tab that allows users to scroll through and find anything from fun stories to current events. It also allows users to subscribe to others Snapchat stories and turn on notifications to see when something is posted on the story. This is a great way to stay updated on current news events. 

Spotify

Another great way to stay updated with current news is by listening to podcasts or the radio. There are many podcasts that have to do with news and events going on in the world. Spotify is a great app and resource that allows users to listen to a wide variety of podcasts that are updated daily. Some great podcasts that include current news events are The Daily, Up First, and Global News Podcast. Podcasts are a great way to get news because you can listen to them from anywhere.