IDEOLOGY CAN BE DEFINED AS A COLLECTION OF VALUES AND BELIEFS. TO WHAT EXTENT DO MEDIA PRODUCTS TARGET AUDIENCES BY CONSTRUCTING AN IDEOLOGICAL VIEW OF THE WORLD? YOU SHOULD REFER TO YOUR NEWSPAPER CLOSE STUDY PRODUCTS, THE I AND THE DAILY MAIL

Plan:

Intro- key terms

P1 introduce The daily mail and The i

P2 media regulation livingstone and lunt, hesmondhalgh

p3 audience has an ideology which newspaper enforcesd

In this essay I will be discussing how the CSPs of The Daily Mail and The I link to how media products target audiences by constructing a ideological view of the world. Ideology is defined as a collection of values of beliefs. I believe that The Daily Mail and The I create their ideologies through their positioning on the political compass. However to some extent the audience could be seen to influence their ideologies on the newspapers.

Firstly The Daily Mail can be seen as a right wing which supports a libertarian view in politics. This means that it fights for political freedom and minimise the states violation of individual’s liberties. These views can be seen through the Daily Mail’s edit on the 6th June where one of the headlines stated that “Only Starmer gains from this clueless plot” which suggest that Labour will gain from Conservative divisions over Boris and they are happy about this.

Further more, The Daily Mail is owned by The Daily Mail and General Trust and the current chairman is Jonathon Harmsworth. Previously, Harmsworth (Lord Rothermere) was a friend of Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler, and directed the Mail’s editorial stance towards them in the early 1930s. So showed the ideology of the Nazi party to construct an audience which were intrigued in what and why the Nazis were doing the things they were. This aimed to reach the dominated and possibly the negotiated reader as Stuart Hall would suggest because it wants to attract those who want to find out more about what was going on during the 1930’s.

Additionally, The Daily Mail also constructs an ideology of patriotism to target their audience of white, middle-class older men. This can be seen through the title of the front cover which states “joyous jubilee” showing that they are in support of the royals and proud to be apart of the celebrations and being British.

Perhaps some people may suggest that the newspaper influences their readers ideologies which can be seen when Martin Rowson created a cartoon about a van advertising The Daily Mail driving into a mosque influenced by a recent attack showing their position of their views on this attack. It implies there is a toxic relationship between the Daily Mail and the Muslim community reinforcing the ideology.

The i is horizontally intergrated with The Daily Mail and The Metro as it was brought by the Daily Mail and General Trust 29 November 2019, for £49.6 million. However, unlike The Daily Mail, it can be seen as leaning towards the left wing of the political spectrum, (the idea of neutral/ independent news is itself quite left wing). An example of their left wing views can be seen in the front cover ‘Johnson future turning toxic for Tories’ seems to be against Conservative / Boris Johnson and therefore they believe society is best served with an expanded role for the government. It is aimed at a younger audience which have the ideology that people should have freedom and more accepting of modern issues such as gay rights and transgender topics.

On the other hand, The i can be seen to not construct an ideology but instead allow it’s audience to construct their own ideology. This is enforced by the by-line for the paper which states “for open minds, there’s no left or right”. In the 2017 and 2019 UK general elections, the i chose not to endorse a political party which shows that they are not wanting to enforce an ideology upon readers and express their freedom of views.

In conclusion i do believe that both newspapers (The Daily Mail and The i) enforce their ideologies on issues such as politics, patriotism and business. However, the i is more neutral towards their viewpoints so attracts it’s audience less through the presentation of ideologies. Instead the readers approach the paper due to their ideologies. The Daily Mail’s ideology is very clear but The i’s is less clear.