Media - TV (child soldiers)

http://kr.youtube.com/watch?v=vfB7XusZb5w

TV is one of the most popular media to show world issues to people in the world. The TV show I found about child soldiers is by CNN. It doesn’t have any host or narration, it’s just showing the real video about child soldiers and how they are involving in the war as soldiers, terrorists, and murderers. All the scenes are shocking and unbelievable that how could children threaten people with guns and other weapons.
The major goal for TV, especially the news program like CNN, is delivering the information as accurate and fast as possible to audience. Therefore, one of their characteristics is not to be biased. They are just showing the issues and problems, and making the audience to be the ones who are deciding whether it’s right or wrong. For CNN, which is one of the popular news programs in the world, many people in the world watch it, and those people have different cultures, religions and cultures. People have their own ethical standards so they look at the issue based on their ethics. Therefore, news should be dedicated on their goals of delivering the information itself, and not be biased or prejudiced. According to this characteristic of TV news, the child soldiers’ video from CNN only showing the situation about child soldiers in Africa.
The video is basically about Sri Lanka soldiers wearing black masks and threaten others. They are holding guns in their hands and aim it to people’s heads and cheer together after they caught them. What I saw in this video was not children; they were terrorists and murderers under children’s faces. The message about the video is to show how serious the child soldiers issue is going around in the world and how the world is going wrong.
By looking at this video, I get to understand how serious the issue is. It was much more severe than what I have expected. Children who are suppose to play with toys and get educations at school were actually playing with guns and intimidating people. At this point, there was one question that came up in my mind. ‘Are they even know the seriousness of killing people?’ Before they hold guns on their hands, they should get full education and military trains. Children should go to school and learn ethics so they could decide what is wrong and right by themselves. The governments who are supposed to protect their children and educate them are just using children as their weapons.







http://kr.youtube.com/watch?v=I0MShxMMd8c


The second video I found is about African child soldiers who escaped from the army. It talks about how the army treated the children. One girl who escaped said the soldiers told one of her friends, “You are now free, run!” but they shoot her when she was running. The soldiers didn’t kill the girl because she was pregnant, and they said it bring bad luck to kill a pregnant woman but they cut her ears and lips. The army let the children to kill their friends, and they kick the children if they didn’t listen. This video’s message is to show the world about the reality of child soldiers in Africa and how the army is treating them. Therefore, it’s not biased or prejudiced on the issue. It’s just delivering the information and showing the reality so people can recognize the issue. This is the characteristic of other TV shows too, which is to deliver the information and not to be biased. It’s letting the audience to make decision on whether the issue is wrong or not since everyone has different opinions. TV is standing between right and wrong.
By watching this video, I get to recognize the seriousness of government who are using their children as weapons and treating them like animals. Children should get educations before they learn how to shoot the gun.