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Personally, I believe that the PR practitioner’s actions and behavior are closest to the situational value orientation. They do not see anything wrong about the way they act during the whole process as long as their goal will be fulfilled which of course is to let the president get re-elected. The situational approach is basically to let the result benefit the largest number of people which in this movie could refer to the president and all of his supporters. They are only concerned about their own and the president’s interests which means that they do not care about the people they hurt along the way as long as the result turn out positive in their favor.
According to PRSA’s Code of Ethics the PR practitioners act unethically in several areas. First of all, they do not seem to show any kind of honesty to the public. The news clip, the song etc. are all based on a fake and mendacious foundation. Furthermore, you can say that they all have a high degree of expertise within the field of producing the news clip but it is certanly not the most fair solution considering the credability towards the public.
The movie title “Wag the Dog” is probably a way of referring to when things get out of control. By that I mean, that if you say “wag the dog” it could be seen as when the tail takes control over the dog and not the other natural way around. This is in some ways almost what happens in the movie. The PR practitioners go from having everything frightening under control to loosing it and slowly turn into being “the underdog” of the whole situation.
Concerning stereotypes I think it is hard for me to determine whether the PR practitioners confirm it negatively or positively i the movie. The whole PR environment seems a little bit superfisial which in some ways are how I imagine the life of a PR practitioner to be. However, it is very obvious that they put a lot of serious effort in their job which is a positive aspect of the whole situation. O
However, when the whole spin is based on a big lie, I think it is hard to see the positive effects and aspects of the situation as a whole.
Chapter 2 – The Evolution of Public Relations
We took a round and each of us presented shortly what we found was the most important person or event in the specific era.
Early Beginnings in America:
The Virginia Company distributed flyers, brochures and pamphlets to Europe in order to try and allure immigrants to the New World. Along with the making of a new political system came the Federalist Papers.
The Age of Press Agentry and Hype
Phineas T. Barnum introduced new methods in how to promote and entertain e.g. how he made the dwarf Tom Thumb famous. This era is also known for its promotion of American railroads – an attempt to attract tourists to the Southwest which in many cases did pay off. On the political front the early 19th century also saw a development. Activist and social movements flourished througout the mid and late 19th century.
The Age of Public Relations Pioneers
This era is characterized by individuals. Most remarkable Henry Ford (industrialism), Ivy Lee (PR firm Parker and Lee), George Creel (Creel Commitee) and Edward Bernay (the father of modern PR). A lot of other personalities marked this era either through expertise, professional succes or simply just a strong personality.
Public Relations Comes of Age
Economic growth in America which meant that a large numbers of companies needed people with PR skills in order to communicate succesfully with the mass media. Therefore this era is known as a period where communication went through a revolution.
The Next 50 Years
We will see a constant technological development as the social media begins to dominate in several aspects. People will demand a 24/7 possibility of communicating with the outer world as well as always having access to the latest trends and news. People within the field of PR will request specialization in order to become as professional as possible in a certain area. The world of PR is constantly developing and therefore highly qualified communication people are in demand!
Well…. Ive been here for over 1 month and still feels like a freakin idiot when Im in class… Ill never make fun of an exchange student ever again!
Just pisses me off when people laugh when were not talking perfectly english!!!
Anyway…now Im looking forward to the weekend – going to Florida with the other Scandinavians yeahuuu!!!! Statesboro….hmm…nothing bad about it….but its kinda boring when you dont have a car!!!
And who would have thought that we were gonna find ourselves sitting at the library until late night…..EVERY night… how du you guys do it?!? Never did that many homework at home 🙂
Now Im almost ready to finish the day…just have to do a blog post in PR – still trying to figure out how to use this blog :S
Tired, hungry (that lake side wrap didnt saturate a lot) and ready to go to bed….wednesday – the day from hell 🙂
Sweet dreams out there 😉
”Line Olesen is….”
What am I doing, what have I been doing, and what do I want to do? Modern technology enables us to answer all these questions in a second if we make use of the so-called social media. Phenomena such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter give us the opportunity globally to keep up with the life and the state of mind of both close and random people.
In my PR class 2330 with Barbara Nixon I was recently introduced to the last-mentioned mass communication Twitter which has been both a pleasure and challenge to work with.
First of all, it was hard for me to draw my attention towards Twitter when Facebook has always been the most preferable – I simple forgot that I had to update my status on Twitter. After a while I began to see the advantages of Twitter. It is undoubtedly an effective way of getting in touch with people with similar interests.
The fact that you can follow everyone without their acceptance really enlarges your own network in terms of getting inspiration or feedback on your own thoughts and ideas. Since all updates pop up as the first thing in your profile, you cannot miss any pearls that might fall from someone’s lips which is like striking gold for a callow Danish exchange student like me. So maybe someday I will benefit of a piece of information from a guy, I do not even know just because we both joined Twitter.
However, I do sometimes fear that this constantly nosing into other people’s lives someday will pass beyond reasonable limits. I do acknowledge that Twitter is somehow more professional in terms of sharing professional opinions than e.g. Facebook but it astonishes me how some people have this strong urge of knowing everything about everybody.
Luckily, it still is our own decision how much we want to let out in public.
Line's blog! What you see, is what you get - welcome :) 