Toms River And The Monarch Butterfly Summary
Dan Fagin, a Pulitzer Prize winner in environmental journalism and published author, breaks down science to a more understandable form for the masses. In his talk to Point Park University students and faculty, he addresses the importance of communicating science and the hurdles the environmental journalism community faces when doing so. Readers can be biased and can be swayed by the source of where they get their information. Fagin explained the skepticism people have toward journalists can be derived from fake news reporting and political influences on society. The source of where people get their information has changed, to newspapers to social media, which promotes more accessible fast-fake news. Consequently this results in fewer reporters
…show more content…
Toms River brought to light the connection of the childhood cancer rates and the presence of hazardous waste within a small all-American town. He incorporated accurate information and reliable sources. In writing about the Monarch Butterfly, Fagin identifies the connection between the decreasing migratory grounds in Mexico and the human impact. The struggle in Mexico is described by the turmoil of saving the Monarch’s migratory lands and bringing back economic prosperity to a poor town. Bringing about this information to the world allows for action to take place to remediate a problem. Without publications and notoriety of environmental situations like Toms River, environmental awareness and actions would not take place. Though there is a need for reliable environmental journalism, there is going to be a continued trend of declining new paper journalists and an increased presence of online reporting. Of adults aged 30 – 49 years of age, 50% of them get their news through online sources compared to 10% of them getting their news through newspapers (Mitchell et al. 2016). Though Fagin calls for better narrative journalism writing and introduction of more authors, there is still going to be an uphill battle of acquiring paper readers and gaining the trust of online
Toms River brought to light the connection of the childhood cancer rates and the presence of hazardous waste within a small all-American town. He incorporated accurate information and reliable sources. In writing about the Monarch Butterfly, Fagin identifies the connection between the decreasing migratory grounds in Mexico and the human impact. The struggle in Mexico is described by the turmoil of saving the Monarch’s migratory lands and bringing back economic prosperity to a poor town. Bringing about this information to the world allows for action to take place to remediate a problem. Without publications and notoriety of environmental situations like Toms River, environmental awareness and actions would not take place. Though there is a need for reliable environmental journalism, there is going to be a continued trend of declining new paper journalists and an increased presence of online reporting. Of adults aged 30 – 49 years of age, 50% of them get their news through online sources compared to 10% of them getting their news through newspapers (Mitchell et al. 2016). Though Fagin calls for better narrative journalism writing and introduction of more authors, there is still going to be an uphill battle of acquiring paper readers and gaining the trust of online