Is this media text biased? How can you tell?
This media text is biased. This can be told because there is only one opinion in the whole text about what is happening on the summit of Mount Everest, all saying that it is overcrowded.
How might facts be manipulated to inspire bias?
Facts can be manipulated to inspire bias by putting it between negative facts and opinions. For example, it is actually ok to have lots of people on Near the summit of Mount Everest, and the total death toll isn't extremely high too. However, by putting this fact between some negative (those that people think is bad) facts, the fact itself will look negative. Some negative facts are: some black markets are making low-quality gas cylinders and people with no experiences are coming up onto the summit. There are also lots of negative comment on the crowd on the summit of the Everest from experienced mountaineer, which looks like facts but are actually opinions. These all manipulate facts to inspire bias.
How are language and images used to engage an audience?
Images usually attract the audience to read the text, and the language media uses explains the images, but in its own way so that the audience can think in the way the media wants the audience to.
For example, the first image of the article shows a long line of audience on Mount Everest. People usually just see grand sight of the mountain and the audience probably has never seen an image like his. The scenery might just shows the crowd near the summit of the mountain, but the language used underneath the image: "crowded, unruly gives the state of the entire Mount Everest, which makes the audience to think that what shown in the image is the overall condition of Mount Everest.
What values and beliefs does this media text promote? How are language and images used to promote these values and beliefs?
The media text promotes that if people are not prepared, they should not climb the Everest, or else there will be serious consequences that are both bad for themselves and the others. This is promoted with images that show the mountain packed with the crowds that give the audience an uncomfortable feeling and quotes from professionals(mountaineering experts) telling that there will be health and ethical problems for people with no mountaineering experiences to climb the summit of Mount Everest.
Why is thinking critically about media texts an important life
Thinking critically about media texts is an important life skill, because then we would not be just reading the opinions in it and think in its way, and instead we can gather the facts, searching for other media that describes the same event and have our own opinions based on what we perceive everyday, our values and the facts from the media
