Jimmy Carter on and in Media

It wasn't even something that I had planned to do but out of pure luck (and knowing about 5 people in the filmmaking practicum class) I was able to go and see Jimmy Carter speak about media. Not only was he there to speak about media, but it was also part of the film practicum's project so he was literally becoming part of media because the entire interview was filmed.

President Carter had a lot to say about the current state of political media and the way in which he would use it if he were still president in todays age. The number one takeaway that I got from this interview was that he believed that news media is inherently a beneficial source and the burden is upon the subject to make sure the information that is being relayed is true. It was interesting to hear him speak about how when he was first campaigning to be president he took any opportunity to utilize media and even agreed to do a cooking show so that he could get his face out there.

It was uncanny as to how timely this interview was seeing that my digital media class covered the topic of fake news the very next day. It is such a pertinent issue in current times because we do have a current sitting president that uses media constantly but unlike President Carter he does not see the benefit in making sure what is presented to the media is always true. President Carter said that he sees the benefits in Twitter and how it is able to make communication between POTUS and the American people more personal. This statement stuck with me because seeing the way twitter is currently used by our president did not give me much hope of its usefulness but hearing this optimistic outlook was inspiring.