The scope of yellow journalism can be traced to the late 19th century, whereby it was utilized as one of the primary factors that supported the United States and Spain to triumph over Cuba and its ally; the Philippines. In fact, it is through the use of yellow journalism that the United States managed to acquire oversea territories across various realms during the late 19th century. While much has been hypothesized regarding yellow journalism, it is of the essence to note that it mainly connotes to a style of newspaper reporting that does not focus on facts, but over-emphasizes on sensationalism (Fellow 381). Precisely, yellow journalism is a skewed form of journalism that is not founded on the premise of well-researches new. Instead, yellow journalism often utilizes eye-catching by-lines or phrases that are aimed at attracting more sales. Deductively, yellow journalism depicts news in an unprofessional and unethical fashion.
A close analysis on the scope of yellow journalism demonstrates the fact that the term first came into existence during the reign of Joseph Pulitzer II and William Randolph Hearst, who engaged in newspaper wars. Evidently, Hearst’s paper New York Journal and Pulitzer’s New York World restructured the newspapers content to contain more sensational stories. Many at times, these two newspapers utilized cartoons and drawings as a means of propelling the sensational content in their newspapers. Overall, there was intense competition between Pulitzer and Hearst in their quest to gain more markets with their newspapers, and this eventually degenerated into a rivalry between the two. As the cartoons evolved into pertinent newspaper components (Fellow 33), Pulitzer in the year 1896 came up with his personal cartoon duped The Yellow Kid, which was developed by R.F Outcault. The emergence of cartoon intensified the rivalry between Pulitzer and Hearst as each claimed ownership of the cartoon. Eventually, Hearst paid a humongous compensation to Pulitzer in exchange for the cartoon. This did not mark the end of their rivalry as Pulitzer went ahead and came up with another cartoon, which was a replica of The Yellow Kid, which offered him an equal platform where they could compete with Hearst.
The intense competition between Hearst’s and Pulitzer’s newspapers resulted in an intense dramatization and alteration of news. As a result, Hearst’s and Pulitzer’s newspapers were often structured to suit the ideas that two though it would result in high sales by attracting a fascinating admiration from the public. In most cases, The Yellow Kid was often used to discredit stories from various newspapers and sensationalized stories contained in Hearst’s and Pulitzer’s newspapers. As previously connoted herein, the use of yellow journalism favoured triumph of the United States during the Spanish-American war. With regards to this, The Yellow Kid was utilized to sway public opinion regarding essential issues during this war.
During the era of the Spanish-American war, Hearst stationed a team of newspaper paper reporters in Cuba to monitor and report activities taking place there. Hearst noted that the war provide a comprehensive avenue to augment his newspaper sales as various populations had an innate interest in the war. However, it is essential to note that Hearst did not report objectively on the activities taking place in Cuba. Instead, Hearst published false reports on inadequate care, cruelty, and brutality. These reports were published with the sole intent of swaying the opinion of the public regarding involvement of the United States in the war (Fellow 91). In conclusion, the origin and development of yellow journalism is accredited to the conflict between Hearst and Pulitzer.
Work Cited
Fellow, Anthony. American Media History. Boston: Cengage Learning, 2012. Print.
