Marxism & Pluralism: To what extent...?

Developments in new/digital media mean that audiences can now have access to a greater variety of views and values.  To what extent are audiences empowered by these developments?

Marxists believe that media owners control ideas becuase they control the information people are allowed to access . the believe that the media is consciously biased, they provide members of society with a worls wide view or ideologies that explicitly favour the rich and powerful. This is evident in newspaper articles that mostly support right wing political parties such as the conservatives. 20 years ago people relied on newspapers that were mostly owned by the middleclass for opinions, this means that most of the articles were political biased towards left wing as a result people had a limited range of opinions. The increase use of new and digital media changed that. Newspapers being streamed online allowed people to get involved with news as well as commenting their opinions without being afraid to stand out as the internet is desensitised, as a result people have access to a greater variety of views and values, however a Marxist belief is that the other members of society are like "millions of monkeys typing nonsence" therefore the lower class's opinions are not valued its irrelevant. The desensitisation of the internet however has led to the number of suicide rates due to cyber bulling to triple in 2013 according to ‘good magazine’ suggesting that having access to variety of views and values doesn’t always lead to positive effects but can be damaging to society especially the younger generation. 

Meanwhile, this desentitisation and citizen journalism has suggests that there isn't really an empowerment of the media, but the audiences/ members of society are changing the ways of the media supporting pulirist beliefs. Pulirists believe that Choice is involved not just access to a range of different media and views but also to the status of consumers, for pluralist the consumer is the most important factor, this is evident by the use of social media and theses advertisement targeting everyone regardless of age and class, as a result supporting the pluralist ideologies. Digital media is new technology that has an impact on the media. These can be things such as apps, social media, online news, email and many more. Due to this, audiences have access to a greater variety of views and values. The internet is mainly, widely used by the younger generation as they have more access to it e.g. in schools or on their phones. However, is becoming more accessible for adults too. For example, 18.3 million households in the UK (70%) had internet access in 2009 compared to 2 million in 2006 and has risen to 87% in 2013, suggesting access to the internet is increasing significantly, each year. In addition, the younger generation use the internet to look up news, information, listen to music, watch movies, play games etc.  The internet can have positive and negative effects on society both economically and intellectually, meanwhile it is thought of as” the most important medium of the centrum “ by Biggs and Burke suggesting that the internet is key in our society today.