One of the most recent problems occurring today is racism in the media. Stereotyping in television and the printed word has reached its zenith and it significantly increased throughout the years 1970 to 2000. In 1968 The Kerner Commission provided an outline of what a responsible press had the obligation to provide to its all of their subscribers not just "White America." The commission was created because "White America" was completely ignoring the rest of the population, and the rest of Americas population was to say the least a little irritated, perhaps resulting in mass riots across the country. In 1970 there were four covers in Newsweek that featured people of color. One might think there is room for improvement, and I would agree; however, in 2000 a whole 30 years later there were two covers that featured African Americans one sports figure and another a criminal. Accuracy and diversity are aspects of media performance that need careful evaluation of how it represents people of color. Evaluating media performance is important because of the utilization and reliance on the mass media for much of society's reflexive monitoring and evaluation of reality. .
This research has shown that minorities are sometimes depicted as being violent, primitive, and politically unsophisticated. Furthermore, they postulate that certain types of behaviors among minorities may be understood by whites as pathological or deviant because of how the news media represent them. This representation is inaccurate because it ignores historical context and structural explanations for social trends. Newsmagazines reproduce racism by perpetuating a racial hierarchy carried out by mainly whites and consumed by mainly whites that position people of color at the bottom. In 2000 Newsweek featured 11 covers that had to do with politics, none of which were African American. Instead there were only 2 covers highlighting people of color, Marion Jones a female track runner, and Riddell Johnson a male criminal a negative story.
