Reader question:
What does "yellow journalism mean, as in this headline: "Yellow journalism at its worst"?
My comments:
First of all, Yellow journalism is not to be confused with "黄色资讯", which appears to be a handy literal translation but which really does not work. The Chinese yellow (黄色) points to pornography and that is not the case with yellow journalism. Yellow journalism instead is closer to the current Chinese vernacular of "八卦资讯", which means, literally, media gossip.
Confused? You bet.
Just so you may be wary of literal translations^-^.
Now, definitions. Yellow journalism refers to treatment of trivia – celebrity relationship scandals for example – as serious news that results in lowered journalistic standards but increased readership. A large picture of a half naked woman in the front page of a broadsheet newspaper, for example, would be considered yellow journalism everywhere. For a tabloid, this would be standard practice – And tabloids in general embody what constitutes yellow journalism. Yellow journalism is their lifeline. They can not survive without it.
The origin of the term dates back to late 19th century New York, and it used to be called Yellow Kid Journalism, Yellow Kid being a character in a comic strip that for some time appeared in two competing newspapers as cartoon supplements. The cartoons were painted in yellow – those were days of predominantly black and white – and were very, er, eye-catching and popular. And they did help increase sales of the papers for a time. And hence, Yellow Kid Journalism gradually became synonymous to profit-first journalism, or sensationalism aimed at pepping up flagging circulations. Over time, as the Yellow Kid comics died out, Yellow Kid Journalism was shortened to Yellow journalism and the term has stuck since.
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