Journalism of assertion in the midst of tragedy: GZH's titles and communication contract in the floods of May 2024

This article discusses journalism of assertion, which is built from sources' statements presented as facts. The goal is to understand how GZH, the largest news portal in Rio Grande do Sul, constructed its communication contract with readers through declarative headlines during the biggest climate disaster the state has experienced: the floods of May 2024. Using Discourse Analysis methodology, we examined whether the 165 headlines with statements published in the first 15 days of May served more to inform – focused on truth and credibility – or to captivate – aimed at emotionally engaging the audience to generate interest in the news. We found that the captivation approach was predominant in 63% of the headlines. We conclude that journalism of assertion is a kind of unfinished product, justified by a false sense of objectivity, which tends to intensify during tragedies.