Amusing Ourselves To Death By Neil Postman Analysis

Society may seek answers to an issue through a medium that most directly cause them. Neil Postman examines this alarming problem in his work of nonfiction Amusing Ourselves to Death, explaining how television challenges public discourse by transfiguring events from our life into a form of entertainment. This very country designates, “...A city entirely...to the idea of entertainment” (Postman 3) which shows the accepting common norm that usually goes disregarded. Postman’s argument circles the idea of a washed out culture who, “...Come to love their oppression” (xix) controlled by television. He juxtaposes two prophecies, Orwell’s, “...Dark vision” (xix) of societies bond to authority and Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, where people allow

“The problem is not that television presents us with entertaining subject matter but that all subject matter is presented as entertaining” (87). Postman’s main concern does not rest in the, “...Junk entertainment” (159) shows, but when the programs take the seriousness out of a subject matter. Worse yet, “The problems come when we try to live in them” (77). The obvious gap of discourse can be seen evident when he mentions the Lincoln-Douglas debates, with attentive audiences listening to oratory for a long period of time, while constructing arguments of both opponents claims (45-47). Soon this “Age of Exposition” (77) gave way to the “Age of Show Business” (83). Irrelevant Information found its way through the telegraph, that ultimately creates no effect on the receiver as, “Facts push other facts into and out of consciousness at speeds that neither permit nor require evaluation” (70). A variety of information does not mean all can be useful and beneficial. The public's attention shifts to photographs that are attached to a story, creating an illusion of context. “...Pseudo-context provides [no] action, or problem-solving, or change…[but] to amuse” (76). Postman reminds the audience that information will not lose

If only but an insignificant counter argument may be made that reading remains to be an everyday activity. However, this requires one to slowly consider the litteratre’s argument and construct thoughts, a sophisticated approved that seems too ancient now. Postman can easily defend himself by assuring that, “...[A] reader must come armed, in a serious state of intellectual readiness” (50). Just as Postman begins with Huxley’s warning, he also ends saying that, “What Huxley teaches is that in the age of advanced technology, spiritual devastation is more likely to come from an enemy with a smiling face than from one whose countenance exudes suspicious and hate” (155). Getting everyone to stop watching television remains hopeless, but to educate people about the dreadful effects could help with understanding what television does. And eventually, the entertainment society of disorited discourse may find the lost culture in which more intelligent discourse is common