A Slight Misunderstanding
The media sure has its hands full! First off, it’s changing the physiology of grown men, transforming their brains into those of sixteen-year-olds with its cathode tubes, according to Steven Stark in his essay, “Where The Boys Are.” Next on the list is the task of convincing our youth that “murder is cool and fun,” a statement courtesy of John Grisham’s essay, “Unnatural Killers.” The media is making today’s youth somehow disregard everything they’ve ever heard about it being wrong to kill someone and consult their television for guidance instead! That job can’t be easy! Never having a moment’s rest, the media has also been sighted by Marie Winn. It was in the act of changing our entire families into groups of distant acquaintances, which we read in, “Television: The Plug-in Drug.” Finally, add to this list “screaming.” Deborah Tannen states that the media is making us scream at each other, an enlightening fact one may find in her essay, “The Triumph of the Yell.”
Some new light has recently been shed on the subject, though: the media is not a concrete being. To say the media is sending out a message is akin to saying that your TV is talking to you. This being not possible, we must now examine those who control the media. This is a tough crowd to figure out. We do not know anything about these people. They could be the guy on the corner, or your favorite bartender… probably not, but with all the face-less notoriety this industry has been painted with, one might think so. We are led to believe that we are being controlled and manipulated by unknown egomaniacs that are systematically destroying every facet of good ole’ fashioned life. Life, though, was fashioned many moons ago and has not changed much since.
We have always craved to live our lives vicariously through art. The concept of real life imitating art was not born with the advent of slasher films and rap music: the heyday of the Wild West spurned multitudes of dime novels that city kids grabbed up and relived on their stoops. And the media, throughout the course of its evolution, has always attempted to tap into our innermost desires, desires to step into surrealism. It has to. It’s the product it’s selling. Some may say that they’re exploiting our vulnerabilities.
She showed this best when she “took time for leisurely pursuits. She loved music and could play the lute herself,” (bio.com). Because of her love of the arts, Elizabeth gained social power. Social power for a ruler is the ability to use the arts in order to influence a country or a ruler’s image in a way that helps them keep power. Elizabeth loved going to see plays or dances in her free time. This allowed her to gain social power because it was a way to connect with her subjects. It allowed commoners to trust her more and they could feel they were more personally connected to her than they were before. Elizabeth’s complete social control could also be seen when artists would honor Elizabeth “by painting her portrait. These images reveal that she was an early fashionista,” (bio.com). Her image was a very important factor in her reign of power. She was able to present herself as very well respected and almost “God-like”. Elizabeth wanted to show people who would see her or her portraits that she was not just a weak woman. She was a force to be reckoned with and her people could see this. She gained social power because her subjects looked up to her and respected her very much. This also allowed commoners to trust her more because her image showed she was intelligent could make decisions for
As the SS grew in power they began to build concentration camps for the Jews and other accused people. The SS had full control over these concentratio...
The Schutzstaffel (SS) started off as Adolf Hitler’s personal bodyguards. They later became one of the most feared and powerful organizations in all of Germany. Founded in 1925, the SS started off as a small group of eight members who were lead initially by Julius Schreck, a dedicated Hitler loyalist. The SS crew grew to more than 250,000 by the start of World War II. The SS did more than just guard Hitler; they guarded the concentration camps, and the Waffen-SS specialized in brutalizing and murdering people in territories occupied by the Nazi’s. The SS guards had an important role for Germany in World War II because they did most of Hitler’s work. The SS-VT were the SS guards that actually fought in the war, they were later named the Waffen-SS, who also caused terrorism. The regular SS’s guarding of Hitler, and of concentration camps affected the war in a major way.
Queen Elizabeth was an intelligent, courageous person. She could be described as the ideal queen of all times. Her bravery is one of the most admired traits which caused everyone in England to love her, based on her grand encounters. It was quite a popular detail of Elizabeth’s life th...
Queen Elizabeth lived a life full of adventure, good times, trials, and even sorrows. Being a queen is not always easy. Queen Elizabeth was well remembered and loved.
Elizabeth the first, born on September 7, 1533, is the most different and intriguing monarch in the English history (Dunn). Elizabeth is known as the Virgin Queen all of her reign. She used that image to keep out of marriage, prevent war and become one of the most beloved monarchs of the people. This image helped her also fend off Mary Queen of Scots claim to the throne. Between her vivacious and often volatile personality she led her kingdom well up until the day she died on March 24, 1603 (Alchin). The kingdom went into genuine morning for their queen of The People who had made herself loved by all of her subjects.
The video hosted by Bill Moyer that we watched in class on March 4th involved violence in the mass media and the effects that it may have on children in modern day society. Video games sometimes display graphic violence as well as violent verbal messages that often convey a message of appeal to children. Movies often combine humor, violence, and/or sex in order to be more appealing to the audience. Usually two or more of these factors are used. Whether it is through these sources or as something as simple as the evening news, violence is everywhere in the media today and displays messages of approval that American society may not realize.
Many Americans feel that the viewing of violence in the media reinforces negative behavior in society, especially among children and young adults. "Three thousand studies have been done since 1955 on the link between television and violence; 2,980 of them found a correlation between the two. We hear little about that because we get most of our news from television" (Peterson). With this much research one must acknowledge that there is a problem in America involving sex and violence in the media. We cannot blame all societal problems on the media and its portrayal of these issues, but we can become educated, ourselves, in order to better facilitate the healthy lives of our children.
The media is by far the most influential mean in millions of Americans lives today and can be used to impact behaviors, especially in the vulnerable minds of children and young adults. The media is responsible for the increasing amount of violent crimes and desensitizing society with explicit imagery and the importance of our culture and contributing to negative behavior, society should pay careful attention to the kinds of role models we provide to the youth. Possibly, the most powerful source of role models can be found in every home: the computer or television. Television is a source that has given more knowledge in the past several years than any other kind of knowledge distributor, including books and newspapers. Television is the most dominant invention of the twentieth century and has created more public figures than radio, books, and magazines combined. However, the role models that are created through the television are not always upstanding citizens like Barrack Obama or Steve Jobs, but instead psychopathic murderers such as Jeffery Dahmer, Ted Bundy and Charles Manson. Not only is society fascinated by the media attention that certain types of citizens receive but they are also mesmorized by films that make these people look like tough fighters who can kill people with the snap of a finger. Actors such as Steven Segall, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Bruce Willis have have capitalized in violent films because of the media exposure as killers and murderers.
In 1973, Thomas Elmendorf, an emergency room physician, made a speech to the American Medical Association about the increase in violence behavior among young adults and it’s correlation to violence on TV. In it he cited that “Murder is the fastest growing cause of death in the United States. The annual rate of increase exceeded 100 percent between 1960 and 1974.” He also goes on to explain that by the time a child graduates high school, they have spent an astonishing 18,000 hours in front of the TV, not to mention other forms of media, versus 15,000 hours in the classroom. Elmendorf also elaborates that within those 18,000 television hours, a young adult will have witnessed “18,000 murders and countless highly detailed incidents of robbery, arson, bombings, shootings...
Angus McLaren, author of “Illegal Operations: Women, Doctors, and Abortion” demonstrates the life of an abortionist in the late 1800’s to the mid 1900’s. McLaren explains a series of affairs in detail with many different abortionists. Since abortion was illegal at the time, many women consulted midwives, or took the procedure of abortion among themselves, this at times resulted in their death.
She was one of the most important people in England. Elizabeth was well liked and respected by her subjects. The young queen was wise beyond her years and knew how to compromise with her people. She referred to herself as “Supreme Governor” over spiritual matter rather than “Supreme Head” of the church. This minor change between Elizabeth I and Henry VIII made a huge difference in how her subjects saw her. She worked hard to unify her country and did exactly what she set out to do.
Surrealism and the surrealist movement is a ‘cultural’ movement that began around 1920’s, and is best known for its visual art works and writings. According to André Berton, the aim was “to resolve the previously contradictory conditions of dream and reality into an absolute reality, a super-reality” (Breton 1969:14). Surrealists incorporated “elements of surprise, unexpected juxtapositions and ‘non sequitur”. Hence, creating unnerving, illogical paintings with photographic precision, which created strange creatures or settings from everyday real objects and developed advanced painting techniques, which allowed the unconscious to be expressed by the self (Martin 1987:26; Pass 2011:30).
The regularity and asperity of media violence has dramatically increased over the years. The Media exists in almost every aspect of people’s lives and exposure to violence in the media is becoming a large concern. People are exposed violent acts in the media everyday between video games, movies, and television. Parents are distressed over the fact tha...
“The media's the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that's power. Because they control the minds of the masses” (Thinkexist, 2010). The mass media, including news, movies, magazines, music, or other entertainment source has become a part of daily life for many people. As the quote mentions mass media and its power are capable of influencing people’s mind and behavior. Contents in the media introduced to young people make it difficult for them to distinguish between what is real and what is not, as a result stimulating confusion and blind imitation. The mass media plays an important role in the increase of violence, sexual activity, and risky behaviors among teenagers.