Death By Media

Mass media is slowly and progressively degrading everyday culture and society. It is beginning to have a negative effect on how humans obtain information, the way people talk, the health of society, and even face-to-face interactions.

People used to venture into a local library in order to various sorts of information. By physically opening an actual book, information could be accessed at the flip of a page. Yet now, that same information can be obtained at the tap of a finger. Through a search engine on a cellular device, or on the internet, people can conduct research, skim a brief summary of a novel, or look up facts, simply because they did not feel like driving to a library. This immediate accessibility to any necessary information encourages nothing but laziness and irresponsibility. Meanwhile, hard copies have their own sense of originality while the electronic clones distort all intrinsic values of the original book. Not only that but books provide humans with a connection to the past and keep the nature of previous authors alive. Yet, instead of soaking up the information and breathing in the historical value of the pages, people are searching the internet for their needed information. Media is “altering the meaning of ‘being informed’ by creating a species of information that might properly be called disinformation.” (Postman).

Mass media also influences the way people talk. People have begun to incorporate words that were created by social networking sites into their own vocabulary. For example, the word "unlike." This word has mistakenly taken the place of “dislike” due to a media-created substitution. "Selfie", or the act of taking a picture of oneself, has now become a prominent expression used in everyday language...

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...mans than a resource. People are using it as an easy way out and an excuse not to do thorough physical research to obtain the information they desire. Due to the overall negative influences of mass media, culture and society have slowly began digressing toward illiteracy, laziness, unhealthiness, and a lack of social interaction.

Works Cited

Postman, Neil. Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (1985): USA: Penguin. Web. 17 May 2014.

Burton, Michael C. “Twitter: Subverting the English Language?” (7 Sept 2010): PR Daily. Web. 17 May 2014.

“Communicating about Media Saturated Lifestyles:

A formative case study of a Community Based Media Risk Reduction Strategy”. Simon Fraser University Media Analysis Lab Research Reports and Publications. (sfu.ca). Web. 17 May 2014.< http://www.sfu.ca/media-lab/risk/new/researchrisktohealth.html>.