The Media, its in my eyes

The media has clearly affected the things I see in the world, but my question is has it affected the way that I look at the world. In other words, ha the media prescribed a specific procedure for me on how to process the world around me. Has the media been able to condition me to look at the world and think in a way that is beneficial to their wishes. I can definitely argue yes, a lot of people in this world including me are led to believe to things make you good, no not dental hygiene and church donations, things and beauty. The media has pumped me full of thoughts that if I am one of the unfortunates that does not fit the ideal model, or if I don't have the coolest new thing, then I am not doing enough. So in that way they have programmed a huge part of the thought I have to be based on getting things and trying to look better. But my real question is it can affect the way I think about real matters, like race and gender in America. I think that maybe it can, It may not be able to change exactly how i would perceive the truth, but the media can certainly stretch and manipulate the truth to their own gain, and in turn control the way I think about a piece of news, which is actually a fairly disconcerting conclusion, but its better than lying to myself, i think enough people lying to me as it is.

PRODUCT (try an ice cold Coca Cola today!!!) PLACEMENT

Watching the Truman show is definitely a fun time. However, having seen it more than once i can say that more than few things became more clear on just how closely and accurately the movie critiques the media. In the movie their is no shortage of product placements by the actors for their sponsors in the show. The first time i watched this movie it was just something funny about how prevalent advertising is in television. This being the third time i've seen the movie, it was surprising to feel that this wasn't just some cheap gag, they were really trying to say something about the media. Though it was funny, it was also very true, advertising is as much a part of media as the stars are a part of the night sky, they always go together. It suddenly hit me that not only is the advertisers pumping their brand through media outlets, but also that the media works along with them so willingly. Then it became clear why almost instantly, money. Clearly in the movie for something like this to be possible, a lot of cash is going to be needed, and when the media need cash, who is their go to source, sponsors and advertisers. I mean, take a look at the superbowl, half the hype over it is for the commercials. We have become a society so saturated with ads that we barely even consider them a separate entity from the actual content media, like pilot fish and a shark, only the pilot fish called 40 of their friends and they are slowly devouring the shark. Looking at the Truman show in an interpretive way, I can see the public as truman, unwitting and unaware, the actors as the media, pushing truman right up against the ads and shoving it in his face, and he still remains consciously oblivious to it.

(This post was brought to you by budweiser, please drink responsibly)

Transgender and the media

It is no secret, or rather it is a secret hidden in plain sight so very well, that transgender people receive little to no recognition in the media. They are either there for comedic relief or some cruel purpose, or not there at all. This goes for fictional media like movie and television as well as in the news (Though some artists like Ray Toro have been a hopeful sign that that is changing slightly for the better). It therefore delighted me when I read a New York Times article, not buried deep in the website, featured a story about the transgender community. The story talked about president Obama's plan to attack "conversion therapy" for transgender youth at a state level to ban it. It also brought to attention a huge case of transgender youth, Leelah Alcorn, who receive much less attention than she deserved for her tragic death to do a family that abused her identification as a female. The article gave me so much hope that maybe the media will really get the ball rolling on this issue and people will start to realize that as much as ethnic and racial minorities and gays and bisexuals and lesbians are mistreated by the media, transgenders are far more worse off and there needs to be significant change brought about to assure their well being, and feeling of a safe place in society, and that starts with good media representation to show those who are not transgender the real issues.

Medium and media

We talk a lot about the media and its effects on us. But which media do have the greatest effect on us? Is it balanced? I would argue that it is not, in two ways. The first being that not everybody consumes the same media an not everyone places the same value on each media. One person might place a lot of what they believe about the world from listening to music and what those artists have to say about the world. Others might religiously watch the news on t.v. and draw a lot from that. Another reason is the function of some media. Television for instance is supposed to give accurate reporting, there is supposed to be very little opinion, whereas in something like the movie industry, people are free to push their own ideas and beliefs through their work. So I would argue that the media has a lot of unequal influence on the world, some media have more freedom an influence certain people more than other media. The next question would be, why is this important? Perhaps because people owe it to themselves to broaden the scope of their media intake. If someone watches fox news all day everyday, then they will end up with a narrow perspective about what the world is like. However if they watch several new channels and they listen to a variety of music and they read lots of books and go to see lots of different movies, then they will have a much better chance at becoming more aware of what the world is like.