How the Media Affects Us

How the Media Affects Us

Sitting in my 10th grade science class a discussion begun about our homework assignment and stared an uproar. My teacher asked us to find a television show that was related to her class. One boy who was very reserved and always quiet in class raised his hand; when he did that everyone got still to listen to what he was about to say. He simply said "I don't watch t.v. at home can I have an alternative assignment please?" Once those words left his mouth the class burst out into questions and looks of disbelief.

Why is it such a taboo to not watch television and why have we let the media control our lives. We have become weakened mentally to what is normal, how we spend our time and what is important to us.

With the way technology is growing and becoming more advanced at such at a rapid rate; we really had to chance to fight against it. No matter where you look there is either a computer, cell phone, television or music player. And most of the time we have them all on at once. In my own experience I have been working on the computer listening to music, texting and had the t.v on. My mother calls is attack of the machines like from the movie The Matrix. These items we often forget are just machines, tiny little parts make them up, they can be broken and fixed and really cost nothing to make. But we idealize them and they take over our time and space. The generation now is losing sight of what is real and what is not. My younger sister was told to put away the computer one night and go to bed. She told my mother "but I just wanna spend time together" and together as in with the computer. We laughed and told her you don't spend time with computers but with people. But when you think about it, we as Americans and do spend a lot of our time with objects, machines, things that can be taken away and shouldn't really affect us but yet they run our lives.

Todd Gitlin is a writer that wrote "Supersaturation, or, The media Torrent and Disposable Feeling". Gitlin writes about how the media we are exposed to is an unstoppable force that we cannot fight against. We receive thousands of images and messages each day; many have subliminal messages we never notice. We replace painting that we like or that have history behind them with just something that everybody is liking at the time.

Today Vermeer's equivalent, if we were painting domestic scenes, or shooting a spread for vanity fair, or directing a commercials or movies, would also display his figures against a background of images; and his work appeared on screen, there is a good chance that he would mix in a soundtrack as well. (p 355)

Gitlin wants us to challenge ourselves and think outside the box on a higher level. He is saying that painting are still and your mind has the room to be still and look at the painting as a whole and begin to understand it piece by piece. But with the scenes we put in front of our eyes now there is just to much going on. There is a cluster of images sounds and meaning, our mind just become clustered as well and then we are no longer thinking clearly and for ourselves. We stop using our mental filter and allow anything to enter our already over capacitated minds.

A mental filter also does not exist when it comes to eating disorders. Susan Bordo wrote the article "The Globalization of Eating Disorders". Bordo writes how body image, culture, and media influence what the standard of beauty is to young girls and women. This mentality lead to eating disorders and it is a problem that is growing. The media tells people what is popular and appealing, anything other than that is less and unworthy. Many of these images are not really true at all, and girls begin to compare themselves to superficial, fake women. And after they compare what they see they realize that it dose not match with their body image. But what we fail to realize is that the women that are really that small or look how they do on television in real life only make up a small percentage of the people in the world. This handful of women by no means defines what is normal and or average.

Not feeling good about your body and who you are as a person is unhealthy and deadly. This sickness that is spreading through our minds is not being passed around by a sneeze or air borne