Entry One

A paper written the fall semester
of my Sophomore year in
English 1000

Social Experience: The Comfort of Control

“…The chief effect of television is passivity and dependence.”

-Dr. Eugene David Glynn (Seldes 48)

Media has an overwhelming effect on today’s society. The choices we make about what we wear, how we act and what we feel are all made with some regard to current trends in television shows, newspaper articles, and other forms of communication. But to what extent do we as individuals in a world dependent on its technological advances allow the media to control our actions and emotions? In a time where pain and suffering has become such a widespread experience, where does our desire to know the truth end and our need to nullify pain take over? To answer these questions the definition of “control” in the media must be established. How exactly does what we watch and read and experience control our lives? And what advantage does that pose to those feeding us this information?

In an example given by writer Gilbert Seldes, October 30, 1938 was a day where thousands simultaneously experienced a very real but unwarranted panic. The broadcast of H.G. Wells’ fiction “War of the Worlds” on the radio is a prime example of how the media can influence the reactions of the world in astonishing ways. Even though it was stated several times that the broadcast was speaking of fictional events, people all over the world were terrified at the thought of being invaded by a hostile species from another world (Seldes 47). Had society not been so dependant of the veracity of radio broadcasts, there may not have been such a dramatic reaction. This is evidence that although the ones responsible for the broadcast may not have intended for it to be taken seriously, the combination of people’s dependence on the radio and the events of the current time created a very real reaction. In a similar instance, actor Clark Gable took off his shirt in a film. His chest was bare which was surprising to the viewers of the time period. Undershirt sales dropped drastically since it seemed more appealing to only wear one layer of clothing on your upper body (Seldes 47). Consumers responded to this actor’s actions because of his fame. We see evidence of control even today. There is a commercial that plays on television supporting the efforts being made in stopping terrorism. It makes several good points about the dangers of the fanatic minds that want America destroyed. But to strengthen their position, they bring into their equation the fact that the religion of the citizens of the Middle East degrade and oppress their women. This is an invalid addition to the commercial. The religious beliefs of people in the Middle East have nothing to do with acts of terrorism. The people who made this commercial perhaps wanted to create a greater sense of injustice by mentioning the fact that women in the middle east are treated unjustly. The control the media has over today’s society is a combination of presentation and the willingness of people to accept.

Presentation is key when it comes to creating something that the world will consume. Whether it is a food product or a film or even an event in the news. With current news it becomes difficult to define the line between portraying actual truth and edited truth. In many cases, the event being covered is presented in a truthful way. In Seldes book, Mass Media: The New Challenge to a Free Society, He discusses how in news coverage there are certain rules to be followed. There are several including that the truth be told, that it not be distorted by opinion and that human judgment will inevitably enter the equation but can be countered by ones experience (Seldes 33). But Seldes goes on to discuss how even these rules can be worked around. This is especially true for newspaper and magazine articles. “…An introduction like ‘There’s good news tonight’ has a different effect from ‘This is the news’” (Seldes 34). Despite the truthfulness of the news, there is always an omission of fact. Unfortunately, news time is limited there has to be judgment towards what qualifies as news and what does not. The result it that there seems to be a lot more violent and negative events presented than anything else. Someone is more likely to pick up a paper that reads, “Death of young child leaves authorities baffled” rather than one that says, “Price of corn increases.”

Then there are television shows. They too have a certain way they are exhibited to the public. “A capitalist society…needs to furnish vast amounts of entertainment in order to stimulate buying and anesthetize the injuries of class, race and sex” (Sontag 178). Even more so than films, these works of fiction have a tendency to help us escape from the truth of our own lives. Selde says this about films: “…The core of the fiction have a truth, an ideal, a thought which is relevant to human experience…of the movies we never say [this is lifelike] because we feel ‘this is what life is’” (Seldes 22). This comment applies more to television than it does to movies in today’s society now that movies aspire to be more real and shocking. When we sit down to watch our favorite show, we are always looking for an escape from the events we have to deal with every day. This is especially true for comedies and “feel good” family shows. When we watch the events of fictional characters we can forget our own problems. In comedies we seek humor to stifle bad emotions. In feel good family programs we want to see the event of the characters unfold and eventually resolve the way we wish our lives could. Even with drama’s we look to excite our minds and senses so that we can forget the events of the day. In short, we go to television programs to dull the pain and frustration of everyday life. We wouldn’t watch a show if it showed how life never goes right and never resolves.

The film The Truman Show presents an excellent example of how acceptance plays an important role in this idea of control. The character of Christof says about Truman, “He can leave anytime. If it was more than just a vague ambition, if he was absolutely determined to discover the truth, there’s no way we could prevent him from leaving…Truman prefers his ‘cell’…” The idea that people enjoy control and being restricted by what the media presents may be a poor way of putting it. The better word for this complacency is “comfort”. People in the world today would much rather be told what is going on outside their homes than discover it for themselves. The truth of the events going on around the globe may be made more real through technological advances, but they still hold a certain detachment for us. Rather than be in the thick of things we feel more comfortable being passive observers allowing the impact of events to register but not let the truth of them seep into our life’s purpose. Another quote by Christof about the fictional world of Sea Haven and the world outside it illustrates this. “There’s no more truth out there than there is in the world I created for you. Same lies. The same deceit. But in my world, you have nothing to fear.” Christof believes that the world he has kept Truman from is a “sick” place full of corruption and lies. In a way that is what the media is trying to express to us. Out there in the real world there is war and pain and anguish and death. But here in the world we create for you have nothing to fear. It’s terrible, the goings on out there, but they cant reach you where you live. So take comfort in you T.V. where the trouble is miles away from your life.

To be fair, there is another side to all this. There are those in the world who devote their lives to seeking the truth. In our day, documentaries have become more and more popular and Bill Nichols addresses this in Epistephilia. He states that documentaries stimulate a kind of “social engagement”. “The engagement stems from the rhetorical force of an argument about the very world we inhabit. We are moved to confront a topic, issue, situation or event that bears the mark of historically ‘real’”. And there are now T.V. shows like The Colbert Report and The daily Show that insert opinion into the events of the world and all truths are explored. We are not always content to be complacent and comfortable. We can be stirred into action especially when the events hit so close to home. A prime example is September 11^th. An attack on U.S. soil caused an uproar and an increase in security and fear. People started taking more interest in the events going on around the world because they directly affected our daily lives. Here the control takes another turn. We are shown terrible events that go on in our own country more so than other countries. This of course makes sense being that we are mostly worried about problems that are occurring on American soil. But because of this the media separates us from the world and creates a gap in our awareness. This all goes back to comfort. We allow this and accept because we don’t like to have terrible events thrust into our faces and our busy lives. They make us feel just guilty enough to be uncomfortable but not enough to push us into action.

As technology increases, our perceptions of the world change. There is no helping that. McLuhan says, “The medium, or process, of our time-electric technology-is reshaping and restructuring patterns of social interdependence and every aspect of our personal life. It is forcing us to reconsider and reevaluate practically every thought, every action, and every institution formally taken for granted” (McLuhan 8). We can become more connected with the world as a whole through advances in the Internet. The “control” is lessening and our desire to break from our “cell” and discover the truth is becoming stronger. “Whenever we consider the effect of the mass media on the citizen and on the individual who wishes to exercise independence of mind, we should consider this question: Is an un- or semi-informed, an intellectually and/or emotionally retarded public ultimately a danger to the independent individual?” (Seldes 4). Seldes’ discussion of the possible danger of the media to the individual mind creates an interesting argument. Through our want of comfort from the world the darkness it falls deeper into, the individual mind is in danger of becoming just like those that are complacent. Conformity is the easiest path and our minds are so impressionable. With the progression of technology it becomes so easy to access information that it is often hard to determine what is fact and what is fiction. And the individual mind is put under pressure to be able to determine what it believes and not what the world believes. There comes a time when we must realize that we cannot enclose ourselves in our own safe, comfortable and controlled worlds. When we must see beyond what is fed to us and look into ourselves to find that which is true instead of that which makes us feel good.

This was probably the best of the papers I wrote for that class. By best, I mean most interesting and most supported.
This class was immensly interesting and made me explore media and our relationship to it in a whole new light.