As a child, I grew up sickly with asthma. I would sit and stare at the TV for hours on end, literally drool at all the televisions shows, in a mindless zombie-like fashion, not willing to move because I might miss something. Yet, still today, I cannot even remember the names of most of those TV shows. I don’t know what it was that made me so addicted to television, but I could not stop watching. After reading Neil Postman “The Ring Around the Collar” where he sarcastically defines one TV ad as “religious parables”, (Postman 68) I found it to be an eye-opening experience. Postman shows how advertisers use media in a religious context to control the masses, where consumers are considered to be a sinner unless they purchased their products. Being that there are five million products on TV, consumers sin a lot. Then, through this process, consumers are only redeemed by purchasing their product and then you are immediately cast into a heaven-like environment. Basically, this whole idea of television persuasion is based and preyed upon consumers need or even fear to be socially accepted. In addition, Marie Winn’s essay, “Television: The Plug- IN Drug”, depicts how American family structures are being depleted because of the influences of television. Having a TV in the home takes away the intricate interactions that families need to assure a healthy structure. Television disrupts bonding growth and an overall nurturing environment is detrimental to a family’s self-worth. In analysis of these two perspectives, I can acknowledge that TV has immensely impacted our social structure, but I believe it is the just another way of social manipulation. In general, most television ads give a false reality, deplete self-worth, and take ...
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...w see how TV uses social acceptance to influence people to perform or to buy things by instilling a lack of self-worth, advisement manipulation, and sales tricks, such as Postman’s “religious parable.” We are forever changed by TV and TV advertisement. We talk about them, we relate to them, we are influenced by them, but we should not let them dictate our lives. It is a big world out there. My advice to all is to turn off the TV and go outside. See the world for what it is, in all its intricate beauty.
Works Cited
AT&T U-Verse, Advertisement. ABC. 31 January 2011. Televison.
Cohen, Samuel. ed. 50 Essays: A Portable Anthology. 2nd ed. Boston: Bedford/ St.
Martin’s. 2007
Postman, Neil “The Parable of Ring Around the Collar.” Conscientious Objection: Stirring
Up Trouble about Language, Technology and Education. New York, Vintage books. 1992
66-71
Postman has valid points when he claims that television and media are destroying the American society. Postman is right to assume that television is manipulating the way Americans think. However, television can provide Americans with both right and wrong morals. Since this book was written in 1985, Postman could not have predicted the influence technology has on the current American population. The theory he applies to television is similar to the theory he probably would have used on modern day media. The dependency we have on media reiterates Postman’s thesis that Americans are losing critical thinking skills and basic human values.
Consumerism is the idea that influences people to purchase items in great amounts. Consumerism makes trying to live the life of a “perfect American” rather difficult. It interferes with society by replacing the normal necessities for life with the desire for things with not much concern for the true value of the desired object. Children are always easily influenced by what they watch on television. Swimme suggests in his work “How Do Kids Get So Caught Up in Consumerism” that although an advertiser’s objective is to make money, the younger generation is being manipulated when seeing these advertisements. Before getting a good understanding of a religion, a child will have seen and absorbed at least 30,000 advertisements. The amount of time teenagers spend in high school is lesser than the amount of advertisement that they have seen (155). The huge amount of advertisements exposed to the younger generation is becomi...
The many evils that exist within television’s culture were not foreseen back when televisions were first put onto the market. Yet, Postman discovers this very unforgiveable that the world did not prepare itself to deal with the ways that television inherently changes our ways of communication. For example, people who lived during the year 1905, could not really predict that the invention of a car would not make it seem like only a luxurious invention, but also that the invention of the car would strongly affect the way we make decisions.
It leads inevitably to narcissism and solipsism”. Kilborune also makes a point about how quickly advertisements can really affect a culture that is not consumerist in nature. Kilbourne notes the Gwish’in tribe, a tribe in Alaska, who were first exposed to television in 1980. Within ten years consumerism had taken over the original culture of the tribe, “Beaded moccasins gave way to Nike sneakers, and ‘tundra tea’ to Folger’s instant coffee”.
In an article ' The Plug-In Drug ' the author Marie Winn discusses the bad influence of television on today's society. Television is a ' drug ' that interfere with family ritual, destroys human relationships and undermines the family.
With nearly global use of the television; it has become a preferred method with which to influence and regulate people’s thinking, creating an unreal and idealistic, hypothetical reality which people strive to emulate. This is accomplished through shows and movies; the majority of which emphasize a perfect world, entirely free of corruption and poverty; where everyone is physically attractive, emotionally stable, and economically wealthy; a distorted reflection of our own world. This leads real people to attempt to create this imaginary world, only to fail; thus generating in themselves a sense of unworthiness, which in turn prompts them to try harder, to stop being individuals and become uniform.
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Whether consciously aware of what is being displayed or not, media plays a substantial role in influencing consumption patterns and lifestyle. Researchers noted television's power to influence even people who are illiterate. Smith-Speck and Roy (2008) explained that even individua...
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