I have included the following videos for your learning pleasures. As you watch them, please be mindful of the following prompts:
- What criticism does the video make of the mass media?
- What conflict exist between the mass media and its public?
- What traits/features of the mass media does the video highlight and attack?
- What are your thoughts on the videos?
I invite you to post your comments on these videos for our sharing and discussion by Sunday 22 March 2009. Review and reflect on each other's thoughts and opinions.
Thank you and best regards
Mr Low
Video 1: The effects of the mass media on American women
Video 2: The Hypnotic Effects of Television & The Mass Effect
VIDEO 1
ReplyDeleteIn Video 1, “The effects of The Mass Media on American Women,” it criticizes that The Mass Media creates a certain image that young girls are meant to portray and how this makes life difficult for the average teenage girl to grow up. According to the video, the message portrayed by The Mass Media, “Fit in or fail miserably is stamped everywhere.” This causes the teenage girl to have difficulties when transacting into adult hood as The Mass Media portrays so many images which young girls are meant to uphold and this makes it difficult for them to grow up. In the video, it mentions that magazines are the only medium where girls are overrepresented. 70% of the editorial content in teen magazines focuses on beauty and fashion and only about 12% on school or careers. The content in magazines is also hypocritical as they tell girls what to wear but then they say respect people for what they choose to be like. This confuses the teenager.
The conflict between The Mass Media and the public is that what The Mass Media portrays the American Women to be clashes with what the American Women wants to be. This creates a lot of pressure for the women in society as they have so many people to please. Women are given a huge number of roles to fill, from business women to models to the perfect wife.
The traits of The Mass Media that the video highlights and attacks is that The Mass Media wants women to behave in a certain way and The Mass Media displays women in ways that the society in general wants women to be and The Mass Media only portrays that one view. This opposes the view that each individual American Woman wants to be. The women in society are pressured to behave in such ways as The Mass Media places so much emphasis on beauty and fashion and less on achieving your dreams and goals. The Mass Media creates a stereotype of women and expects them to live up to that expectation.
I feel that this video is a good one as it brings across the importance of how The Mass Media is “Brainwashing” women to act in a certain way. This restricts the women in society from being individuals who want to stand out and make a difference.
VIDEO 2
In video 2, “The Hypnotic Effects of Television and The Mass Effect, “it criticises that television hypnotises people in a way and this creates a robotic society. Hypnosis is a simple way of inducing a trance like state and we all have the ability of entering into a trance. Television is something like hypnosis as by watching it, “it creates a unified mindset among the entire population.” By watching television, “it builds into us a condition response so that we will respond automatically without thinking.” This creates a one-minded society. An example the video gives is with news reporters. In the video it states that the speech patterns of a news reporter are similar to that of hypnosis’s. The news caster also looks directly into the camera and into the eyes of the viewer. This is a similar technique used by hypnosis’s.
The conflict that exists between The Mass Media and its pubic is that the public may not agree with the views of The Mass Media but they are “Brainwashed” to do so and they do not really have a firm ground to explain their views because The Mass Media is still in charge. This is because of the hypnotic effects of the television. Viewers are conditioned to think in such ways.
The traits of The Mass Media that the video highlights and attacks is that information is passed down from one person to one person and eventually to the masses but no one knows for sure if it is true. Information is just repeated from one person to the next and in a way it is like propaganda. An example given in the video is in the case of doctors. They pass down information that they learn in medical school to their patients because they believe that what they have learnt is true. They are forced to believe what they learn in medical school is true and thus when they pass down this information to their patients, their patient’s think what the doctor says is true because he is a doctor. The patients’ minds are conditioned to think that just because he is a doctor, what he says must be true.
I feel that the video highlights an important aspect of television and that it does “hypnotise “us in a way. Therefore, we need to question what we hear and find out for ourselves whether what we read and hear is true. We cannot always accept what information we receive, even if what we hear comes from a very professional person. We have to be alert and aware of what information is passed down to us.
Vanisha:)
The Effects of the Mass Media on American Women
ReplyDeleteThe video criticises the fact that the Mass Media preys on young children for example, by the fact that the average American girl watches about 80 000 ads before kindergarten. Not only that but the fact that this, is further backed by the fact that Saturday morning cartoons alone come with 33 commercials per hour means that the ads itself focus on the young children. At an age where their brain is still developing, is this really a good idea?
The Mass Media also gives a stereotype of girls all the while telling them that they have to be themselves. For example, this is showed by commercials that show girls, majority of the time doing indoor activities while boys, on the other hand are portrayed doing outdoor activities most of the time. This tells me that the Mass Media has an assumption that girls should stay at home and boys should stay outside. However, is this true for all cases?
All forms of Mass Media also have more male characters that greatly outnumber the number of female characters. This is true in all cases except when it comes to magazines where females are overly represented. The Mass Media also states their own image of what girls are like. For example, the fact that 70% of the material in magazines are about fashion and beauty while only 12% talks about school or careers. This tells me that the Mass Media “believes “that girls care more about beauty as compared to brains.
All in all, the Mass Media gives an outline as to what they expect the classic American girl to be like through mediums like magazines and sitcoms all the while sending messages out to them to be themselves. This is conflicting not to say the least especially to girls that are making the transcend from childhood to adulthood. At a young age, would they be able to form opinions easily or just follow the crowd and become the perfect American girl stereotype?
Therefore, I believe that it is important for the women, to forge their own opinion. For if they truly believe in their ideals, regardless of what the Mass Media portrays women as, they will still stand steadfast to their beliefs and the Mass Media will do less harm.
The Hypnotic Effects of Television & the Mass Effect
This video criticises the fact that that television can “hypnotize” people thought the clever use of advertisements, programmes and make the people, more open to suggestions, creating a unified mindset with conditioned responses. This can be seen from the example given in which sometimes, people buy items without knowing why they bought them. This is also a tool in which many companies use to increase their sales.
Hypnotizing someone causes a mental transaction into which a person will focus their attention and stop being critical to suggestions made by the third party. It is the natural way of inducing a trance like state that everyone has. For example, in news, the newscaster always looks into the camera, therefore making it seem that they are looking into your eyes and uses a patterned speech that hypnotists use. They are merely repeating information in which their higher ups tell them and that they assume is true and deliver the news to everyone in the country. Since they have not been there , how would they know what they are saying is the truth and not some lie coughed up by the government to make people believe that what they are saying is a fact to make their people side with them?
Everything that everyone knows is due to the existence of “repeaters”. They can be school teachers, who repeat what they learnt from exams, and the training colleges, doctors who repeat what they learnt from drug companies and medical school and lots more. They are all around us. If there is a mistake in what they learnt, the same mistake will be repeated through generations as they teach the young what they learnt from their seniors.
This causes a mass effect in which the entire population will eventually, be it now or later, learn the exact same thing and errors that the previous generation made. This mass effect also causes the public to criticise the fact that they have been brainwashed into doing some things, buying some things or even thinking in certain ways as if that is the case, we, the public are merely puppets that follow what the government or other people want us to do or think.
Therefore, in order not to sway to the opinions of other people so easily, we have to have our own opinion in everything we do and not believe what others say easily but try to separate the truth from the information given. This will help to ensure that we will not get “brainwashed” easily and prevent the mass effect from spreading through you and me.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe video critizies the mass media for affecting the behavior of females in the modern world. The mass media has portrayed and fed girls with so much information about how they should learn to be the perfect and classic american model which includes finding love,being successful and being funny and most importantly to be able to fit into the modern society. This not only pressurizes girls mentally, but also physically and that it is enough to drive any sane girl into conformity. The video also stated that the mass media is making girls into believing that being yourself is not the right way to “fit in” and that girls should follow the trends that the mass media are portraying in order to do so.
ReplyDeleteThe conflict is that how a normal girl should grow up is heavily affected by the mass media as they often send mixed messages portraying HOW a girl SHOULD grow up to be like and not how SHE herself would want to. This is also why the video says that the label “fit in or fail miserably” is stamped everywhere.
The video focuses heavily on one point about the mass media; It only affects girls in a negative way. This is assumed by the narrator as with every factor she talks about, only negative effects are begin mentioned while positive effects are not. One such point she made is that the mass media clearly did not send the approperiate messages across; almost all forms of television programmes consists of male characters outnumbering female characters to the ratio of 2:3. Magazines are the only few forms of the mass media where most girls are over-represented however, 70% of which focuses on beauty and fashion and only 12% talks about school or careers
I agree with every single statement the video has made. It is one of the very few videos that encourages girls to be themselves and not what the mass media “wants” them to.
Video 1:
ReplyDeleteThis video criticizes the mass media for sending conflicting messages to the public. For example, it has advertisements telling people how they should dress but also say that we must respect people for what they choose to be. However, by having advertisements telling us what people should wear, it outcasts those who choose to be different which makes it difficult for others to respect them. This is because majority of the people would wear what is portrayed on the advertisements making those who don't stick out like sore thumbs.
In addition, the video also criticizes the mass media for encouraging women to think only about fashion or beauty- that they are just objects to be seen. This can be seen from the video which claims that 70% of editorial content available focuses on beauty and fashion.
Another criticism is that the mass media makes it difficult for people to decide what kind of person they want to be. This is because the mass media creates many cultural expectations which most people need to fulfil.
Conflicts exist between the mass media and the public as well. For example, the public accept teenage stars as role models. However, the mass media portrays these "role models" partying, drinking and taking drugs all the way until they are slammed into a posh rehab centre. These actions are what most people would shy away from,and yet their supposed role models are doing it.
The video highlights the fact that most of the characters in television are mostly male. Television is also claimed to follow stereotypes closely- females remain inside fulfilling superficial roles such as talking, laughing and observing. However, males are shown to be located outside doing more strenuous activities.
I felt that this video was good in its criticism on the mass media and its effects on teenage girls but also felt that it was one sided. The title of the video was the Effect of media. Yet it only showed the bad effects of media. In doing this, this video implied that there are only bad effects of media which I felt was not entirely true.
Video 1 showed us how the mass media targets adolescence, the young and impressionable, especially teenage girls. Being exposed to many advertisements since young, their minds have been shaped to think that being beautiful is to follow the latest fashion. The mass media stresses on the importance of physical appearance of girls, and many do not realise that is just an idealistic view. The various forms of mass media such magazines and the television have very little content relating to school and careers, and have little educational value. They have conflicting views on how females should present themselves and how others should respect girls for who they really are. The video also critised the mass media for pressurizing young girls into living up to certain expectations in the different culture and explains that it is already difficult for teenagers to cope with the transition from teen hood into adulthood. In addition, the mass media lacks of good role models for the girls to learn from. Those featured on the magazines and tabloids are infamous for committing vices like consuming illegal drugs, and it might cause young girls to follow suit. Video 2 gives us an explanation on the hypnosis effect that advertisements have on us. The video critises that the advertisements on televisions influence the minds of consumers, leading them to buy more than they should with seemingly attractive offers. Such advertisements may be considered as a form of propaganda.
ReplyDeleteThe conflict here is that the mass media does not provide the public with the kind of information they expect. Traits such introducing information that taps on certain insecurities of the public are common in the mass media.
I feel that the videos have been effective in highlighting the negative influences of the mass media, although they should include some positive features of the mass media, like the ability to identify emerging or recurring trends in the society and providing discussion forums as to how to manage it.
In the first video, Media: The effect, it criticises on the media evolving into something that "decides" what girls should be like. It also criticises on how sexist the media really is. Girls who want to be themselves are unable to do so due to the overwhelming effect of the media. The video is trying to spread the awareness of how the media is negatively affecting girls from a young age. In my opinion, the startling facts of the video indicates how vital and difficult it is to be yourself in a world where the media is able to confront and influence young girls.
ReplyDeleteIn the second video, it criticises on the media and how its able to "hypnotise" us into believing what the media tells us. It also criticises on companies and government officials who manipulate the media into making us believe their propaganda. The public wants and what the media actually delivers is actually contradicting. The media are really "repeating" what they heard without a clue if its right or not. The video is attacking the way the media functions and how it misleads the public away from what we percieve as the "truth".
HI THIS IS NATASYA IN CASE YOU ARE WONDERING WHO PEANART IS. (I thought the username was private, but apparently not. Sorry I am techno clueless)
ReplyDeleteThe first video criticises the mass media for its bombardment of television commercials on youngsters and its negative impact on them. In addition to that the video also criticises the practice of sexism in the mass media. Females are potrayed as the lesser being- appearing onscreen 2 to 3 times less than boys. When girls do appear, they are often involved in “no thinking” activities. By doing this, the mass media portrays a stereotyped and prejudiced perception of the female gender. The mass media plays up on the “fit in” image that one has to attain – a tall order for an average person.
In this sense, there is a conflict between what is reel and real. The media portrays family, success, love and fun as the classic American model. However, this does not always happen in real life. Such exaggerated and “perfect” images can only cause disillusion among youngsters who are impressionable and naïve.
The video attacks the hypocritical feature of the media which blasts viewers with its values and synthetic lifestyles. For example, magazines tell us how to look and dress up. But at the same time, we are expected to respect everyone for who they are.
I feel that the video addresses only on the negative aspect of the mass media. While I agree that some of the issues mentioned are valid, the issues raised are one- sided. It is true that today, youths (including me) are always on the look out for the latest gossip or tv shows- many of which are non-beneficial to our intellect. Yes, the mass media is responsible for brainwashing us with their superficial standards. However, as youths, we must not be so gullible as to accept everything that comes our way. We should be able to distinguish values or standards that are practical and real from those which are absurd.
The second video criticises the mass media for the “hypnosis” effect it puts on the public. Messages or images shown in the mass media is distributed without the public having any say. There is no room for arguments. We are expected to accept and digest their propagandas continously.
The conflict which arises is that although mass media is for the great numbers of people, it is being controlled by only a small group of people. They have control in the everything we watch, read or listen.
The above trait of the mass media is heavily attacked in the video because it forces the masses to eat up whatever information served to them. Journalists act as “repeaters” Information being passed to them about the ongoings in the parliament, for example, are passed to us. Whether the information is accurate or authentic, the public do not know.
The video does make a good point that mass media in a sense is propaganda because we, as viewers are only able to listen, read, watch then digest. However, this argument is limited because today there are many outlets for us to question or retort to the media. There are shows such as Larry King Live where viewers are able to give their thoughts and opinions about situations or happenings. By giving our comments on this video we are able to counter the man’s argument in the video rather then just taking in whatever he is saying.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThe first video criticizes the hypocritical stand that the mass media portrays women are suppose to conform to. Are they suppose to be physically beautiful and vain? Or are they suppose to just be themselves and forget what other people are saying? Indeed, like what Vanisha said, it gets very confusing for the average girl who are still maturing and discovering themselves without having to meet the various expectations that the media are displaying women to be like. Also, the video gave an example that the majority of the content about women in magazines are about beauty and fashion, whilst only a small percentage talk about school and careers. This, I feel, is a showcase of sexism against the women in the media, devaluing their roles and capabilities in the real world. Additionally, the fact that a large amount of time spent by the average American girl before they even enter kindergarten is watching TV is worrying because of the negative influence the media might have on the impressionable minds of the young.
ReplyDeleteFor me, I think that the statistics mentioned here highlights the serious issue about the stereotypical image the media is portraying women to be. It is quite shocking, really and this is a good video to make people more aware of the negative influences of the media.
The second video, however, criticizes hypnotic effects of the television. It highlights newsreaders as an example with the way they look straight into the eye of the camera while delivering the news. Because of these hypnotic effects, people tend to absorb the information transmitted and take it as the truth. However, the newsreaders and journalists are merely repeating what is told to them by the government so that this information is conveyed to the public. This is propaganda. What Gabriel said is very true. In the end, what the public expects from the media and what the media delivers are completely different.
In my opinion, this video is slightly cynical about the media. Looking straight into the camera while newsreading is important so as to have a connection with the viewers which does not necessarily mean hypnosis. Viewers won't necessarily go into a trance once they are stare straight into the eye of the newsreader on TV. Hence, people are not wholly hypnotised by television. I think that they are still able to think for themselves and come to a weighed conclusion. They are still able to make the choice whether or not to believe what they watch.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete1st video:
ReplyDeleteThe video critisizes the mass media on it's warpped idea of how young girls can 'fit in' or conform to society. This warpped idea also possesses a very sexist opinon of how girls SHOULD be in society. Also, the mass media also contradicts itself by dictating how girls should grow up, yet telling them also to grow up however they please. At such an impressionable age, girls would naturally follow the easiest way to fit in, which is how the mass media has portrayed them to be. "Pretty" in the mass media's sense and bimbotic. I feel that this video has done the right thing in attacking the negative influences that the mass media has. However, i think that perhaps the video could also advise parents on how to educate their child properly, to discern what is true and untrue in the mass media and in society. If however, the parents too have been affected since young, then what hope do we have in undoing what the mass media has done?
Video 2:
The video critisizes the mass media on it's hypnotic effect on the public. This effect has consumers buying products, some of which are useless to the consumers, and making the public believe that whatever is brought to them through the news, is the truth. This, in a way, is feeding the public propaganda. The public has absolutely no idea what is going on in the world so they would have to rely on the mass media for the news. I really like the part about being 'repeaters', where everything that is taught or said, is just repeated from its source, which is quite true. Unless you are in the situation, you would just take in whatever is given to you, delier it to others as if you really know what goes on, and this 'trend' continues. I agree that we just take in what the mass media tells us, however as what Natasya has said, this is a limited argument. Yes there are now ways to voice your opinons and provide your insight, or the correct insight, as to what is really going on in the world. I believe that we as viewers should not be taken in so easily. We have also got to find out by ourselves what is the real situation and not be gullible to take in what is told to us. We need to be able to discern for ourselves what is true and untrue.
Video One
ReplyDeleteThis video critises the Mass Media on how they stereotype how young girls should look like and how they should behave. The girls are not even yet past puberty but they are caring about how the world looks at them already. The Mass Media also practises sexism, like how girls should be doing things that revolve no thinking which ultimately make girls seem bimbotic. The Mass Media makes girls feel that only by following the fad, they will be able to fit in with their friends and the society. And thus, they conform.
Video Two
The video explains the hypnotic effect the Mass Media has on the viewers. Viewers are usually taken in and accept all the information the Mass Media provide to us. It says that the information is merely repeated again and again by people, from the source wholesale. Viewers need to be able to learn how to diffrentiate the truths and the twisted facts.
2nd Video
ReplyDeleteThe video critises the reliability of mass video and that viewers should not trust what they see and hear from it. In addition, the mass media has a hypnotic effect that makes viewers believe and trust whatever information they got from it.
The conflict existing here is that the wants of the public are not satisfied by the media because what the media has delivered totally contradicts their wants.
It highlights the fact that whatever the journalists are reporting are from what they hear and what other people say. They themselves have no clue, whether the information is accurate.
The journalists/reporters are just doing their job of delivering whatever information they acquired to the masses and it is entirely up to the viewers to discern from what is fact and what is not.
The second video focuses its attention on the television, which is part of the mass media.
ReplyDeleteThe video criticizes the television for its usage of hypnotising techniques. In order for propagandists and advertisers to sell their ideas and products respectively, they induce the viewers' hypnotic state of mind, making them focus their attention, stop being critical, become more open to suggestions and favourable to the messages brought across. This is done by griefing the circumstances the viewers are in. This is when viewers will slip into a trance-like state. Newcasters look directly into the viewers' eyes, which is another hypnotising technique.
When viewers slip into a trance-like state while watching the same commercial or speech, they will begin to have a unified and congruent set of mind. This means that the advertisers and propagandists have seeped their desired messages into the targetted groups after successfully hypnotising them.
Agreeing with what Vanisha mentioned earlier, the whole process of hypnotising actually creates a robotic society. This is what many governments aim for - to gain the control of everybody in the country. This brings us to the next part of the video, in which it criticizes the way information are being distributed. The system which distributes information is controlled by influential repeaters, such as newscasters, teachers and journalists.
The video claims that journalists themselves don't know the truth behind the events they're reporting on. All they do is to repeat what they've been told by the higher orders. When viewers watch the news, they slip into the trance-like state and take in whatever has been said by the jornalists. In a way or another, the propagandists have successfully spread their messages.
This video on "The Hypnotic Effects of Television & The Mass Effect" is being far too critical on the effects of television. It sounded as though the producers of the video have never and will never touch a TV in their life. Although I agree that hypnotising is a method used by advertisers and propagandists to spread their messages, not all of the messages sent out by them are undesirable or harmful after all. Encouraging speeches made by the U.S. Government on TV following the 911 attack shouldn't be plainly viewed as a cover-up. Those speeches in fact united the nation as they overcame the ordeal together.
Video one : The video criticizes that The Mass Media had made a negative effect of the development of teenage girls to adulthood. Teenage girls find it difficult to be themselves. The message "fit in or fail miserably" is stamped everywhere and it only pressurises girls to be accepted in the society.
ReplyDeleteAccording to the video, 70 percent of the magazines in America focuses on beauty and fashion, whereas only 12 percent focuses on school and work. Magazines teach girls how to dress , or even how they should look like. Its difficult for girls to live up to the expectations in a society where everyone expects so much of them.
The video is actually a showcase of sexism in the media. Girls are expected to fufil so much expectations of themselves. Girls would tend to feel that the mass media is setting an example of how they should be like and look like. This actually has a negative effect on their development to adult hood. It makes them materalistic and they would tend to go after unmaterialistic things like fashion as a result which coincidentally, their favorite celebrity had worn. Its very pressurizing for them to remain in 'tip top condition' always. Fashion always changes and its difficult to keep up with this ever changing trend.
I feel that as teenagers, we should be able to distinguish what is right and what is wrong. We should not believe everything that The Mass Media shows and follow blindly just because we feel that it is our 'ideal' role model.
The video is also being one sided as it shows only the negative effects of the Mass Media.