To receive full credit, these blog assignments must be posted by SUNDAY night, May 2nd at midnight. Thanks for a great semester, good luck on finals and have a wonderful summer!
1. Self Evaluation
Blog a 5 paragraph summary of your learning and growth during the course OR create a "Top 10 List" of specific things you learned about media literacy from our course, using 2-3 sentences for each. Finally, ask 3 specific questions you still are thinking about. What was significant for you? How have you changed since experiencing something read/viewed/discussed/experienced in this class? Did something move you to action? How do you relate the course content to your own life and future work? How does this affect your vision of the earth or society? What is your role in promoting the ideas and concepts of media literacy?
2. Inspiration for Activists:
People say, what is the sense of our small effort?
They cannot see that we must
lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time.
A pebble cast out into a pond causes ripples
that spread in all directions.
Each one of our thoughts, words and deeds is like that.
No one has the right to sit down and feel hopeless.
There’s too much work to do.
- Dorothy Day
1. Self Evaluation
ReplyDeleteI would like to start with this was my favorite class I have taken while at UVM, and I have learned so much. Going into this course I dint really know what to expect. I have always had bad feelings about the media and what it was doing, but I never really knew what it really was. I think my biggest problem with the media is its views on women and how they should look. The media seems to have such a hold on what people should look and act like, and it kills me to think that people actually fall into that trap. By taking this class, it has only made me want for media literacy to be spread throughout more schools and be taught at younger ages. I regret not learning this stuff earlier on in life, because if I did, I would probably would have had a whole different view on the media earlier on in life.
I think the most important thing I learned in class was that things don’t need to be the way they are, and it is up to us to make a difference. Regarding the media, they will only change when we make and effort to make the change, because if we don’t, nothing will ever happen and we will just keep being disappointed in what the media is doing. I think one of the most surprising things I learned this semester was all of the negativity towards Disney. I have always thought of Disney as this wonderful, happy, perfect company. I don’t think that I could ever hate Disney, but I think my views are permanently altered but I don’t think that that is for worst. I am happy for the little pieces of knowledge I gained throughout this class such as things like this. Simple things like that will help me along the way and just help me have a deeper understanding of the media surrounded world we live in.
I know that my education in media literacy has grown dramatically since the beginning of the class. I have learned so much and I now find myself very aware of the media surrounding me. I can’t watch a TV show or movie without being critical about the little messages they send out. But I don’t consider this a bad thing, I have come to terms with this growth as a good thing because now I am just a lot more educated and aware of the world around me. This growth has helped me understand a whole lot more and just makes me want to talk about it with my friends and family because they know so little about the negative impacts of media.
I have found myself on many occasions talking about the negative images the media sends out and how they have this set view of what people should be. I plan to spread the knowledge I have learned and help my friends and family understand that what the media portrays isn’t the only answer. This past weekend I found myself in a conversation with my best friend talking about how she feels that she needs to dress and act a certain way because of how everyone else does. I told her she doesn’t need to be that way, and all she could respond with was how she NEEDED to because otherwise she would have no friends. I plan on making her my first victim of a media detox this summer and try and tell her how she doesn’t need to follow this “norm” that the media makes there out to be. I mean the media isn’t the worst thing, but the fact that some people are just consumed by magazines, facebook, television and what not, it makes it almost seem that it is an awful thing.
I don’t think I could be anymore grateful for the knowledge I gained in this class. If I didn’t take this class who knows what I would be doing now. I have never been one to listen to what magazines or television says about beauty, but I have bought magazines in the past just to read, but now I feel that I have no need for that junk to be a part of my life. I hope to keep spreading the knowledge I learned and I hope that media literacy spreads more throughout school systems. I feel that it is a really important idea to know about since media surrounds us everywhich way, but the only way to change our understanding about it is education, and I feel that it is a completely doable task!
ReplyDeleteThree Questions:
1. Will there ever be a limit on how far advertisements will go??? Vermont can be a good example as a good start since we have no billboards.
2. Will the news ever start showing the REAL side of things regarding war and other issues?? This is in reference to that one film we saw and how the news doesn’t show the real true side of things, and how if it did, there would be no war in a week.
3. When will media literacy be a part of every schools curriculum?? It better be sooner than later, because this negativity that comes from the media will only be a growing problem
I think I covered all of this in my essay, but I feel that everything I learned in this class was of significance to my life. I have changed my views on many things, especially Disney. Regarding my actions, I plan to just be more alert when I feel that media might grab a hold of me and try to suck me into its evil world. I plan to just share everything I learned whenever appropriate because I feel that it is extremely necessary for people to know all of this. Media affects my vision of earth and society by just putting scary images in my head regarding the book FEED and thinking that’s what our world will turn into.
Media Literacy and the Environment Top Ten List
ReplyDelete10. Number ten is a quote from Michael Moore at the end of the documentary “The Corporation.” He says, “a greedy man would hang himself if he could make a profit from it.” This sums up the attitude of people who are single mindedly trying to make more money and it describes the nature of how some CEO’s have no regard for people or the environment.
9. Also from “The Corporation” number nine is about the statistics on the cheap labor conditions in countries where the United States has exported jobs. Nike for example pays their workers in China a very small percentage of the retail value of the product they make. I could not remember the exact amount but the numbers were staggering.
8. Number eight is learning about the beneficial program Democracy Now and how there are alternative and non-biased sources for attaining news. Amy Goodman’s coverage and knowledge about the media cover-up during the beginning of the Iraq war is insightful, as is the rest of her news coverage.
7. “Consuming Kids” the documentary on how children are targets for advertisers is my pick for number seven. There were several disturbing facts I learned from the film, however the one in particular is how companies infiltrate and sponsor personal lives of kids. For example, the sponsored birthday party or advertising in schools and textbooks.
6. Disney takes the number six spot because the company along with its mergers is gigantic and very influential. With all of these popular animated movies it is easy to take advantage of this control and push racist, imperialistic and violent ideas. With Pocahontas, The Jungle Book, and, Tarzan; Disney has basically re-written history and with more success and influence than textbooks in Texas.
5. Number five is learning about the big five media companies, and dissecting their media programs, revenue, and the influence they have. My group investigated Viacom but it was amazing to learn all of the TV stations and radio are controlled by only a few companies. All of the smaller media programs answer to the big five so any message has to be congruent with donors and advertisers.
4. Speaking of the influence advertising and corporations have, the story about the whistle-blowers and the case about hormones and cows was shocking. Fox news completely stopped a story investigating the effects of BGH, a Monsanto hormone and illness in cows. This shows how new stations report the news how ‘they’ want it, or basically how their sponsors and advertisers want it.
3. Bringing the countdown to number three is the statistics on how real journalism and investigative reporting is non-existent. The numbers were unexpected, and it is scary to think about but almost every news publication and television and radio news programs has ties to corporations. There is a spin in which the media communicates, and it is not a trustworthy one.
2. Number two is being media literate and being able to critique and analyze advertising and point out its goals. I learned a lot from “Making of a Literate Mind” along with “Still Killing us Softly 3" from production techniques to the effect certain visuals have on humans limbic system. I viewed hundreds of unacceptable ads with stereotypes about race, gender, affluence, and body type.
1. The number one educational moment in this class was learning about public relations, in particular the information in “Toxic Sludge is Good for you!” I always thought I was being hard on the corporations because they can do some good after all. After reading this I was back on my hate bandwagon. The is infiltration in government by corporations is more than I thought. Even the EPA is an organization compromised by the pr industry and lobbying by corporations.
Three Questions
ReplyDeleteWhen is media literacy going to be broadcasted on the airwaves and in mainstream television? I know this would go against profit motives and what media corporations do to protect themselves. Yet, I think this can still happen, people have the right to real news and information without any bias or slant. The public also has the right for a voice in media, like democracy this is something we have created, and we cannot leave the power in the hands only a few.
Why are those protesting an unhealthy lifestyle and large corporate influences not given a voice in media? In this class there was mention of several organizations to fight corporate power and influence such as Adbusters or Project Censored. The readings mentioned several examples of activism from changing McDonalds signs to creating violation tickets for SUVs.
Are middle and high schools going to start teaching media literacy classes? The entire semester I thought about how good it would be for everyone in the public school system to learn what I have. I always want to advocate for environmental studies courses to be offered in high school. Although it is getting worse the public school is one of the more free places from corporate influence and advertising.
Top 10 List of What I Have Learned:
ReplyDelete-Environmental art project. I remember talking about how we believe that we are not affected by advertising, however when I did my environmental art project I thought differently. I remember looking for pictures through trashy magazines like People and 17 and just seeing ads of weight loss and beauty products. We may say we’re not affected, but there is a reason why many people in America are unsatisfied with the way they look.
-I believe it was in The Corporation, there was a factory that made shirts in South America. The workers were being underpaid and abused, but on the tags of these shirts it said X amount will be donated to impoverished children. I found that one striking because I would fall for that and be more tempted to buy that product, so the company is fooling the consumer by abusing their workers. There is no way to tell if a product is good or not.
-I was surprised by how 6 companies control all of our media. There is little room for other companies to move in or try to do anything. By being a huge company it provides stability, but at the same time the people do not know who to trust. Also, I wouldn’t be surprised if within 50 years we will only have 3 companies controlling everything.
-Disney, enough said. Mickey Mouse Monopoly frightened the heck out of me and it is so true. I have tried hard to ignore the facts about Disney because my best friend is obsessed with Disney and she wants to work for them. I do not know what to do buy boycott Disney, but even that is hard to do when all of society knows all Disney movies and media.
-The movie Consuming Kids will stick with me for a long time. I did not realize how effective and screwed up advertisers are. The fact that they do studies on how to get kids to nag to parents as well as sending consumer messages and values to kids. One sees this all the time, thinking that buying an item will make them happy or fill some empty whole. That doesn’t work in society and the matter how many items Americans buy they are still depressed. This movie has made me decide to really limit my TV watching, I set a goal to watch 2 hours or less of advertised TV programming a week. (Therefore, the Drive In in my town wont count, however movies also are jam-packed with advertising.)
-The power of corporations like Monsanto over the media. I was shocked to see how well Monsanto forced Fox to change their story on BGH. The reporters knew what was up and were constantly fighting their director who was feeding them money, however the reporters in the end still wouldn’t agree because of the Whistle Blower Law, however they didn’t even win that law.
ReplyDelete-The public relations industry was really interesting. Reading Toxic Sludge is Good For You was frightening. I am surprised by how much of a billion dollar industry it is. It isn’t just, this is our product and this is what it does, but shows that our purchasing really comes down to how an item is pitched instead of how good it actually is.
-The movie Tough Guise was really interesting to me. I saw that movie and understood exactly what it was like, even though I never really thought of it. For example, when I meet new guys I instantly put on a deeper voice and act tougher. There is no need for me to do this, but our society wants us to act tough and therefore it often seems like a competition to see who is more manly, compared to who is a better person.
-We never see real news about the war, that was shocking to me. I don’t think about it, and in all honesty I don’t want to see the gruesomeness, but Americans do not see the real side of war. Like the film said, if we saw it, there would not be war.
-Feed. Our society is becoming like Feed. We are losing our ability to freely think, make up our own games, and want instant knowledge and constant connection. I am constantly hating modern society for having headphones in all the time and texting like maniacs, what ever happened to just sitting out in the woods and listening to nature or going for a scenic bike ride.
-The internet. Facebook and Myspace are not private, as well as any other internet website. We need to understand that there is a connection made between advertising, jobs, and that people look at Facebooks. It is not private, be aware.
Questions:
How long until the wave of media related illnesses are connected to the media and modern technology? I often wonder about brain tumors and if those will emerge related to cell phones. I also wonder about all the mental illnesses and ADD in children. When will we reach a point where instead of prescribing kids anti-depressants and telling them to lose weight, we tell them to go outside?
People are catching on to advertising all the time, however they do not have the full picture. Even after taking this class I do not have the full picture, yet my understanding of the media is greatly enhanced and I’ll never look through a magazine or watch TV the same way again. I believe we need to have media literacy education for all students but how can this get done? It is hard to implement something like this because companies would probably try to shut it down. Will media literacy one day become a normality? Kids need to learn this because the internet is a normality and people shouldn’t be posting half the stuff they post on Facebook.
How well can we use our current media to make change? Despite the current corruption in it, there can also be quick change. A celebrity can say one sentence and it is tweeted across the world to millions of people in about 10 secconds. One advertisement reaches millions of people. One Facebook post is read by at least 50 people. There is potential for change and I wonder what will be some of the first big changes to be seen for good through our modern use of technology.
Good song about media in society-Cookie Jar by Jack Johnson:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66jpwLSxZrw
lyrics-
I would turn on the TV but it's so embarrassing
To see all the other people I don't know what they mean
And it was magic at first when they spoke without sound
But now this world is gonna hurt you better turn that thing down
Turn it around
"It wasn't me", says the boy with the gun
"Sure I pulled the trigger but it needed to be done
Cause life's been killing me ever since it begun
You cant blame me cause I'm too young"
"You can't blame me sure the killer was my son
But I didn't teach him to pull the trigger of the gun
It's the killing on this TV screen
You cant blame me its those images he seen"
Well "You can't blame me", says the media man
Well "I wasn't the one who came up with the plan
I just point my camera at what the people want to see
Man it's a two way mirror and you cant blame me"
"You can't blame me", says the singer of the song, Or the maker of the movie which he based his life on
"It's only entertainment and as anyone can see
The smoke machines and makeup and you cant fool me"
It was you it was me it was every man
We've all got the blood on our hands
We only receive what we demand
And if we want hell then hells what well have
EXTRA CREDIT
ReplyDeleteThe Age of Missing information by Bill McKibben
Part one:
In our society information is available to most people twenty-four hours a day, whether we want it or not. Be it newspapers, magazines, the internet, or television, it’s in your face all the time. We are told that the world is now a smaller place because it’s so easy to see what’s going on anywhere in the world…almost. But are we really “informed”? Does knowing the current celebrity gossip make us any smarter? Do sitcoms like “The Brady Bunch” or “I Love Lucy” enlighten us at all? What about the news? We receive raw information from across the globe, but unless we experience something firsthand, how can we really know?
In The Age of Missing Information, Bill McKibben tells the reader of his critical analysis of television, and also his spiritual time spent in the wilderness near his home. He is bombarded with commercial propaganda, news, and entertainment on the television. The overwhelming amount of information he receives requires almost no effort to obtain except to remain conscious. In contrast to watching twenty-four hours of television from each local channel, McKibben delves into nature for twenty-four hours. The insights he gives to his experience in the wilderness are far less frequent than the endless facts he receives from TV, but deeper and more insightful. He uses nature to convey a message of simplicity to the reader, of a deeper understanding of life. McKibben tells us that in today’s world of endless information at our fingertips, we are still not truly informed. Enlightenment occurs at a more personal level than can be attained from mass media.
Early in the book, McKibben writes about the Travel Channel. It is there to feed our natural curiosity about foreign places, and indeed it does show us a glimpse of other cultures. But what we receive is information, not firsthand experience. We are absorbed in it while we watch, but when the tube goes off, has what we “learned” changed anything in our lives? He writes (page 44): “We’re starved for impressions, curious about how people live their lives that don’t inhabit the great suburban sameness. As long as we stay in the big beachfront hotels all we can see is how we live our lives, though more luxuriously and probably with more liquor. But we’re so used to this life it’s hard and scary for most people to surrender it even for a day or two.” He explains that at some level we want to live like people of other cultures, but never quite make it past the virtual reality of the Travel Channel. This concept also reminds me of something we talked about in class. When people watch television they simultaneously feel restless and glued to the screen. Maybe people watch channels like Travel and Discovery because they feel anxious in their own lives to have cultural experiences, but are held back by different constraints (money, health, time, etc).
part two:
ReplyDeleteTelevision is essentially a business, a money maker. Therefore, it targets it’s viewers to make them feel important, valued, and unique. The varieties of channels themselves show us that TV aims to strike an interest in everyone. From sitcoms to cartoons to the discovery channel, anyone can find something mildly entertaining. That’s the trap. TV acts as if it’s speaking to you personally. By contrast, nature is everywhere, with no intentions of catering to anyone. In nature there is astounding beauty, but you must seek it yourself. McKibben writes (page 228): “Human beings--any one of us, and our species as a whole—are not all-important, not at the center of the world. That is one essential piece of information, the one great secret, offered by any encounter with the woods or the mountains or the ocean or any wilderness or chunk of nature…” Nature teaches us to forget about ourselves just for a moment. It shows us the complexity of all life forms. When I did my own McKibben-like experiment for class (spent a half hour outside as well as a half hour in front of a TV show) I found that I learned more about myself when I was outside. I had some peaceful time to contemplate my own thoughts and how I wanted to conduct my day and even my life as a whole while I sat outside. When I was in front of the TV, I was half focused on the show and half focused on thinking about personal, unrelated things.
Knowledge must be obtained through personal observation and reflection, and when it is attained it is more precious, simply because it was sought out, not brought to your living room at the press of a button. McKibben’s arguments are both valid and relevant to our society today, particularly in the “West”. He addresses issues of the environment, humanities, and psychology in a tasteful and intriguing manner. The knowledge and motivation to do so will have to come from wisdom attained through personal observation and reflection of the real world. McKibben’s study is focused only on television, and was written several years ago when internet wasn’t as big a source of information and networking. I would have to take a more moderate stand and say that media has its good and bad effects. In terms of communication, modern media can be extremely useful. Capitalist advertising and corporate-owned news programs are a problem. Since media inherently has mixed effects on people, media literacy skills are the key to using media to our advantage in activism/advocacy work.
Meh Top 10 yo
ReplyDelete1. I had no clue that toxic sludge existed. I know that sounds so bad but it does prove the point that we need to get the message out!!! A lot of people think we have a sewage system and don’t think about where it all goes. We need to get the message out!
2. I had no clue that almost all of my news is PR. It’s a terrible thing to think that when I want to know what is going on around me and I turn on my local news I’m just another victim of American society being fed things I should never believe. I am going to break myself from this loop, if I want to know what is going on around me I’m going to go out and find it and I don’t need to the big man on the tube to tell me lies.
3. it’s not illegal for the people on the news to lie!!! This is crazy. At first it makes me really sad to think about it; we have all these stupid laws but we can’t make a simple law saying it’s illegal to lie to people who trust you. You trust your doctor not to lie to you and you trust your news anchor to lie to you - and apparently one of those people is lying to you every day.
4. The television and the internet are killing our brains and our vocabulary skills. I wish I was half as smart as my grandparents - they had such a wonderful vocabulary and they know so many random skills and facts that I couldn’t even imagine because the internet has sucked in my brain and chewed it away to slosh. We spend so much time looking at screens and not enough time looking at trees.
5. I learned that my children are in for hell when they get here. I had no clue how involved advertising companies are at getting the children of America to buy products. Products are always everywhere as it is and I don’t want to see my kids to be consumed by them at such a young age. It seems ridiculous to me that there are people out there trying to capture my children’s attention. It makes me think that having children will be harder to do in the upcoming generations; maybe I’ll just live off the grid.
6. I had no idea that corporations were people legally. This seems so asinine to me. How on earth can this be? It keeps bringing back the question of how bad can it get before it gets better? I suppose that I have learned a lot in this class that has outraged me and therefore have begun to think of the world differently. I feel like this class made me realize that I barely know anything about the country that I live in. Facts like this make me think about the fact that I need to do a lot more investigating to find out how the media and the world in general works around me. I need to get more informed so that I can inform others!
7. There is a grave potential that we could all end up like the people in the feed if we don’t do something. I think this class made me think about where the world is going more seriously than I ever have before. I never thought about the fact that we are getting so caught up in technology that we might all just end up turning into computers. I feel like these thoughts are very serious and again need more investigating so that I can spread the word.
8. I never realized how many people are out there culture jamming! It’s a wonderful thing that brings a little bit of hope to this ever growing problem. I had actually never heard of culture jamming before this class so I not only want to participate but I want my friends to hear about this too so that we can create a whole American culture of culture jammers!
9. I didn’t realize that the pharmaceutical companies were out to get you! I had no idea that there were company reps out there telling people to go out and cough on people to boost sales. As someone who wants to work in health care, this is appalling! I want to work to make the world a healthier and safer place and I don’t want to think that the drugs I need to give to people are sponsored by people who just want to make the world sicker in order to make more money.
10. I can’t believe that the US is the only place where you don’t really honestly see the casualties of war. We are supposed to be a country built on educated people but we don’t even know the hatred that we are causing across the globe! I wish that we could see it all so that maybe we would have a chance at stopping the madness of war. It’s ridiculous that hate just breads more hate and that we are not only behind it all but are keeping it from the rest of Americans who just might want to know about it.
ReplyDeleteThree questions I’m still thinking about
1. How to I fight the American way without getting really depressed about not seeing any progress and coming across people who just believe everything they are told and don’t care what I have to say?
2. Would I be cheating all the people in this country who don’t know what is going on by moving to another country and just running away from this mess?
3. And on a lighter note…why hasn’t someone blown up Monsanto yet?
Top Ten List that I know is entirely too long but I had a lot to say, so yeah:
ReplyDelete1.Advertising, my dear friend advertising. I had always seen various ads and seen the stupidity in them, but I had never realized the sneaky, conniving work and thinking that went into making the ads. I had also never really thought about what may of these ads are doing to the human psyche. Advertising turns people into products. We value people less if we are surrounded by objective images of them, which occurs in advertisements across the board. Ads cloak human and environmental destruction behind images of beautiful people. In addition, they often make beautiful and desirable the using up of resources. Furthermore, one of the main goals of advertising is to create conflict in a person in order to make them consume. This is just gross, and not okay. All people are beautiful and fine how they are, don’t tell them they’re not okay, and imply that they are lesser just to make them want to buy your shit.
2.Personality Diagnostic checklist for Corporation= Psychopath.
So true. Corporations are not people, and if they were they would be psychopaths. As was stated in the film The Corporation, they have callous unconcern for the harm of others, the incapacity to maintain enduring relationships, reckless disregard for the safety of others, deceitfulness/repeated lying and coning of others for profit, the incapacity to experience guilt, and the failure to convert to social norms with respect to lawful behaviors. Yet they are considered people? Then can someone please tell me why on earth they aren’t being aren’t they being put in jail or put through some sort of intensive therapy then? I’m a little confused, I mean last I checked, people who were diagnosed, as psychopaths weren’t allowed to go running around trying to control the government. I don’t, maybe I’m mistaken, but it just seems a little backwards to me that corporations can go around being able to claim person status, yet they don’t have to suffer any of the same consequences. And just to get a little more controversial, how can people be okay with calling a corporation a person, but then some people have a hard time seeing an embryo before thirteen weeks as a person. In my mind, a thirteen-week-old embryo, no wait, a five-day-old blastula has more potential for personhood than any corporation anywhere, but that’s just me.
3. Monsanto, (cringe) nuff said.
4. Corporations can patent anything that’s alive except a full birth human. Really? Really?! Is this at all necessary? Pretty soon they’ll own the idea of a human. Companies are now able to patent genes. Before you know it, they will own the genes that make up the evolution of our species. The idea of a human can be owned. It just doesn’t make sense. No one, no company will ever own me, or the idea of me, I don’t care what any patent or legal papers say. Nope, not gonna happen.
5. Fanta was created for Nazi Germany so coke could keep making money in Germany… while people died…What?!?! If people only knew some of the things corporations have done to make a little extra green. And, IBM punch card system used in Nazi concentration camps. My goodness. And to make matters worse, all of the machines to print these cards were leased out and had to have on site maintenance done once a month. They can’t say they had no idea anything was going on. Not okay. Perhaps some of these corporations should have been tried for some form of war crimes. I don’t know, just a thought.
6. US media is over sanitized. People say war is tasteless. Well, yeah, it is. Its also vile, cruel, deadly, unnecessary, unintelligent, barbaric, merciless, malicious, hateful, despicable, abominable, violent, and bloody. That doesn’t mean we should keep doing it but not show it on the news because that makes it less bad. The United States does not see the true face of war. We don’t see the gory pictures, the photos of death affecting the people. We only see the gray heat seeking videos with targets. We don’t see the people behind the target, the people with tears leaving streaks down their dirt and blood covered faces, the people screaming while carrying limp children who don’t even understand the meaning of war. We don’t see that, and thus we tend to be ambivalent to the whole concept of war. It’s a problem.
ReplyDelete7. Toxic Sludge. To be honest, I think I knew it existed, but I didn’t know the extent or any of the issues surrounding toxic sludge. But now that I’m more aware of some of these issues…whoa…like whoa!! And bio solids? Ya, that’s crap. Changing the name doesn’t change physical properties. I’m pretty sure if I legally changed my name to Flying Unicorn I wouldn’t sprout wings, hooves, or horns, or start having weird hay cravings. .
8. Dissent built this country, I had never really thought about it that way before. But I suppose it’s true. And the idea that rage is good when it is used constructively to create social change, I like it. But society has sort of morphed to tell us that rage and the like is bad, and we should suppress and accept. But this is just not okay. That is the kind of thinking that leads to dictatorships. And last I checked, we are supposed to be living in some form of democracy. Further more, we should not let our creativity and imaginations be sold to us. Those are the kinds of things that need to come from the people, not the companies. Creativity and imagination are things that should come from with in the individual not bought from the corporations and their idea of what they want us to like, and see as cool, etc…
9. And I had no idea about all of the PR that’s present in our media. Where did real journalism go? Wherever it’s hiding, it can come out now. Its presence would be greatly appreciated.
10. Also, culture jamming, not gonna lie, I’m a fan. I really like the idea of people, individuals doing what they can to kind of stick it to the corporations and let them know that what they are doing isn’t welcomed. It’s kind of a way for the people to take back what is rightfully theirs. I have done some small culture jamming activities, and I plan to continue, and expand. Next on the list, sending an much needed letter to the Brats company. Its going to take all of my editing skills to not end up sending them what could turn out to be a novel length letter describing all their violations to humankind.
Questions:
1. Fill in the blank. It has to reach _____level for the majority of people to start realizing that the amount of media in our lives today has started to reach unhealthy levels and that people as a group need to take back their creativity, imagination, and partially media free lives.
2. There are so many people who are in charge of corporations. Why have none of them realized the harm being done by them, and made any steps to fix the problems the corporations are creating?
3. Why don’t companies actually go green, like for real, instead of dancing around the idea and saying they are when everybody knows they aren’t. It would end up saving them money anyway? Which, if I understand correctly, is pretty much all corporations care about anyway.
Top 10 List:
ReplyDelete#10 Learning how to set up and efficiently run a blog. This was something that I would have never thought myself capable of doing so I am grad I now have a little more techno knowledge. Maybe I will use this again in my future endeavors, but then again maybe I would like to stay far away from computers.
#9 That we are all being watched on-line. Every account we set up or purchase we make is dually noted by someone wanting to sell something. This was a really creepy realization.
#8 Hip-hop music was really made popular in the 90's to sell merchandise. Like in that Sprite concert in "Merchants of Cool." Their images are tough, but they are really just a bunch of sell-outs.
#7 Students are being marketed to while in school. I can't believe that text books are being used to sell products. I actually argued this issue with my dad, who is a 3rd grade teacher, and he said there is no way that is going on in his classroom. I told him to look closely.
#6 The association between a consumers loyalty to a product and a members loyalty to their cult. I wish this wasn't a valid observation but unfortunately it was a reoccurring theme in so much that we learned in this class. It's all brainwashing.
#5 MTV has labeled it's most valued consumers as "Mooks," and "Mid-drifts." This is something I can really ID with since I was an MTV viewer during the height of this craze. I proudly will never allow this channel to grace my television screen again.
#4 Corporations are treated as individuals by law. This realization about knocked my socks off. The real unfortunate fact of the matter however is that where humans are severely punished for the bad things they do corporations many times get off with only a slap on the wrist.
#3 Women are treated like products in advertisements. I had never noticed before that almost every commercial or magazine advertisement that contains a woman portrays her as a body, or a bitch.
#2 Even more eye opening than #3 is that boys too are harmfully marketed too. In "Tough Guise," the staggering amount of male induced violence or murder is really upsetting. This belief that "real" men don't show emotions is so damn destructive. I thought that women were the real big victims of advertisements and image, but men are really suffering.
#1 That I have the power to filter what I see and believe. This was the most empowering thing for me and thanks to my introduction into media literacy I now know when to be a skeptic. It's funny how this little bit of knowledge has really flooded into my life. I have been constantly preaching the good word to my family and friends. Most importantly I now can see how important it is that all children and parents are taught how to filter this crap.
Questions???
ReplyDeleteSomething that I have yet to get over is how has this great country of ours gotten to this place where our people are bought and sold? Our country was established to free people from the reign of a monarchy and now that has been replaced with the reign of a corporate monarchy.
I know this is a near to impossible question to really answer but, how can we fix the self esteem of the people? Since apparently it is so low that we believe that what we have is never good enough.
Finally, how do we get media literacy education in our school systems? I mean come on. I am sure our schools can do without a pottery class, or weight training. Let's replace those slots with something worthwhile like learning about the history of American media.
Media Literacy-Final Blog
ReplyDeleteBlog a 5 paragraph summary of your learning and growth during the course ask 3 specific questions you still are thinking about.
I was actually moved into action (activism) far before I even decided where I would go to college or what I would study. When I was fourteen I was doing research to write an essay about a controversial topic for social studies class. I chose to talk about animal rights because I had always been passionate about animals. While on the internet, I found PETA.org and looked at some of their blogs and videos. My life changed forever because of that media. I became vegetarian that night, and really started to explore activism. What started as a mission to save animals became a mission to use my life for activism. The media really does reach people.
Learning that corporations have human rights under the constitution really affected me, and the way I think about politics, scarcity and inequality issues. I have contemplated this topic over and over. I have discussed it with many people since learning about it in this and one of my other classes this semester. I have begun to realize that all problems are much larger and interconnected than I had ever realized, yet very simple at the same time. The overarching problem is greed and inequality. The specific problem is that those in power are those with the most money and least compassion, and it humanity has not risen together to overturn it yet. I don’t know how we’ll overcome, but I know that millions of people are already active. There isn’t one larger collaborative movement, though. Some people use grassroots organizing to change their communities, some take “monkey-wrenching” direct action, and others try to separate themselves completely from “the system” (almost like what Chris McCandles did in Into the Wild).
Something I have really come to terms with this semester is my need to focus my efforts on problems that I am passionate about and can change. I have a tendency to get overwhelmed and defeated by all of the issues that I hear about. I have had to slowly learn that it is more effective to do what you can about immediate local problems, while sustaining an overall compassion for everything. Personally, I am really motivated to make effective changes for the lives of animals. I have gotten heavily involved with a campaign to change VT state legislation about livestock care and slaughter. I am going to make a campaign plan today (for ENVS Activism) for a project that I will implement in the fall. My main ideas are to reform animal testing practices at UVM and hopefully eliminate the need for it as much as possible, or mandate that only local meat is served on campus. From taking Media Literacy and the Environment, I have learned how effective the media is in reaching the masses. Before our PSA project, I had never made a video for anything. I had also never had a blog or talked critically about Facebook before taking this class. I am really interested in journalism, and seeing the DemocracyNOW video really spoke to me. I absolutely plan to take what I have learned with me to make effective changes.
part 2-
ReplyDeleteAs far as spreading media literacy, I have already been doing that in my own life. Whenever I see any kind of ad I automatically question which company made it and for what reasons. I don’t have a television, but when my roommate is watching her TV I overhear commercials and literally start laughing and usually ask her what she thought about it. Generally we agree that it is ridiculous. I have always questioned the exploitation of women in the media, but now I have even more reasons to validate my disgust.
My vision of the world has been molded by two major voices in activism: Saul Alinsky and Derrick Jensen. In his book Rules for Radicals, Alinsky writes: “Much of an organizer’s daily work is detail, repetitive and deadly in its monotony. In the totality of things he is engaged in one small bit. It is as though as an artist he is painting one small leaf…What keeps him going is a blurred vision of a great mural where other artists –organizers—are painting their bits, and each piece is essential to the total. (Page 75)” I certainly try to maintain a blurred vision of a better world, and make sure that I take actions everyday to make it a reality. When I heard Derrick Jensen on Earth Day this year he said that: “the world is pretty fucked up, and there is great work to be done”. That sums it up pretty well. There is always something that we can do.
3 questions:
Do you see anything happening in the future as far as a movement for parents to have much more control about the media that their children are exposed to? Or a movement to reform the way that movies and TV are rated so that violence is taken more seriously? It seems like right now the corporations have a lot of control over youngsters, and it would really irritate me if my kids were being unnecessarily influenced, peer pressured, and exposed to violence.
This one may be difficult to answer, but it is something that I have been thinking about. There is a lot of violence by men onto women, as well as extreme objectification in the media in our society. I feel that much of it may have been catalyzed by pornography, which really doesn’t accurately display female sexuality whatsoever, but rather caters to male fetishes. Are there any laws or limitation to what can be made and distributed as porn? How can that type of film be allowed to be so corrupt?
What would be an effective grassroots campaign to take rights away from corporations? Would that even be possible since they can put as much money they want into lobbying? Are we doomed, or could democracy come back to life?