Hi Everbody. Here's a link to one of TV theorist Jason Mittell's blog posts on the topic of media violence and effects. Please read this for our next class and post at least one comment and one question you have after reading what Mittell has to say. Please indicate what you are responding to in his blog post (give a paragraph, etc. so we can find it).
http://justtv.wordpress.com/2012/12/17/media-violence-and-debating-effects-influences/
Towards the end of the second paragraph, Mittell says "I do believe that as media citizens, we should ask ourselves what type of violence we want to see on our screens, and that families should make informed, conscious choices for their children. But blaming the media for violence like the Newtown massacre is simply wrong."
ReplyDeleteThing is, how is blaming the media for violence in the Newtown massacre wrong?
Violence is all over the news, television shows, movies, books and video games. Yes, there there are parental warnings on CDs, videogames and covers of DVDs. Yes, before every television show that's targeted towards adult audiences, there are always "view discretion is advised" given as a warning to parents to not let their children see what is about to be viewed.
Those usually help, but one way or another, children will witness the violent acts on the screen and reenact what they just saw.
Children absorb everything they see.
They imitate everything adults say and do.
They are prone to reenact anything they see on television, so honestly the media aren't innocent here.
In paragraphs 4 and 5 after the subheading "The Media Influence Paradigm and Active Viewers," Mittell talks about the different extremes of decoding: dominant, oppositional, and negotiated. I think that each version of decoding can be applied to every person, based on belief structure, upbringing, education, etc. This leaves a distinct inability to truly measure the effect of media on the masses because literally, everyone reacts differently. While one person may have a dominant reaction to one media source, another person may have an oppositional reaction to the same source. The roles could then switch completely for another media source. Negotiated decoding is the middle ground, but even then viewers are still able to fall into one of the other extremes based on what they are experiencing at the time of viewing. Therefore, it the links between media's effects on the masses becomes much more clouded and harder to define or generalize.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the fourth paragraph under the Media Affects Paradigm, Mittell writes that the majority of media research concludes that "some media have some effects on some viewers in some circumstances."
ReplyDeleteAs a student of media studies, I thought to myself: Brilliant! We go through this complex and rigorous discourse of academic acrobatics in order to reach the confirmation that our question of how media affects us is indeed a valid question.
As long as violence on television exists, children will come to see it, or learn about it from a friend or outside source. The more parents and policies attempt to censor T.V., the more resistance there will be from the child, the more demand for the forbidden fruit.
The solution, in my humble, naive, and ideological opinion, is for adults to speak to children about what they see on T.V., to be aware of what children are watching, acknowledge the content as a glimpse of a truth, and have a conversation with kids about the images they see, putting it into a context of how human beings should properly behave.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteIn the very beginning of the article, second paragraph Mittell writes "Personally, I have little tolerance for the way our television news media covers such tragedies, as they fill the 24-hour cycle with unfounded speculation, ill-informed opinions, and most of all undiluted emotional manipulation." He basically shows examples of how the media is saturated with news stories of tragedy and violence. This is not an uncommon thing. One could pose the argument that continuous exposure to these types of stories in the media, relating to violence can make a person numb to it.
ReplyDeleteMittel himself mentions early on in the article first paragraph "Like most people I know, I’m sad, angry, and numb in reaction to the massacre of children and their teachers on Friday". The news is saturated with tragedies on a daily basis, we as a society are exposed to so much violence by the media that it doesn't even have an affect on us at all. Most of us, like Mittel, are numb to it all. Even the most heinous crimes have little or no shock value anymore to provoke our society to do something about it. Is it possible that media can be at the root and/or the cause of such desensitization ?
In the second half of the third paragraph Mittel uses the example of how the Japanese have much greater violence in their media yet don't have the same (or higher) crime rates as the US. I didn't find this surprising as the Japanese culture is very different to the cultures in the US. From what I have seen in my visits to both countries, and from the people I have met, Japanese have a lot more respect for each other and are brought up with a better knowledge of whats socially acceptable in certain outlets. From how I see it, the people who create such violent media in Japan use that as their outlet, rather than actually going out an doing these things on real people. In turn the Japanese audiences know that this media is to be watched and enjoyed (if that is their thing), rather than being watching and then reenacted.
ReplyDeleteThe question I get from all this is how can you blame those who have used a creative and safe outlet for their violent thoughts for the actions of people who don't? That being said, would those who don't use a creative and safe outlet for their violence still have these thoughts without the ideas from those who do? The media certainly reaches a lot more people than it once did, so these ideas are being put out to people who have blurred ideas of real life and what is entertainment.
Television definitely gets an unfair amount of backlash whenever a shooting happens. In the ninth paragraph under "The Media Effects Paradigm and Passive Viewers", Mittel talks about the other factors that could contribute to violent behaviors. In recent years most violent shootings have been committed by people with mental disorders or psychological problems. There needs to be more of a focus to help these people rather than taking the easy way out and blaming television.
ReplyDeleteWhy is it that television is always blamed when when a youth commits a shooting but that is never the case whenever an adult does it?