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Amusing Ourselves To Death Neil Postman Analysis

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During the 1960s era, millions of people watched a popular science fiction television show, The Outer Limits, and are told that “For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear”. This seemingly absorbing lead in may set the stage for the television show but it could also be actually telling the truth in real life. What the unsuspecting audience is being fed is chilling. “What is dangerous about television is not its junk it is that television is transforming all serious public business into junk”. (p449) Effectively, the realities of life are being rephrased by clever writers to entertain and amuse us in their quest for the highest Nielson ratings and more importantly your mind. The written word is being …show more content…

Postman establishes his premise through a comparison of two notable literary authors; George Orwell and Aldous Huxley; through their dark prophesies of the evolution of man’s attitudes and the demise of books. In Orwell’s assertion, he “feared that the truth would be concealed from us.” (p449) In contrast, examples are given that assert that the realities and truth in politics, news, business and even religion will be choreographed into a visual and theatrical piece of entertainment, to be viewed in full living color and surround sound, with little substance to the veracity of the subject. This dramatically illustrates Huxley’s forewarnings that through the phenomenon of television, reality will be disguised as an entertaining production that captivates the audience producing trivial people. Huxley saw that “people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think. “ …show more content…

98% of American homes have at least one television and this activity alone occupies most of American youth’s time other than sleeping. By the age of 40 most Americans will have watched over one million television commercials. If sheer statistics is not enough to put concern in one's thoughts, Postman goes for the jugular. As the chilling effects of Hitler and the current environment of the cold war are still fresh in the minds of the German people, he demonstrates the mind controlling effects of television. Politics he says is about looks and imagery, where “ideas are irrelevant to political success.” “News shows are only marginally concerned with public information. A TV news show is precisely what its name implies: A show is an entertainment. Television has little tolerance for arguments, reasons or explanations.” (p449-450) Television shows are all about imagery of good looks, amiability and a good show. Political and government personalities are also jumping on this media band wagon. Cameo appearances on top rated television shows advances the candidate to that familiar face and friend who joins you in your living room at night. As television invades our homes and our time, it invades our reasoning and choices in mind controlling conclusions as derived by the clever media

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Have you ever wondered if America is going in the proper political direction? The articles “American Psychosis,” by Chris Hedges, and “Engaging Apolitical Adolescents,” by Melissa Ames, have contrasting views and opinions about how pop culture is expressed through young adult’s political views and interest. Hedges explains why he thinks that reality TV shows- among others- are destroying this country. Hedges uses harsh and critical phrasing to evoke a deep emotional response in the reader. Ames, on the other hand, references the rise of dystopian novels after 9/11, and the fact that the “total vote has increased consistently throughout the past four presidential elections” (4 Ames).

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The Overuse of Television Kameron G Loyd BYU-Idaho  During an average week, how much television does the average child watch? Parents, educators, and concerned citizens alike would be appalled at the answer of 1,480 minutes (BLS American Time Use Survey, A.C. Nielsen Co.). They would also be revolted by the statistic that 54% of four to six year olds would rather spend time watching television instead of spending time with their fathers (BLS American Time Use Survey, A.C. Nielsen Co.). In 1984, Neil Postman saw how devastating television watching was becoming to the culture of America, and gave a speech to the literary community at the 1984 Frankfort Germany Book Fair entitled “Amusing Ourselves to Death” which deals directly with this monolithic issue. Although the speech and subsequent article, published in Et Cetra, were directed at the publishers, writers, illustrators, etc., all those who read this article can also benefit from Postman’s overarching desire to decrease the hours of mind-numbing television watching.

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The 19th century or typographic America was a time where modern media sources, such as television and radio did not exist. Therefore everything was either presented in written word or spoken word, by a source which could either be a book or a person. In Amusing Ourselves To Death, Neil Postman communicates that the people of the 19th century would endure very long hours of debates and speeches. These events were very long, but these people seemed genuinely interested in these events due to the fact that it would inform them on current political events. However many people began wondering how these people were able to maintain such interests in these events.

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Lust for Disgust There is not a minute in the day where a news broadcast is not being televised. For twenty-four hours, the same repetitive and monotonous information is delivered by different news anchors. Even though they report nothing new, Americans will still watch for hours upon hours. The large majority of these television broadcasts deliver stressful and generally upsetting news, but in no way, is this a deterrent to the viewer.

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Censorship, along with the introduction of television, allowed humans in this world to become indifferent to the change. The reader can understand that over time, the world in this novel turned into one of governmental oppression due to the change in nature of eliminating the controversy.

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However, Postman wanted to promote the idea that people would become so obsessed with pleasure that they eventually sacrifice their rights. Postman furthers on this idea by describing television as something that will be an exchange of rights for entertainment. He then extends this theory by saying ideas are affected by their medium and that media as a medium causes people to evaluate information’s quality by its entertainment

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The thesis of the essay is that we find ourselves idolize the lifestyle displayed in television, therefore, television becomes our reality as it is a much easier story to tell. 3) The title of the essay “Loose Ends” is significant

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Neal Gabler defines entertainment in his book Life the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality as a damaging power which is able to “ruin” society (Gabler, 1998). However, according to Longman Dictionary, entertainment refers to “things such as films, television, performances etc that are intended to amuse or interest people”; to be more objective, it “entails communication via external stimuli, which reaches a generally passive audience and gives some portion of that audience pleasure” (Bates & Ferri, 2010). The contradiction of these definitions shows that entertainment makes both negative and positive influences on society, so it is not entertainment itself, but the way how it is used by human beings has the capacity to “ruin” or improve

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In The Essay “The News” Neil Postman demonstrates the problems with News on TV and the Psychology behind it of why our society continues to watch. Postman displayed many points that becuase television news is must appeal to everyone in a short amount of time; the coverage is often shallow and gives a false impression of the world. Neil Postman describes the time restrictions of (22 mins) because of commercials overtaking the news. This reflects “The News” as we know it to become a big piece of entertainment that has nothing to do with the intellectual information that affects our lives. The lack of in-depth look on News nowadays draws an Appearance vs. Reality that the News isn’t what It should be.

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One of the big examples he used was how television has affected not only children but also the school system. Postman does not show both sides to his argument, but instead he goes straight into the burden that “television may bring a gradual end to careers of school teachers” because teacher were the first to invent the printing press (pg.3). Consequently, Postman then goes on to say that teachers are blind to this reality, losers, for not seeing of the negative outcome coming their way and instead seem to be enthusiastic toward this new

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Entertainment Controls Them All Huxley has a theory of entertainment as control and we can see it throughout his book Brave New World. The fact that his vision was made years ago, makes this vision even more interesting, because knowing that entertainment has a big impact into our society for the book reveals similar forms of entertainment to control it’s people. The ways that the book was created has brought to conclusion that our society is controlled by entertainment. Our society has become a trivial culture preoccupied with entertainment.

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The main media’s used are social media and television which are the main focus of chapter 9. Shirky’s article “Why I Just Asked My Students To Put Their Laptops Away” begins to talk about a way that people investigate and draw conclusions about the intersection of technology and everyday life. While Elavia writes about how reality shows are viewer driven rather producer or network driven. One thing social media and television have in common is how much of an impact they have on today. Everywhere you look there are ‘perfect’ images being displayed representing unrealistic goals.

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Society expect to be constantly entertained; they have become so concerned with things such as who the latest star is dating, scandals, or dumb people doing rather idiotic things. Much of society have been consumed in their personal instant gratification and what makes them “happy”. When on an off chance that news does show things that are serious and impactful(not necessarily positive things that is happening in the world) people have become so numb that the best they could do is feel sympathetic and at worst continue on with their day. The other part of the problem is that those behind what is being published and shown on the news media have been absorbed in their avarice nature, whatever allows them to make as much profit they do. “Writing thousands of hours of coverage from what could have been summarized in a couple of minutes every few weeks, a new rhetorical strategy was developed, or-let’s be generous-evolved”(6), Saunders describes the new formula formed by mass news firms that would yield the most profit.

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1309 Words | 6 Pages

Neil Postman in Chapter 1 of "Amusing Ourselves to Death" aims to show how the television can manipulate a person 's decision in politics, religion, education and turn those into entertainment. Even today Postman’s ideeas stand strong and it is true that if an information is entertaining the viewer will not look at the autenticity or what the origins of it are. Probably as expected, the more the technology advances, the more the manipulation from the television is taking place. This is done by: changing how people think, making their brain numb by not allowing them to have an opinion and interfering in their family life and in people decision-making process. The only way to save ouselves from living under the control of the television is simply

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What were they going to do? Well, said Mildred, wait around and see” (42). What followed was a display of colors and sounds, and the people were back to shallow words again. The TV that everyone spends their lives watching does not have a plot, purpose, moral or point. It is nothing more than unconnected sentences, bright colors and loud noise.

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