Tuesday, June 22, 2010
The Television and Our Notions of Truth
In Chapter 2 "Media as Epistemology" of Amusing Ourselves to Death, Postman states that "a major new medium changes the structure of discourse; it does so by encouraging certain uses of intellect, by favoring certain definitions of intelligence and wisdom, and by demanding a certain kind of content - in a phrase, by creating new forms of truth-telling." This made me realize how people's perspective of the truth have changed quite significantly as our culture shifted from orality to writing to printing and now to televising. Comparing those people whose epistemology is based more on television to those whose epistemology is based more on books and newspapers, I wonder, who is closer the truth? Are information in print much more accurate than public discourse on television? According to Postman, "not necessarily." Before the age of media, our society favored writing as closer to truth than speaking. According to Postman, "the published word [was] invested with greater prestige and authenticity than the spoken word." But now, television has replaced print as our source of "truth." But wait...Isn't the television basically about talk shows, live gossips and interviews? Oh, the irony! How did we suddenly favor speaking over writing ? Two words: new technology. Based on my own experiences, I would often believe whatever Nancy Grace or Anderson Cooper says about politics or any other news. I am aware that they may be biased at times, but it is difficult not to listen to them simply due to the fact that they are on television. In the eyes of most average people, those people on television must be right or else they would not even be on TV. It may seem ignorant, but I know for a fact that many people in our society have developed this mentality, affecting our notions of truth. Do you agree or disagree?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
"In the eyes of most average people, those people on television must be right or else they would not even be on TV."-Louise Angeles
ReplyDeleteI understand most of your argument, but you lost me at the statement above. Maybe you do, but I do not know of any person so shallow to believe everything they see or hear on television just because they are telling us through television! But you have opened my eyes, maybe the average person is that naive, maybe our generation is too deep into this "T.V. Culture" that we may not know any better. A wise man once said "Believe only half of what you see, and nothing that you hear." I agree with you for the most part though, that we have shifted into believing most of what we see/hear on T.V. but never do I feel I must believe them because they are on T.V. Very nice post, it made me think ^_^
P.S. My bad for posting so many times and then deleting them! It looks so messy, I hate that!
(I can clean that comment deletion thing up, and when I notice it, I do.)
ReplyDeleteYou know what gets me? I won't watch FOX news because I hate those guys and think they are a bunch of blow hards. Why do I think that, though? I have only watched a few times, and many of my conservative friends admire those talking heads over at Fox. Do I hate them and think they're crazy because I don't agree with them? Probably.
Likewise, I really like Rachel Maddow, Anderson Cooper, Keith Olbermann and Ariana Huffington...but I think I like them because I agree with them -- my conservative friends hate them as much as I hate Hannity, Limbaugh, Palin, Coulter and to a lesser degree, O'Reilly.
I know I'm biased, but I can't SEE it myself.
Louise makes a very interesting point, many people dont formulate thier own opionions,they go by what they see on t.v. just because they saw it on tv,even though many people on tv are very biased. I love television and sometimes they do give a new interesting view on different subjects but you can't always believe what you see.
ReplyDeleteP.S. ms fletcher I watch fox news every morning I like thier ideas but I formulate my own based on my beliefs.