| Television & Cultural Destruction I:
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| Television & Cultural Destruction I: World View The engine which has always driven humans toward so-called progress and development is 'rising expectations'. It is a sort of divine or devilish itch which is peculiar to Homo Sapiens. Whether this is good or bad is a value judgment. This force has certainly brought our species to the dominant position on the planet. Until the 20th century this primarily influenced only other members of our species. Now it is influencing all life on earth and even the physics and chemistry of the planet. Until the last few decades this rising expectations force was relatively subdued because people's vision of other people was limited to their neighbours who usually had the same standard of living. Television has changed all that. In America slum dwellers can enjoy watching the lives of the rich and famous while a rat runs across the floor of their own hovel. Resentment, alienation and despair are, as a result, far more in evidence now than they were decades earlier when economic conditions were even worse. The sense of family and belonging were stronger in former times but these have been almost blown away by commercial television. I say commercial television because the unholy handmaiden of the technology is the use of it to make profits. What seems to sell is the worship of consumer products, the celebration of sex without love. and the triumph and fun of violence. These are being used to sell products and are indoctrinating our youth in particular and destroying our culture and heritage in general. Those parts of the world that do not have much commercial television do not have many of the social problems from which we suffer in North America. There is a direct correlation. Government television, although it may be prone to propaganda, does not seem to be nearly as destructive. The great tragedy is that the technology is spreading rapidly all over the world to cultures already vulnerable to collapse. It is a cruel joke to pretend that these billions of people will ever have a fraction of the American consumer products yet they are throwing the traditions of thousands of years (traditions that worked quite well in their environment) into the garbage. This priceless heritage will never be retrieved, nor will it be replaced with anything of more value than the despair of an urban slum where frustration will continue to build up as the inhabitants watch the rich and famous on television. I have heard some recent horror stories about remote mountain villages with no television where an enterprising young man has a generator and a VCR and screen. He rents foreign action films and shows them nightly in the village. Thus, rising expectations are rapidly being turned into a world-wide force which will destroy biodiversity and cultures and breed frustration and violence. Television & Cultural Destruction II: Homo Sapiens Teenager Consumerensis For the last few decades we have been conducting an interesting social experiment in North America. We have been working on the creation of a new variety of human being I will call homo sapiens teenager consumerensis. This being has been cultivated by our society and the process began in earnest with the growth of commercial television in the late 1950s. It carries on to the present ever stronger and more effectively. Teenagers were trained to have special needs ... special foods, beverages, clothing, music, films, etc. They are divided into market targets and the markets are changed seasonally in order to sell new products. Once this enterprise was really rolling the eight year olds were persuaded that they were teenagers already and then the twenty-five year olds were convinced that they were still teenagers. This experiment is hurtling on apace using some of the most creative minds in our society and every modern technological and psychological tool, sparing no expense. Often sex, violence and greed are exploited to help sell products including TV shows and films. For the first time in the history of our species the most vital, active years of a person's growing life are dedicated to one major goal - self indulgence. From a business point of view it has and continues to be an overwhelming success. At the same time automation, downsizing and shipping jobs overseas has taken meaningful work away from young people. Except for so-called McJobs, business and labour can find nothing important for young people to do ... except to buy. Is it any wonder some of them turn to anti-social activities such as drug dealing and violence. The key to this state of affairs is commercial television. It is not so much public television. It is probably no coincidence that other continents which do not have such advanced commercial television do not have such advanced teenage problems. If one could do a global map of drug abuse, teen violence and other such problems it would likely be the same map as homo sapiens teenager consumerensis. I predict that any countries that follow in North America's footsteps from a commercial TV point of view will develop the same problems. It is part of the package. I have been told that the average North American child will have spent more hours watching television by the age of four than they will spend talking to their parents for the rest of their lives. Well, why would this special species talk to its parents? It has been finely crafted into a market target which doesn't relate to other age groups. North American teenagers, on average, (and by the way, this does not apply to every individual young person, of course) spend about the same amount of time watching television as they spend in school. We now have a generation of parents whose idea of family values were conditioned by Saturday morning cartoons. Both school and TV are educational but in different ways. Which is more effective at forming attitudes? There are three categories of commercial TV which are the most popular. First, the abject worship of consumer products, especially shown in game shows but subliminally even in the sitcoms. Second, the celebration of sex without love as seen in rock videos and many commercials. Is there any connection between this and teen pregnancy and the speed of sexually transmitted diseases? The third is a category very popular with boys and that is "blow away your troubles with bullets"; the connection of films with excessive violence to crime and violence among youth is obvious. In our system the worst human vices are encouraged for the sake of profits. I suggest that for all the problems they create, these profits come at great expense. What surprises me is why so many people lament the sorry situation of certain elements of our youth and no-one discusses the real reasons for the problems. How can an adult say "Just say NO to drugs!" when everything else in society says YES to self-indulgence. In order to fix a stalled car or an aching tooth I thought that the best idea was to find the reason for the problem and address that reason. I don't know how to start changing the thrust of several decades of homo sapiens teenager consumerensis but I do know we have to face the real reasons for youth problems and begin a dialogue on what to do about them. The future of our civilization is at stake. Robert Bateman |
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