Media Conglomerations have Dumbed Down Media

Television, magazines and especially newspapers have all seen dramatic changes in content, organization and methods of delivery to their audiences throughout their history. In the early days, when printing presses were first coming onto the scene, what few newspapers that existed could only produce a small number of pages of news per day, both due to physical limitations of the machines, and the limitation imposed by the communication technologies of the time. Today, though, all three mediums have an exceedingly large number of resources to draw upon. The legion of reporters the large corporations can afford to employ, reports given directly to them by content creators and even secondhand stories from around the internet leave these mediums with so much content that they cannot cram it all into a single episode, issue or release.

This is especially telling due to all three mediums’ use of the internet to deliver their content to their audience. They can literally throw hundreds of articles and shows at us each day, nearing thousands should we consider that any given person might stay up to date with 2 to 3 television series, read 1 or 2 newspapers for news, and keep an eye on between 1 and 5 magazines. With all of this information coming our way, we should easily be the most literate society to have existed on this planet. Despite this, citizens of the United States are woefully uninformed about the goings on of not just local events, but of national and international events as well. How can this be, though, with such an alarming amount of information being hurled at us? Looking at how content has evolved over the past hundred years, it’s very easy to discover the answer to this question.

Even just 50 to 60 years ago, shows like Leave it to Beaver and I Love Lucy were hugely popular. These shows were extremely conservative, and were some of the very few shows available for viewing, aside from ‘the news’. The number of magazines in existence at that time was also only a fraction of the number of magazines that currently exist. At this point, newspapers were relatively established, but during their beginning, there were a very small number of papers in existence. Now, though, a staggering number of ‘competitors’ among these mediums exist, as easily evidenced by the existence of about 6 ESPN channels, the dozens of magazines we all see when we visit our family doctor and the dozens of newspapers offered to those of us walking around cities by peddlers of such printed mediums. The competition among such a huge number of companies means that they have to ensure that their product will sell. By far, it would seem that the current strategy they use is extraordinarily effective: extremism.

Looking at the average cable television news story from my high school years, every third to fourth story involved a crime and/or a death, every other story was sad or depressing, and every single story had an overly dramatized title. Magazines such as The Enquirer hype up all of their stories on the front page by using provocative language about the lives of celebrities that should not even concern most of us. Even newspapers have fallen victim to this type of over-advertising their product, in order to try to compete with television and magazine news. Each medium has to attempt to outsell each other medium in order to keep its head above the water in the vast ocean of media companies that now exist. Those that fail to outsell their competition eventually go under, and get lost among the staggering amount of content being hurled at ‘modern’ civilization. They literally dumb down their content to make it easier to produce, and to appeal to a ‘wider’ range of customers, so that they can keep up with the deluge of other stories and media constantly being thrown at us. The only problem is that: they don’t really need to.

In reality, most of these companies are owned by a very small number of parent (and super-parent) corporations, who own nearly every piece of media that reaches our eyes and ears. Each one can slightly change the content of what they receive from their vast network of sources, and send it to a great many of their subsidiaries, who then alter it slightly more to ‘make it their own.’ Where responsible organizations would forward an unbiased story, though, these companies send only what is in their best interest to be published. This leaves us sorely lacking in a second, vital view on most issues, and with no information about things that these small number of corporations wish to keep hidden. They intentionally keep us in the dark, in order to maintain the large amount of power that they already have. The cycle can be broken, though, by citizens demanding better of these companies, and by taking actions into their own hands. United, modern civilization could keep itself very well informed, and could do a great amount of good in the world. We all have to participate, though, we all have to do our part, and be good citizens and keep ourselves and each other informed and entertained, rather than take what they give us.

Episode II: A New Hope?

With the election over, President Obama having been re-elected, the Democrats holding a majority in the Senate, and the Republicans losing many seats in the House, but still maintaining a majority, we can finally say goodbye to all of the inane, redundant campaign commercials. We finally don’t have to put up with each side calling the other a liar, and then presenting completely opposing viewpoints on each other’s candidates. We have finally reached a hiatus in what seemed to be a never-ending, brutal ad campaign between the two major political parties. We can finally get down to what really matters: running the country… right?<n>

Maybe I’m being too hopeful, but maybe we can see an end to the bickering and fighting between the two major parties in Congress. Maybe we can see the end of the gridlocked battle lines erected in the House, so that we can really work towards a recovery. Maybe we can see the end of (now shown futile) attempts of many, many Republicans to completely discredit President Obama in order to prevent him from having a second term, and see them finally start to cooperate in order to restore America to where it should be. With the new stance taken by Speaker Boehner in the House, it seems like we might be able to see these men and women put aside their political goals for the greater good of the country.<n>

John Boehner spoke to his party shortly after the election, telling them, in no uncertain terms, that they had lost the election badly, and that they could not allow what had been happening for the past two years to continue any longer. Regardless of whether or not this is their strategy to keep their party alive, or he really wants them to be able to work with Democrats in the House, it is a very refreshing change of pace. While not all of the Republicans in the House may agree with the stance the Speaker seems to be taking, a large number of them seem to have finally “fallen in line”. We can only hope that this behavior will continue indefinitely, as what this country needs most now is to be united, not divided, as so many of these people have accused the President of trying to do. After years of a bitter stalemate and stagnation within Congress, we may at last see the action taken needed to get this country out of this recession, and back on its feet.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/11/us/politics/boehner-tells-house-gop-to-fall-in-line.html?smid=fb-share

Mainstream Media Liberal Bias? I say not.

As a fore note: I really dislike most radio talk shows. That out of the way, and regardless of the fact, I feel that political radio talk shows are terrible. Unregulated, and very, very biased, you can take almost nothing they say without a grain of salt, or maybe even a whole salt shaker. Using a radio talk show to attempt to keep oneself up to date on current events is like listening to a crowd of cheerleaders gossip about the school geeks: you’re going to get very opinionated, one-sided, and not very accurate information. You may say that not all talk show radio is like this, and you’d be right: sports talk show radio sometimes just goes on about facts. But the sports version of talk show radio isn't what we’re discussing here.

After the dissolution of the Fairness Rule under Ronald Reagan gave rise to such monstrosities as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck: all hyper-conservative, right wing lunatics, who feel they have nothing better to do than blame government for every problem anyone has ever had, and whatever Democrat they are able to for problems that have yet to even really arise. While I may be letting a little bit of liberal bias slip into what I’m saying here, it’s not a lot. Having listened to Sean Hannity repeatedly, I can easily say that half his show is tossing blame around for problems (the target of said blame almost always being President Obama), while the other half is criticizing big government for everything else that is wrong with the country, according to his narrow-minded beliefs. It’s frustrating to listen to, and more frustrating to realize that some people like and believe everything he says.

As if this wasn’t bad enough, the proprietor of conservative talk show radio, Rush Limbaugh, is responsible for one of the largest conspiracies to have arisen in the past century: the Mainstream Media’s Liberal Bias that he has made so many people believe exist. He has used this in many situations in order to help justify his, as I have heard quoted, “somewhat extreme views, because he has to make himself heard amidst a sea of liberal opposition.” To this I say: what liberal opposition? It simply does not exist. It is truly hard for me to believe that people are willing to take this kind of affront lying down. I feel that it has gone on for far too long, and that the facts need to be set straight, that this single-sided argument needs to stop, or at least be shown for what it is. I feel that the old Fairness Rule should be brought back, to combat misinformation, and to help produce a more educated society. Isn’t that what a democracy relies on?

The Storm that may have Brought Us Together

Hurricane Sandy never sounded all that threatening, living in the Albany area as we do. Some ‘frankenstorm’ was coming up to annihilate the eastern seaboard, but as far inland as Albany is, we barely saw anything on RPI campus. Of course, the storm hit much harder than many of us had anticipated, and wreaked untold havoc upon New Jersey and New York City. Of course, with a national disaster, the first thing everyone thought about was how the storm is going to, bad puns aside, turn the tides in the then upcoming election. With many dead, and a rather sizable portion of the New Jersey and New York areas without power, and some without homes at all, the first thing many political pundits do is blame the opposition for causing the storm and using it as a political weapon. Ignoring the faulty logic in these claims, do they really have to politicize it?

Unfortunately, politicizing tragedies seems to be becoming almost a sport, where each person to politicize the current strategy first tries to outdo the person who did so before them. Romney wisely kept quiet about the effects of Sandy, other than to wish his condolences to those affected and to attempt to raise some funds to help those people out. Many conservative pundits, though, decided to take it upon themselves to blame the president, and the rest of his party for using this hurricane to stop Romney’s momentum and win the election for the Democrats. As usual, we saw politicians make a play for their own power and status, rather than focusing on the real problem: millions of people without power, many of whom still don’t have power, and the many areas that are still rationing gas in order to make sure that everyone gets some.

I do, though, thoroughly applaud the President on his efforts to put aside politics and work towards fixing the real problem. The fact that Governor Christie of New Jersey, a staunch Republican and long-time critic of the President, complimented Obama on his efforts made me feel proud, both as a New Jersey native, for having a governor willing to put aside partisan politics to help his people, and as an American, for having a President willing to do the same. While I still feel that an overwhelming majority of politicians are out there to make a name, and a small fortune, for themselves, and to further secure their own power, I feel more confident now that there are some of them who are looking out for us, the small guys. It has slowly begun to restore my faith that our Democracy is not yet beyond saving.

Net Neutrality: What's so hard about it?

Net neutrality is something that matters to me an awful lot. I use the internet for nearly everything: file storage, communication, entertainment, and also for schoolwork and even at my job on campus. That said, it’s obvious why I would be a proponent of net neutrality. Much of my life revolves around my ability to access the internet universally, and without biased repercussions. Certainly my love for the game Star Wars The Old Republic, a massively multiplayer online role playing game, would be difficult to enjoy if I were to have to limit my data upload and download speeds and totals, as the game requires a large amount of data transfer in order to run. A limit on my transfer speeds would also serve to limit my ability to email files to and from colleagues and professors, and in my sharing of files with other people through popular programs such as Dropbox. Knowing that many other students at RPI have similar levels of connection to the internet as I do, it isn’t hard for me to classify net neutrality as something very important to not only me, but most of this school as well.

With all of this said, it should come as no surprise that I believe that a loss of net neutrality will destroy the internet as we know it. The Federal Communications Commission enacted rules that safeguarded non-mobile internet connections, but as Campbell, Martin and Fabos have mentioned, many people, myself included, do not feel that it was enough. I happen to own a smartphone, a tremendously useful, and simultaneously distracting, device. Where it should be a device that allows me to access anything I need at any time, so long as I can connect to the internet, instead I am forced to live in fear of overage charges for using more data than the data plan I was forced to buy would allow. Were this my only connection to the internet, I would feel almost shackled by the data plan, and would not be able to experience many of the wonders of the internet.

I feel that a similar plan for the entire internet would limit creativity, and kill innovation on the web. Innovation is a large part of how the internet has grown throughout its lifetime, with huge advancements made by individuals with many gifts and talents, more so than companies who can build infrastructure. It is because of this, that I feel that ne neutrality is such an important thing, and that if we want the internet to continue to be the open forum, the grand knowledge database, and the facilitator of business and entertainment that it is now, we must push for a continuation of the net neutrality that currently exists, and fight for a more strict enforcement of it.

Whoever Won the 2012 Presidential Debates, the People Lost

With all the buzz of which candidate did well during each of the debates, it is really quite easy to lose track of the most important part of these, what used to be, vital pieces of information for both decided and undecided voters. Veiled by the ‘performances’ large media conglomerates so love to sensationalize and sell to the masses, we no longer see debates for what they should be. We no longer use them to judge a candidate’s position on a topic, or to learn more about how a candidate would act in office. We see a dumbed down version, where the only thing that matters is who ‘won’ or who ‘lost’. While this is horrible, it does tend to be what the masses want, or the media couldn't sell it so well, could they? Regardless of who is to blame, the fact of the matter stands: these debates are no longer the tool they used to be, and are farces of something that used to be useful.

Throughout the three debates, we saw both, and that it is only two is another problem, candidates not just fail to answer numerous questions in an adequate fashion, but actually avoid questions entirely. When they finally, rarely answer a question, the answer we receive is so convoluted and twisted that it is nearly impossible to tell what the candidate really means with what they see. More recently, though, we have seen Governor Romney change his views from week to week, debate to debate, which only makes it harder to take what he says seriously, and harms his reputability. His ever changing position was only part of the cause of President Obama’s ‘poor’ ‘performance’ in the first debate, combined with what many viewed as a serious lack of respect for the President during that debate and especially the next. Meanwhile, the President appeared to not even care about his participation in the first debate, something that he should hold near and dear to his heart, to help the American people to the best of his ability, even if that means helping them to elect an opponent who they might believe will do a better job than he himself has.

As if these problems did not make the situation bad enough, these debates fail to truly encompass the entirety of opinions represented within the ballot. Even the more popular third party candidates such as Jill Stein and Gary Johnson were denied entry into the debates based on archaic rules that prevent the current bipartisan system from falling out of power. This limits further the already limited discussion, which is already only on topics that the two ruling parties agree are fair game to talk about, and so what we see in the debates is a severely narrow-minded view of what is really important in American politics. No matter who won these three debates, it is the American people who lost.

Media Monopolies

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries, citizens of the United States of America saw a series of laws put into place to limit the ability of any one company to establish a monopoly over any one portion of the market. This had been done in response to the recently ended Gilded Age, during which corruption reigned supreme, and also to give unions a better chance at being able to negotiate for their members. For a very, very long time, these laws abated the growth of many already large corporations, and prevented total monopolies. While these laws were not extremely effective, they were at least an attempt to stem the tide. Unfortunately, we have recently seen the passing of the Telecommunication Act of 1996, which, according to the case study in this week’s reading, removed most of what little restrictions media companies once had on how much of the market they could own, and completely obliterated minority ownership of media companies, giving rise to the possibility of a very one sided representation of the world around us by media companies.

These larger companies are now able to use their even more ludicrously large amount of resources to buy out what few companies they do not yet own, in order to more completely ensure that their message is the only one that reaches the ears of their audience. They have removed almost all minority opinions, as well documented by Campbell, Martin and Fabos. A loss of all but less than 10% of all media corporations to the majority, when the minority represents almost 40% of the country is unacceptable. This is not a capitalist democracy at work, it’s a totalitarian oligarchy, a few individuals (read CEOs) within a small number of companies retaining complete power over what information is fed to the masses, and knowledge is power. This terrible turn of events has marked a period of American history where our voices have become increasingly smaller, and less easily heard where we are bombarded by the same series of thoughts and ideas that likely do not align with our own thoughts and opinions of important matters. We are bombarded and assaulted until our mental barriers protecting our original thoughts are brought low, and we are converted.

We live in a sad age where we rely so completely on media corporations for our news, and they hold an amazing, unchecked power to influence what we see and hear, with absolutely no transparency. While we might like to think that we’d stand up to this, that we would not let someone so completely dominate our thoughts and our national discussions, we see it every day, and honestly, some of us are happy to oblige. It’s easy when they don’t have to think for themselves, when they can just blindly believe what they are told on television, or via chain emails. But this does not a true democracy make. Eventually, and hopefully sooner than later, we will finally, as one people, realize how intolerably we have been wronged, and we will rise up and take back our democracy from those who would subvert its purpose.

Is telling the truth really so hard?

Why does it seem that at every turn, we, the American People, are lied to by those who wish to govern over us? I hate to single out any one single party or candidate, but the entire Romney Campaign seems to be attempting, to quote a Fox News contributor (which makes this all the more poignant), “to set the world record for the greatest number of blatant lies and misrepresentations slipped into a single political speech.” It would seem that these politicians are willing to take whatever measures are necessary to secure their spot in the White House this year… but wait.

Haven’t we seen that from their entire party for the entirety of this presidential term? Lying to, cheating and deceiving the American People seems to have become their favorite past time. From voter suppression barely thinly veiled as an attempt to prevent voter fraud to statements that their first goal this term was to unseat the President, it’s a miracle that most of these politicians still hold office. The only explanation I can come up with for why they have remained for so long is this: that they are well versed and highly skilled liars, capable of whipping up any explanation for their actions. They can spin any story to put themselves in a positive light, and anyone they happen to dislike at the time in a negative light. Of course, this doesn’t include the fact that they have some of the most vocal media outlets completely under their thumb.

What is amazing, though, is that we let this happen. From Paul Ryan’s Republican National Convention speech to Romney’s performance in his first presidential debate, we seem willing to ignore the fact that half of what they spew is lies, and grade them on their performance otherwise. Despite the fact that we’re becoming aware that we are being lied to, we are simply taking it lying down. Between the two of us, the media, and ourselves as citizens of a once great democracy, are failing the Constitution and ideals upon which this once glorious nation was founded. We have shown that we value sensationalism and showmanship over honesty and substance, and it has become unacceptable. It is becoming ever more apparent that we cannot trust the Republican Party to be completely honest with the American People, the Democratic Party to challenge their opponents on this dishonesty, nor ourselves to call either of them out on these issues, and this is what I believe to be one of the greatest problems, and greatest challenges, of my generation: to fix the problems with the Bipartisan American Political system.


http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2012/08/30/paul-ryans-speech-in-three-words/

Social Media and Press Releases: Bad News for Us

With the advent of social media, we have seen the creation of a media outlet that seemed nearly impervious to the influence of corporations: everyday ordinary people informing other people of the goings on in the world at large. We saw the possibility for a more transparent news outlet, one where people could inform other people without the meddling of public relations firms, or other insincere corporate twists on a news story. These new methods of communicating ideas could put an end to fairy tales such as the great and kind John D. Rockefeller. We could finally realize a society where lies and dishonesty in the name of a public image were brought to light, and we could finally begin to actually trust what people said: as they would know they would be caught in any lie they attempted. Unfortunately, it would seem that media relation firms are up to the task of continuing their deception.

This week’s reading contained a case study on how social media has changed the method in which companies and individuals give press releases. It was honestly quite disheartening to see that such methods of blanketing harsh realities with lies and half-truths were being converted to become compatible with today’s social media scene. It had been a great hope of mine that social media could help put an end to the ability of those with enough money to deceive the common citizen, and convince them that nothing was wrong, no matter how badly it was.

Thankfully, though, it seems to be an imperfect method, as seen in the somewhat recent oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Those old enough to comprehend most of what is said in this post are old enough to remember BP’s public relations fiasco that was that massive oil spill. No matter how many commercials they released in an attempt to make amends for their mistakes, It would seem as if people still see them as a rather environmentally unfriendly company. This leaves me with the hope that we may still one day reach a point where the citizenry of not just this country, but of the whole world, can get by without having to rely on information hand fed to us by those wanting to appear a certain way. While I doubt media literacy will ever become an unnecessary skill, I still see the possibility for it becoming a much easier skill to learn.

A Doomed Environment

After the first Presidential Debate of the 2012 election, I am again struck by a striking, disquieting realization: neither of the two largest parties’ candidates appear to be worried about the environment, climate change, or science in general. With the threat of global warming looming darkly over us, it pains me to see both candidates so callously ignore the danger it represents. Already we can see entire countries1 plan to evacuate their citizens due to rising sea levels caused by global warming. This problem threatens national sovereignty, and yet both candidates dismiss it as some secondary issue, insignificant when compared to arguing over who gets the last word in any given section of a debate. What happened to the days when politicians took the recommendations of scientists seriously, where they respected the decades spent learning about their field in order to better the understanding of humanity as a whole? Governor Romney certainly used to.

During his gubernatorial term in Massachusetts, he argued for, and indeed pushed through, strict environmental policies, policies that would lead to cleaner air, water and homes for his constituents. He fought back against corporations lobbying to prevent these plans, and he dedicated himself to ensuring that his commonwealth became much more environmentally friendly. Governor Romney teamed up with staunch environmentalists, because he was concerned for the future of his state. He accomplished a great deal of good in his term as governor, including the creation of a governmental “agency” in order to “integrate policy in housing, transportation, energy and the environment.” Then he put in charge of it an environmentalist who lead a group that had filed lawsuits against Massachusetts due to the state’s poor energy practices. Governor Romney “was like Nixon to China,” according to a Democrat, high praise coming from his opposing political party.

Of course, this golden age was not to be forever, as Romney, near the end of his term, shot down a plan he had worked on for two years, likely because it would hurt his chances for the presidency in the upcoming years. He gave in to bipartisan politics, and refused to do what was needed, indeed what was right, and allowed concern for his own political future cloud his better judgment. Once again, science was ignored in favor of political safety, and a candidate put his own needs in front of the needs of his constituents. I fear that by the time we are able to have a serious political discussion on the state of the economy, amongst the big players in Washington, at least, it will be entirely too late, and we will be unable to change our course and prevent irreparable harm to our beautiful planet.

1 http://www.conservation.org/global/gcf/fmg/articles/Pages/kiribati_evacprep.aspx

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/30/us/politics/romney-energy-agenda-shifted.html

How Stereotyping Still Holds Us Back

As seen in the case study in this week’s reading, there has, for a very long time, existed a habit of stereotyping different groups of people within advertising. From men who can’t get by without a beer in hand, to women who can’t even operate around their own house without the guidance and advice of a ‘competent’ male narrator; many of us are still old enough to remember how awkward these commercials made us feel. Despite what Campbell, Martin and Fabbos may believe, these stereotypes are long from dead. While they are much less common today, digging under the surface reveals that they are not entirely extinct.

So this brings up the question of: do these stereotypes do anything helpful, or contribute to society as a whole? The answer, of course, is obvious: no, they don’t. They leave the impressionable close minded, and unaccepting of ideas that may break what stereotypes have been ‘forced’ upon them, and it doesn’t stop at product advertisement. It carries over into the advertisement of ideas, ideals and people, too, and unfortunately, people are willing to believe whatever they see on TV, or in a magazine. All these stereotypes, and the outright lies seen in some other adds, lead to is an ignorant, intolerant and influenced population that has yet to learn to think for itself.

So we once again see a return of the need for media literacy, in debunking the myths and stereotypes reinforced by questionable sources of information, and even by sources that we should be able to trust. With an increase in media literacy, we can finally bring about an end to the intolerance and ignorance that so fully permeates this country. We can put into motion the end of intolerance, and create a society worth defending. We can begin to see the untruths and outright lies fed to us by many companies and corporations and by people in a position to be able to do so, and debunk the falsehoods we may now believe.

We can bring about a more truthful society, one where we know that we can trust the information that is being given to us, no matter the source. Wouldn't it be nice to not have to worry about where a company got its statistics or how a political candidate arrived at her or his final numbers presented in a particularly effective speech? We can make this happen, but we have to act as a responsible society, one that cares about the well-being of its future, and one that is not completely absorbed in the here and now.

A Failing Democracy

Matt Taibbi’s article this past Friday published on Rolling Stone’s website strikes a resoundingly true note. He comments, not at all briefly, on how it’s quite ridiculous that Mitt Romney ever stood a chance at winning this election. He proposed the idea that the current split of the electorate among the two candidates makes absolutely no sense, given what the two major candidates represent. He also goes on to suggest that any candidate really and truly different from the two from our bipartisan system would clean house, with a true landslide victory. I have to say: I agree with him completely. So then why do we not see this?

For the grand majority of our country’s history, we have seen the federal government run by a bipartisan system that has attempted to maintain its position of power. Referring back to class (or was it recitation?) on the 26th, the system was designed to keep newcomers out of power: and we've seen a huge increase in the size of the obstacle newcomers now face. Candidates like Jill Stein, who truly differs from Mitt Romney in almost all areas of policy, has no real shot at even garnering a small percentage of the popular vote, much less the vote of a single member of the electoral college, and while this might seem like a small problem in the face of our ever-impending economic “apocalypse”, how could it be any less important?

This bipartisan system that’s firmly latched itself to seats of power throughout the 50 states of the union has slowly been sucking the life from this country. We have seen nearly no major differences between the two major party candidates in decades, and without some serious change, we won’t for the foreseeable future. Yet the vast majority of the American populace seems not to care, they seem content to sit back and be ruled by parties who would as soon toss them under the boss as toss them a bone, and this really, truly weakens our democracy.

We were founded as a nation governed “by the people, for the people.” In a true democracy, we could easily kick out these impostors  and rid ourselves of this vampiric parasite that is slowly killing our democratic republic. Unfortunately, it will take the actions of a lot of people who cannot seem to agree on the simplest of things to rise up and act, and the dispelling of many of the rumors spread by the stenographic media we now rely on for our information. Make no mistake: this can and will happen… eventually. It simply remains a question of how long, and how much of our freedom will we have to lose before we rebel?

How far is too far?

What constitutes copyright infringement these days? It seems that something as simple as downloading a picture from a Google search could end in a lawsuit in the ranges of thousands, and even hundreds of thousands, of dollars. In fact, just recently, without even having downloaded anything, a media company decided to take legal action against our IP address. While this should come as no surprise in such a sue-happy society, it goes beyond what many people, myself included, feel is reasonable. To the point, though, how much is too much? When does ‘borrowing’ go from ‘fair use’ to ‘copyright infringement’? What are we, and are we not, allowed to borrow, re-use and transform?

The First Amendment specifically protects the freedom of speech, but it’s unclear as to exactly how far it protects this vital freedom. Does it also cover the freedom of expression? Many Supreme Court justices have ruled as such, and I feel that that decision very fairly judges the amendment. We have seen that it goes just far enough to protect someone’s freedom of expression, so long as they are not harming another, or hindering any of their freedoms.

So does this cover copyright infringement, and if so, how? Media and Culture ballparks the unreasonable price of $50,000 to simply borrow a few seconds of media from its copyright owners. This puts it well out of reach of most people to use it under the ‘fair rights’ clause that has for so long existed in the United States. Copyright holders can even file a lawsuit for using an extensively modified version of their copyrighted media. With legal costs upwards of hundreds of thousands of dollars, it becomes impossible for the average citizen to make use of something catchy that they think they could alter to good effect. This is simply irrational.

Yes, I agree with most everybody that an artist’s work should be protected from being stolen. But when someone else takes their work, credits them for it, and then goes on to modify it so that it hardly resembles their original work, should this not be acceptable, given that the artist gives permission for such a modification? Or are we to suppose that we cannot express ourselves through the use of existing media and art? Personally, I feel that the greed of copyright companies is a gross injustice on our personal freedom of expression and that we ought to be allowed to alter things in such a way that I have described. Unfortunately, a lot needs to change in this country before any such changes can even be put on the table. I certainly hope that these changes happen sooner rather than later, before we become stifled under the very ideas that were invented to protect us.

Political Suicide

Monday night, September 17th, 2012, saw the release of a video which may well put the final nail in the coffin of an already dying campaign. A video of Mitt Romney was released, of the candidate during a private fundraiser, in which he made the (once again untrue) statement 'that 47 percent of households pay no federal income taxes and 53 percent do.' Of course, we see even members of his own party scrambling away from this as fast as they can, in an attempt to save face in light of his incredibly demeaning opinion held by the Republican Candidate for the highest public office in the country. In one fell swoop, he insulted half the country, a large portion of which are Republican constituents, or live in the solid red south, and managed to add to the table one of the most factually flawed talking points of the election. Honestly, I'm not sure he could have done anything more harmful to his chances to be elected.

Disregarding the fact that his entire campaign has regarded the poor, and many racial ethnic groups, as unimportant, or not worthy of Mittens' attention, this callous video will likely end Governor Romney's chance to be elected this year, or any other year for that matter. He has shown that he, more than he claims President Obama does, wants to divide the country, not to mention that his division of the country is quite a bit less one-sided. We see again a candidate that wants to say whatever it takes to get elected, something that seems to be an oft recurring problem in this country: a candidate that does not seem to care about the welfare of the country, only that his or her political party gains power, and to further his or her own goals.

Is it too much to ask that we see a candidate who truly wants to work for this country to get a chance to hold office? Is it too much to ask to want a President who will work for the country, without making every attempt to push a personal agenda? We can make this happen, but we need to take action. We need to stand up for what we believe, take a risk, and band together to cast down the corruption and greed that is rending this nation asunder, and to fulfill our duty to both ourselves, and the constitution of this once great nation. It’s not beyond possibility, we just need to set aside our differences, take one for the team, and do what is right, both for this country, and for its people.



http://www.alternet.org/election-2012/big-fat-lie-behind-romneys-absurd-47-argument?akid=9420.29753.11WKmy&rd=1&src=newsletter713446&t=5

Labor isn't a bad thing

This week's reading in Media and Culture contains an interesting case study. The results of this case study have pointed towards media coverage of many labor groups has been at least partially responsible for the drastic decrease in the percentage of American workers who are members of Labor Unions. Today, labor unions have only a shadow of the bargaining power they once held, and are likely to be unable to mount the protests and strikes they were once capable of. The news media outlets that cover these stories seem, according to Campbell, Martin and Fabos, to be reporting the stories as bad for consumers, which aligns quite nicely with what the media corporation's business goals typically are.

I think it's quite obvious that this is no coincidence. Labor unions cause 'trouble' for large corporations, who could otherwise operate mostly without interference. While it's possible to fire single employees, or to reach a small agreement with them to quiet them, or even to bully them into doing what the corporation pleases, these unions were too large to simply bully or fire, and held enough sway to get what they wanted. It's very obvious to see why corporations would want them out of the picture. Without these unions, we would eventually return to the early twentieth century, where men and women performed back breaking labor for 14 hour days with no breaks, for a wage that is now criminal. Labor unions, and by extension their members, have brought about massive social and economic reform, changing the way companies have done business for the better, and hopefully forever.

Without labor unions, corporations could make even further unprecedented profits, further fueling their lobbyists' spending power, and leading us one step closer to a corporate buyout of our democracy. As one of the few powers that has stood up to corporations, losing these unions takes one more obstacle out of the way of a corporate takeover of America as a whole. We can already see the effects they have had on our government officials, swaying national policy by spending millions of dollars a year to buy votes. Can we afford to let them have their way with their workers, too? This, again, highlights the importance of media literacy, and the need for the American people to stand up for their rights, and their freedom, to fight back against those who would rob them, and put into place someone who will fight for them.

Political Selfishness will be our Downfall

I am not entirely sure how I manage this, but it seems that every time I write for this blog, it’s about a frustration, or outright infuriation, with the current state of American politics. It seems that every time we reach the end of a slanderous skirmish between the two major partisan parties that control our government, another one starts up almost immediately. Whereas in the past it may have taken a few days, we now see news sources putting out stories mere minutes after they occur, thanks to new technology. Now I know I seem a bit one sided in this blog, but if I do, it’s only because I’m more frustrated with one side of this civil war. Between voter suppression, the blatant lies which serve only to defame an otherwise average presidency, and the deplorable, dishonest practice of disagreeing with the president, only to then claim credit for his achievements or chiding him for being unable to accomplish anything while simultaneously sabotaging his efforts, it’s easy to see why I might be so frustrated with them. This directly leads to the topic of today’s post: Why do we keep seeing Republicans blame Obama for things that are (at least mostly) out of his control?

The somewhat recent incident in Benghazi, where the US consulate was attacked by a mob of protesters killing 4 Americans, including the ambassador to Libya, and a large number of Libyan citizens, was a tragedy. Not only was it a tragedy, it marked the start of an international crisis. With a very serious, sensitive situation on his hands, what President Obama needed least of all was an attack on his method of dealing with international politics. So of course the Republican Candidate Mitt Romney would launch his attack mere hours after the news of the attack was initially reported, before the American populace had even become aware of the situation. During a time of international crisis, the first thing a possible future President of the United States of America could think to do was to insult his opponent. He “fire[d] his gun without aiming”, to quote Mr. Obama.

Of course, in true Mitt Romney fashion, his statement had to be edited, and re-edited, in order to more accurately represent what actually happened, because as has been the case on numerous occasions, Governor Romney had used information that he could not confirm to be completely true in his attack, and had jumped the gun, eager to mar the President’s reputation as much as possible. He gave no thought to needing to appear like he’s organized, intelligent and trustworthy, to appear nuanced in the handling of foreign policy matters, and instead chose to childishly chide a man who held no responsibility for the incident, and I believe that at least some small part of the American population is getting sick of this crap. We want our leaders to be worried about the safety of Americans abroad, not about their political standing at home. We want them to be respectful, and represent us well abroad, not to paint a picture of juvenile absurdity in throwing blame, rather than working to maintain relations and alliances. We want to see less greed and more selflessness, that we might build a “more perfect union.”

I’m really hoping this drives home points I've made in other posts that we need to stop letting fear-mongers and liars dominate American politics, and concentrate on the important things. As is the Romney standard, his information and arguments against the president were full of logical delusions, and any fact checker worth their weight in coal could invalidate his statements. But that still isn't the problem: the problem is that we let this happen. We let people lie to try to maintain their power, or to become elected to positions of greater power than the ones they’re in now. These people lie to our faces, and actively work to bring down our Commander in Chief, just so that they can put themselves in power. I understand that mudslinging has been and always will be a political past-time, but enough is enough. Sabotaging our country for political gain is unethical, immoral and dishonest, and we cannot sit by and allow it to happen.

I know I am not the only person who is sick of watching the Republican party sow the seeds of discontent with our President among the American populace, and wait to reap the rewards of doing so. We've seen them shoot down numerous attempts to fix the recession the entire world as a whole has fallen into, and propose no real solution to fix it. We need to step up, and stop this madness before it consumes us as a country, and the world as a whole. America is a very large part of the global economy, and losing America could well bring about a global depression worse than that of 4 score years ago. As I keep saying: we must get up and do something to stop this, and to fix ourselves what those we have assigned to fix will not.




http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/1005-trade/249367-romney-campaign-says-fed-action-reflects-obamas-failure

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/09/13/foreign-policy-dominates-campaign-for-second-day/comment-page-5/

http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2012/09/13/time-line-of-cairo-events-reveals-romneys-deeply-flawed-rush-to-judgment/2/

Media Bias

Sometimes, finding a new viewpoint on a subject a writer cares about is like a breath of fresh air. Growing up in a conservative household, in a very conservative little town, I would often hear, almost every waking moment, about how the media is just so darned liberally biased. It was as if they couldn't portray a single story without putting a liberal spin on it. Every time my mom or dad turned on the news, I would always hear about how it was “the left media” or “the liberal news”, not just media or news. Every word that came out of the mouths of the anchors was either biased, or an egregious untruth… except for Fox News, of course. Regardless, For most of my early life, I grew up believing that the media had this huge left leaning, hippie loving predisposition towards how they presented the news. And then I went to high school.

It didn't take me long to realize that the news didn't really have that much of a bias. Maybe a little, but nothing like the national conspiracy I had been led to believe it had. So I accepted what I had seen, and moved on. A few years later, I ended up in a discussion about it with my parents, and lo and behold: “What are they teaching you at that high school?” was ol' pop’s first response. So I dropped it, and decided to just not bring it up again. Besides, don’t we all know that we don’t talk about religion or politics around the dinner table? Oops.

So for the last few years of my life at home, I had to deal with the fact that I could never convince my parents that they were wrong, and let it go. Now, though, after reading Chapter 13, a particular bit stuck out to me: the claim that the media doesn't contain this huge liberal bias that so many Americans believe it does. Like a breath of fresh air, I finally feel like someone else realizes the truth for what it is. Of course, this comes recently after I arrive back at college, having had numerous political discussions with my mother over the summer, which inevitably ended in me telling her she needed to make sure that the ‘facts’ she was told were indeed truthful, and not fabricated, and so she needed to make sure she had reliable, unbiased sources. To which she would, obviously, respond about how hard it is with all the liberal bias there is in the media. Which I would always disagree with, and she’d disagree with me, and then we’d drop it. So now, I can finally go back and show her this, and really prove to her that it’s fabricated! And of course she won’t believe it.

But why? Why, when we’re provided incontrovertible proof that something is wrong, do we blindly hold onto such a belief? What purpose does it serve? To make us feel good about ourselves, that we’re right about it? And then a better question rears its head: when did we start ignoring uncomfortable facts in favor of comfortable lies, and why? I think a good answer to this is one that is attempting to be imparted to us in this course: that it comes from a lack of ‘media literacy’ skills, and that warm fuzzy feeling we get when we’re told we’re right, that our beliefs hold true, especially after being subject to a particularly convincing counterargument. We’d rather be coddled and have our hand held than have to accept that we might be wrong.

It’s hard to blame people who want to say this passage is wrong: those are some hard, well cited facts, with a strong interpretation that follows. And what it suggests reflects back to another post I've made: that we’re being told what we want to hear. It again shows us that public officials are telling us what they know we want to hear, in order to garner our favor, and win re-election, so they can continue to hold onto their ever insecure seat of power, subject to the whims of those they represent every few years. Which is why we, now more than ever, need to ensure that young Americans develop good media literacy, and literacy in general, sills: so that we avoid another generation of brainwashed citizens, who never learn to think for themselves. What we, as mostly Juniors, are learning now needs to be introduced much, much earlier in our development. Just as in every scientific field in existence, we need to be able to present our ideas to the world, let them be tested, and be comfortable with the outcome. Anything else serves only to weaken us, not just as a society, but as a race as a whole, and in this day and age, we simply can’t afford that.

Government: for the people?

For as long as I have cared about politics, and even back into recent history, the American people have seen huge ‘debates’ fought tooth and nail, back and forth, over the “inalienable” rights of people. Debates over what they can and cannot do, both to and for themselves and others. We see huge 'debates' about second amendment rights, whether or not people can carry glorified assault grade weapons. We see people decrying, and others defending, the first amendment rights of the hateful Westboro Baptist Church. We see, nay we sit by and watch, people who are only non-violently standing up for what they believe in, being treated like criminals, and then feel good about ourselves for calling them a ‘disturbance’ and telling them to just “go get a job”. We sit by and watch while two people in love are told they cannot have the same rights as any other ‘normal’ couple, simply because of how they were born. Then worst of all, we sit by and watch as our country wages a ‘war against terrorism,’ sending our boys and girls overseas to die, all in the name of ‘freedom.’ Whatever happened to a government by the people, for the people?

What happened to pledging “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” to upholding a government that protects its people, and enables them to make this the greatest country the world has ever seen? We sat by and watched as politicians stopped caring about their constituents, and began to care only about what would get them re-elected, so they could continue to line their pockets with ill-gained money from lobbyists and corporations. We have watched politicians lie through their teeth about their plans, their opponent’s plans, and damn near everything else, so that they could stay in their seat of power for just a few years more. So what have we done about it? We watched. We sat by and watched as the media failed to report their falsehood, failed its duty to truthfully relay the news, failed its one and only job of keeping the American people informed. Even now, we sit by and watch as politicians tell us what we want to hear, mask the truth about their own plans, and then unceremoniously kick the chair out from under their opponents, taking what good they have managed to accomplish in a term beset with challenges and obstacles, and then beat it into the ground, twist and deform it, until it no longer represents what it once did, and present it back to us as a rallying point. Whatever happened to a government by the people, for the people?

We sit by as the charlatan Paul Ryan lies through his teeth, twisting and manipulating what we see and have seen, attempting to use it for his own gain, whilst he skulks around, waiting to finish off what little rights and safeguards we have left. We accept as truths his lies, about how he will ‘save’ Medicare, about how he believes that “the truest measure of a society’s merit is the degree to which the strong protect the weak.” We unflinchingly consume his rhetoric, without a second thought, without any care that it may not be true, despite the number of times we've been lied to. Like a moth to a flame, we reach for that which we desire with no regard to what it may actually be. We believe the wolf in sheep’s clothing, and put ourselves one step closer to the destruction of a great many things we hold dear. We cannot simply let him walk all over us.

We can change all of this. We can cure this diseased, bloated government, remove the cancer that has been the slow death of a once great nation, and breathe life back into its people, its heart and soul. We simply need to act. We need to get off of our couches, stop watching the news, and take action. We need to inform ourselves, without media bias, and we need to encourage those around us to stand up for what is right, for what we believe in. We need to show the world that the American people are strong, that we still have fight left in us, that we support each other, and that we refuse to lie down and die. We have to step up our game, gather together, and take action against those who would watch us squander our lives in poverty. Even just through our right to vote, we can ensure that this nation lives to see better days. We just have to make our voices heard, organize together, and put into place a better system. We can show the world that this government of the people, by the people, and for the people still lives on, and that we are truly a force to be reckoned with.


http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/08/30-2
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/08/30-8
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/08/30-4

Fact Checking and Our Responsibilities

A good man often appears gauche simply because he does not take advantage of the myriad mean little chances of making himself look stylish. Preferring truth to form, he is not constantly at work upon the facade of his appearance. - Alanis Morissette

Let's say we have two candidates who are running for President this year, and instead of Mitt Romney and Barack Obama, their names are John Doe and Joe Smith. John Doe tells the American people everything they want to hear, even when he knows it's a little unrealistic. Joe Smith, though, tells it like it is, knowing a lot of what he's saying will upset certain, or even a lot, of people. Despite being honest, we all know that John Doe would be elected in this scenario. We also know, since we're so removed from this imaginary event, that he would have been found, eventually, to have told a number of lies. People would be upset, and he would be a very unpopular president, especially since he deceived his constituents into voting for him. In a perfect world, he'd be thrown out of office and replaced. Well, even in the real, business, world, he'd be fired and replaced. But that's not how America seems to operate these days.

We, the American citizenry, seem to have this problem of wanting to elect someone who tells us what they want to hear, not what we need to hear. We want to elect someone we see as nice, someone we'd call a friend, someone we would be willing to let watch our kids. We want to see someone in the White House we'd accompany to the bar after a hard day's work, and share a cold Bud Light with. We forget that sometimes, these qualities aren't what makes a good president. Many times, public figures will promote some publicity event, to attempt to appear more likable. Why should this be necessary though? It's somewhat dishonest, presenting a facade to the people who place a large amount of trust in them, and someone willing to beguile us to appear this way most certainly doesn't deserve our votes.

This is why we need people to become more aware of the truths, lies, and misleading statements that ALL public officials make. No one is perfect, but we need to guard ourselves from those who lie consistently to us, and from those whose job it is to monitor what public officials say who simply sit back, and allow us to be deceived. There should exist some level of trust between the public, and the elected officials who guide the fate of our nation, but it doesn't always happen, and so we both need to be aware of the situation ourselves, and we sometimes need help deciphering what's being shoved down our throats. This is were fact checkers come in, and why their job is so important.

These men and women spend hours searching through speech transcripts, government databases, and other sources of information for hours on end, something the average American has trouble doing. With this knowledge in hand, we then end up having to trust what these fact checkers tell us, even when the do a terrible job. Take Glenn Kessler. A veteran fact checker, he completely failed the American people when he not only failed to call Congressman Ryan out on the scathing, blatant lies littered throughout his speech at the Republican National Convention, Kessler went on to defend Ryan's remarks, further reinforcing the lies that had been told to us all. He broke the level of trust that should exist between the average American, and those who track lies told to us. It raises suspicion towards his other works, and it seems a very real possibility that he's propagated an untold number of lies, which we simply believed due to his position.

It is for this reason that, while fact checkers are an immense help, we need to learn to check the facts ourselves. We can't let some lying, two-faced fraud to lie to us and get away with it. We need to be able to tell when we've been deceived, and prevent it from happening again. We need to be able to put into place a public official who can be trusted, even if we don't like them as a person. We need a leader who will tell us how it really is, who won't stoop so low as to betray our trust for a little bit of personal gain. We need to be able to pick these people out from the crowd, and throw our support behind them, because we deserve to be told the truth, indeed, everyone does. This person may not always do things we approve of wholeheartedly, but when they say that they have America's best interest at heart, we need to be able to tell whether or not they have been truthful with us, and then do what we can to ensure that we choose only those willing to tell the truth, no matter how hard that might be. We need to shake off the reigns of ignorance, and do our part to create a better society, one where we won't be fooled by false policy claims, or slanderous attacks against another person. We are what makes America great, and we should take responsibility for making it so.


http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/truth.html#cLWkMYvS8A1hlvzp.99
http://www.thenation.com/article/169751/washington-posts-feckless-fact-check?rel=emailNation

'High' vs 'Low' Culture: Intellectualism vs Ignorance

Culture is the process by which a person becomes all that they were created capable of being. - Thomas Carlyle

In my freshman year of high school, when my English teacher told me that Shakespeare's work represented some of the best humanity had to offer, I'm pretty sure I just laughed at her in my head, and dismissed that as nonsense. Who could read that dry, dull, drab prose? I swear I wanted to tear my eyes from their sockets rather than have to sit through another class reading of the stuff. It was just so snooty and snobby, so high and mighty, so arrogant and egotistical; as my old history teacher would say, it was "mental masturbation at its best". Looking back now, though, was that really so bad? Forcing ourselves to read such difficult material, to wrap our brains around it and really comprehend what he was telling us?

Back in my hometown, rural ol' Washington, a lot of kids simply didn't care about what they were doing in school. They shrugged off assignments, claiming that they'd "never use this stuff in real life," or "never have to deal with this [insert your favorite descriptive expletive here] stuff again." Of course, then they would go on to talk about something ever so exciting that Snooky did to The Situation, or gossip about Britney Spears' shaved head. I mean, while I really disliked having to sit through the boring stuff we studied in school, I still appreciated it for what it was: an attempt to teach us something, a light in the dark that was our lack of knowledge, our ignorance. It was this stepping stone we could use to achieve something greater, and they were willing to just throw it all away because they thought: "it's hard" or: "I don't like it". I didn't like to admit it, but boring old Shakespeare really was a building block for a large part of culture as it is today, and our society as a whole.

Fast forward half a decade or so, and I'm now sitting at my computer, pondering this idea of 'High' vs 'Low' culture. We always see those rough and tumble characters in movies calling people who listen to Beethoven or read Shakespeare snobs, and we kinda agree with them. But who are we to claim that liking such enduring masterpieces makes someone a 'snob'? After all, there has to be some reason that this 'High' culture is still around, right? Well, let's take a look at some of this 'Low' culture, because lots of people like it, it has to be pretty long standing, too, right? Wheel of Fortune? The show's been around for 37 years now, not bad. Professional Wrestling has been around for a few decades, too. And Jersey Shore's been running since.... well, since it's just been canceled, that makes a few years, and I guess American Idol is pretty dead, too. Maybe this 'Low' culture stuff doesn't really have what it takes to be lasting. Everyone's forgotten about The Hangover: Part II, and mostly about Lindsay Lohan. But then we see Beethoven's music, and Shakespeare's plays, and those plays have been around for the better part of half of a millennium  Even The New York Times has been around for a good century and a half or so. But why?

When we look at demographics for these shows, we see that The Jersey Shore, American Idol, and The Real Housewives of New Jersey (which trust me, isn't very much like what housewives are like in Jersey) all pander to the middle class or poor, who just don't want to think about what they're doing, they already have to think too much during the rest of their lives. But in looking who's kept alive Shakespeare and Beethoven, the New York Times and the works of Emily Dickenson, and Jules Verne and Herman Melville, we see lots of intellectuals and those who've received higher education. Snooty folks? Maybe, but then again, who have been the ones to make the biggest contributions to society? Take Bill Gates, who gave us the first personal computer. He is an avid fan of Leonardo Da Vinci, one of the greatest artists and scholars of all time. Even looking at Da Vinci, we can see that he was heavily influenced by his upbringing in Florence, being bombarded by a multitude of classical culture, works that survive to this day. These intellectuals gravitate to this type of culture, and who wouldn't want to be Bill Gates?

After thinking about all of this, I've come to the conclusion that maybe, as a society, we need to get our heads out of this new fad-centered culture, and value things that are lasting and great. While some may think of people who do this as snobs, sometimes it's those 'snobs' who make the greatest contributions to our society, and to humanity as a whole. So maybe it would be good to start kids younger, to help them develop a love for the classics, and the critical thinking they induce. In doing so, maybe we can produce another da Vinci, Shakespeare, or Tesla.

http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/keywords/culture.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Gates#Personal_life
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonardo_da_Vinci#Florence:_Leonardo.27s_artistic_and_social_background