Postman: Rant or Reason? Essay -- Essays Papers

Postman: Rant or Reason? In his novel, "Amusing Ourselves to Death", author Neil Postman describes to the reader, in detail, the immediate and future dangers of television. The arguement starts out in a logical manner, explaining first the differences between today's media-driven society, and yesterday's "typographic America". Postman goes on to discuss in the second half of his book the effects of today's media, politics on television, religion on television, and finally televised educational programs. All, he says, are making a detrimental imprint on our society, its values, and its standards. Postman explains that the media consists of "fragment[s] of news" (100), and politics are merely a fashion show. Although Postman's arguments regarding the brevity of the American attention span and the impotence of today's mass media are logical, his opinion of television's inability to educate is severely overstated. Neil Postman is right on the mark when he states that television is having an overall negative effect on our society: It promotes short attention spans. Postman takes as example for this argument the seven famous debates between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas. In that time, Postman explains, audiences would "cheerfully accomodate themselves to seven hours of oratory" (44). This is a concept entirely unknown to today's society. In no stretch of the imagination would a sizeable crowd possibly willingly "subject" themselves to such a lengthy activity. The reason for this anomaly is television. A brief peek at any private television broadcasting station will show the reason: We're having entertainment fed to us in tiny portions. During each thirty or sixty minutes, our favorite sit-com family winds its way throug... ...not one posed by television, but by the potential for the public to overlook the positive qualities of television. Televised education has, despite its need for a short leash, a fair amount of useful applications. Postman must look past the negative image of television-zombie children in order to see the true potential beneath. That said, it is safe to add that network television would still benefit greatly from large handful of additional Postman-influence. Works Cited Fowles, Jib. "Advertising's Fifteen Basic Appeals." Common Culture, 3rd Edition. Ed. Petracca, Michael, and Sorapure, Madeleine. New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2001. 60-77. Lasn, Kalle. Culture Jam. New York: William Morrow and Company Inc, 1999. Postman, Neil. Amusing Ourselves to Death. New York: Penguin Books, 1985. Schwartz, Tony. Media: The Second God. New York: Random House, 1981.