Some entertainment notes
Posted on November 22nd, 2008 by Mr. Eldridge
For those of you who argued on your papers, I thought I’d post some thought-provoking articles (at least they provoked some thought out of me). So…
- If you argued that entertainment CAN ruin society try this: Brain Candy.
- If you argued that entertainment CANNOT ruin society why don’t you check this out: The Age of EgoCasting.
Look to how your assumptions can be altered. And now we will watch the debate rage. But this time slightly better informed.
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If there’s a guy who really believes that culture can ruin society, it’s the Sterling Professor of Humanities, Harold Bloom, Ph.D, of Yale University, who looks like Mrs. Bennett and has an odd thing against Harry Potter and reminds me of Severus Snape, Potions Master of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and Head of Slytherin House. Really, he does look like Mrs. Bennett, only Harold Bloom is not as jolly as her. In his very angry sounding column for the Boston Globe, he complains about how Stephen King won the National Book Foundation award and claims that it represents the “dumbing down of American culture.” He then segues into a rant against Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling, complaining that they are poorly written and “cliché ridden” of the “stretch his legs variety” (whatever that means…). Also, in another column he wrote on the same subject, he waxes so intellectual that he cannot resist making a reference to Hamlet in the first line of his column. The first line, peoples!! So he is basically a cross between Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Mrs. Bennett, and Lord Voldemort, because he hates Harry Potter. He is an interesting person, to say the least. I mean, how can someone not like Harry Potter and his Quidditch playing capers and Horcrux capturing antics with his friends Ron Weasly and Hermoine Granger? Here are the columns:
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2003/09/24/dumbing_down_american_readers/
http://wrt-brooke.syr.edu/courses/205.03/bloom.html
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After reading the Brain Candy article I realized that if I wanted to write a better essay I should I included how video games ruin society. I also could have included more names of movies that ruined our society. Another way to have approched this essay was to compare movies of the past and how they were not as explict compared to movies that we watch now. Maybe next time I write an essay like this I can remember to include these things.
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After looking at both of the articles. I think the best way to tackle this essay would’ve been to qualify it saying that it both hurts and helps society. There are good arguments on both sides and the stats used in “Brain Candy” about the IQ tests is a good logical argument.
I would think that in order to do that you would write two body paragraphs one for and one against.
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Ya, I just read Brain Candy and I realized all the good counterarguments the writer had and how strategically he argued. Next time we have an argument essay, I will consider more resources like history, literature, stats (even though it’s a timed essay!?), and more. But anyways, I think that this argument works both ways, depending on your likes and perceptions of our society/culture.
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Personally I believe there’s a balance between both sides, it’s neither all of one nor the other.
But I felt the essay could be written strongest when defending.
The articles make good points though. As Jay and I were talking about before, it’s not necessarily that all entertainment is flawed and sinful. It’s the lack of regulation and desensitization that will cause the problems.
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That’s why I qualified the statement in my essay
.
You can’t ever really prove an assertion true/false because it’s just a statement. Until we had actual proof that the moon wasn’t cheese, no one REALLY knew- there’s a favorable opinion to the non-lactose theory, but no one could argue against it. It’s kind of like the flat-out lie.
Alex and Jay are right though, it’s all about the lack of regulation and desensitization (aka video games).
The whole defend part of my essay revolved around video games ruining kids’ minds. Hell, both GTA4 and Halo 3 have sold 14 million copies. That’s two games selling enough copies for almost every kid in a classroom in the USA to have experienced violence. That’s not even including all of the other thousands of M-rated games that parents buy their kids without thinking about it.
I’m not totally against giving high schoolers Gears of War or anything, but Xbox Live is FILLED with 8-12 year olds. I’m not even joking. The way you can tell, not even caring about the pitch of their voice, is through their language. All they do is curse, and they don’t even know the meaning of it, it’s funny at first, but eventually you unplug your headset.
But on the other hands, nowadays, kids can vaguely grasp the ten dimensions thanks to that youtube video; even television shows like House and even The Office have some educational value.
Sometimes, I’ll sit down with my parents to watch the Andy Griffith show or I Love Lucy but I find myself getting extremely bored just because the shows have nothing in them. At least while watching House, you don’t understand the characters say, but whenever I hear Lupus (I love that disease name), I know it’s something bad. As for the office, there’s actually a lot of education in there- the whole episode about conflict mediation, for example.
In total, I’d say entertainment doesn’t ruin society just because it’s a persons mentality that ruins them. If you expose someone to everything they need to know, it’s up to them whether they’ll use their knowledge for better or for worse.
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Nadir, I actually used both those videogames in my essay.
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I really liked this essay, actually. I thought it was easier because we got to put our own opinion into it.
I’m surprised so few people decided to challenge it though. That seemed like the obvious route to me.
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Umm, how many of you read the articles listed in the post? Nadir? You’re notorious for blowing your own horn without having read any of the suggestions…
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I did read that passage about the fat man! I had thought that he was trying to break the surface of the water by trying to get out of the pool, even though breaking the surface doesn’t really fit the context for my idea (yeah I made a mistake)- thus, drawing the water around his body.
And to back that up, it doesn’t make sense for a fat person to be trapped under water because fat is a collaboration of lipids which are less dense than water (cream floats on top of milk, for example) -> fat people should float easier than skinny people. And if he would just breathe, the gas in his lungs would propel him to the surface even faster.
Anyways, I did read both of the articles. The first one was about humans getting smarter over time, IQ wise and just smarter wise over time. Video games fortify the mind with the thousands of things that people have to learn.
Did you know that the professional Korean Starcraft players make 300 actions per minute. Seriously, that’s so much micromanagement with hotkeys, the mouse, and vision. I’d say that takes a LOT more skill than the old-time professional horseshoe throwers.
And yeah, GTA isn’t a society-ruining game because it teaches kids about the physics as to how to fly a plane properly, but the mature content stands there for a reason, it shouldn’t be in the hands of toddlers.
Anecdote: I remember playing one of my first online games (Runescape, yeah I was a loser) at the age of ~9-10 years old. It taught me that to make bronze, you had to smelt tin and copper and I remember I was so thrilled when my 2nd grade teacher asked how to make bronze. But it also had me addicted for hours on end every day, so I couldn’t really apply my smarts to anything else but the game until I just grew bored. In total, moderation>everything else.
And the second one was basically about the laziness of humans growing over time starting with the remote->the iPod, how people nowadays can’t live without their “necessities” or “needs.”
But without a computer, yeah, you’re pretty much screwed. We are becoming smarter as a species, but we have to have outputs for our knowledge to flourish. Without a computer or calculator, we’d never get math homework done, but with them, as an aid to knowledge, we can accomplish more and more everyday. Without TiVo or an iPod, we’d be stuck in the CD era, or God forbid, the tape era. TiVo and the iPod might not be the “best” form of entertainment for us, but the technology behind them just shows how much we as human beings have advanced. We basically have the power to store anything we want and to control time for our entertainment, so yeah, having 5000 hours of TV on your TiVo is a great accomplishment, technically, but if someone actually sits to watch it, there’s something wrong.
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I was the person who argued that the Entertainment Industry would ruin society.
I mean i can kinda see where he’s comin from in “Brain Candy”…The teanage girl population I think has rose sense the “starsky and hutch” days. I mean come on, it takes a lot to remember every character and every love triangle The Hills has thrown at us for the past few years. It was emotionally painful for us all to watch each week as Lauren and Heidi’s relationship flushed down the toilet.
And even though Brittney Spears’ top singles are filled with suggestive yet ingenious lyrics, America has all seen when her new hit “Womanizer” music video was vailable to the public that Brittney has got her hot body back, her catchy, dacne-friendly vocals are better than “Hit Me Baby 1 More Time” and she’s going to make big comeback! YOU GO GLEN CO-CO!
xoxoxoxo
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I can’t believe people think that entertainment can ruin society. Blaming video games and TV for our problems has become a scapegoat. Look at it this way: people are not lazy because they spend all day in front of the tv, they spend all day in front of the tv because they are lazy. People do not go on shooting sprees because they play grand theft auto constantly, they play GTA constantly because they have a preexisting obsession with violence. Kids are not antisocial because they spend all their free time playing dungeons and dragons, they spend all their time playing dungeons and dragons because they are antisocial. People do not pretend to be someone theyre not and conform to social pressures because they are obsessed with celebrities, they are obsessed with celebrities because of their personal insecurity. Entertainment’s negative attributes are not causes of larger problems, they are symptoms of larger problems. Now, this logic doesn’t always hold up, but I think in most cases it does and it is an interesting way of looking at the issue. To blame a school shooting on the time the kid spent playing halo completely misses the true cause that it is dangerous. Parents and schools need to take repsonsiblity for their own neglect, their child’s feeling of alienation and unhappiness, and their inability to communicate with their child, for these are the real reasons for school shootings.
And that’s not to mention all the benefits of entertainment. It’s culturally and enriching and almost always (yes I do mean almost always, even things you would expect would be dumbing us down) mentally stimulating. I don’t think I need to go much further into that, I think we are all aware of it’s benefits.
Entertainment has been around since the beginning of humanity, and we’ve thrived with it. And to say that today’s entertainment is much worse than in the past is just stupid. The Romans used to watch people literally slaughter each other for fun, and they were the most advanced civilization of the era. So yeah, I could go on and on, but I wouldn’t want to rant. That’s just my opinion
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I agree with you Zach, but can you really completely overlook ANY effect entertainment has on people? While it obviously affects adults in a much lesser way, you can’t deny that the extreme violence portrayed to children has to have some impact.
You can’t expect a child to have the same understanding and comprehension of an adult or even a teenager. The characters in the games or movies never seem to completely die, after all. While I do agree with your views, I feel you’re isolating the problem too much. As for the parent’s responsibility, you are right, but you must admit the game companies are partly at fault for acting like they strict with game ratings yet continuing to market them to children.
As for the Romans, you are right, but they were smart enough to contain and regulate the entertainment; they didn’t just go around having killing sprees in the streets. The problem with our entertainment is that it is gradually but steadily decreasing in regulation. People are being exposed to more and at an earlier age, and things are being shown that you would never have found 40 years ago– just look at “Zack and Miri” or any of the “Saw” movies. Obviously, entertainment is going to display this evolution over time, but if the lack of regulation continues the difference between reality and entertainment will be much harder to discern.
Anyways, everyone have a good 5-day break. WOOO!
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I don’t quite agree with you Zach.
Yeah, people who watch TV all day are lazy, they aren’t lazy because they watch TV.
But about the video games: Video games do have a lasting affect on most people. Books do too. You see people lining up for the 12 a.m. opening for sales for both items, like GTA or the Twilight series.
They’re “addicted” to the games in a way that they consciously think about it. You can’t do something and forget it. Forgive and forget doesn’t exist, neither does playing a violent game and forgetting it.
Same thing with horror movies- Ever been scared to sleep after watching a scary movie? Yeah, it got into your head and it’ll stay there for a while. Eventually, with time, the idea of the zombies killing everyone will go away from your short term memory, but it’ll definitely be stuck there for years to come and you’ll always be reminded of it whenever the topic is brought up.
We watch people get beat up for fun also- UFC, fake wrestling, etc. that doesn’t mean we’re not advanced, it’s just a form of entertainment. But if you actually look at the audiences in the stadium, they’re not your average Joe. Maybe we haven’t been affected as much as they have.
Even USC/UCLA games spark hate between people. Just a football game makes people go on riots and people actually get hurt, you can’t say that doesn’t ruin society the least bit.
On the other hand, there’s always the extremes of every situation. For religion, a common ideal for most people, there’s the fanatics that go and kill people.
Just because some people go crazy about something doesn’t mean it ruins society, it just ruins that group of people. If they have a lasting effect on society, then yeah, entertainment ruins society.
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Nadir, when you said:
On the other hand, there’s always the extremes of every situation. For religion, a common ideal for most people, there’s the fanatics that go and kill people.
Just because some people go crazy about something doesn’t mean it ruins society, it just ruins that group of people. If they have a lasting effect on society, then yeah, entertainment ruins society.
I don’t think you’re talking about entertainment, you’re talking about the effects of religion on society. Yes, religion can ruin society, so many wars have been fought over religion.
The religious worship channel on TV may have some impact on society, convincing them to donate their money to a certain church. The church might gain supporters through television, but the people themselves, get the idea that they are supposed to got out and go crazy killing people.
I think, from what you wrote in those last two paragraphs, that religion sparks more hate and conflict than entertainment does.
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Yeah, I wasn’t really tying religion to entertainment (meditation maybe?), but I was just giving an example that there’s always two sides of a situation, whether be it entertainment or religion, and we have to consider both sides before making any educated statements.
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