If I buy a cell phone, do my parents mean less to me?
In "The Medium is the Massage" McLuhan argues that media is subtly persuasive. My first question is whether or not this is something new or this is the way things have always been, perhaps we're just more aware of it now. On the other hand, maybe we're less aware of it, and that's the point.
Second, does the accumulation of more and more media necessarily diffuse other influences? Here's an overly simple example meant to illustrate my question. If my parents are the primary influence in my decision making (i.e. 100%). Does having a television necessarily dilute that? (i.e. television 1%, parents 99%) Then what if I add a cellphone? (i.e. (i.e. television 1%, cell phone 1%, parents 98%).
If you had to divide up your own percentage pie of influence what would it look like? More interestingly, can you place yourself in that pie? Can we give ourselves that much or any agency in our own decisions?
I know what you're thinking. Is this guy just posting so he can see his face on the homepage all the time?
Comments
And Even How This Interface Cries for a Subject Line is Ideology
I know what you're thinking. Does this guy keep replying to Tom just to make Tom feel better about posting to see his face on the homepage?
I wonder if it's not so much a matter if media has always been, or not always been, subtly persuasive, but that before McLuhan the medium itself was felt to be fairly neutral. The content may have been persuasive, but not the method through which it was relayed, and McLuhan challenged us to see these "invisible" ideologies of the medium itself and how they affect us.
Are we more aware of that now? I don't know, just this week in the Purdue Exponent (in the article on students downloading child porn) someone wrote about how neutral and unproblematic the computer itself is, and that it can only be corrupted by the way someone uses it . . . yeah, I'm thinking about writing them a response letter. When people sit down at the computer in their daily doings, do they stop and think that everything from the desktop, to the interface, to the navigation, to the software applications all carry ideology and a way to think about the world and information? Maybe some do, maybe some don't, but expressing that point seems like a key, initial step in any successful teaching of media literacy.
"just this week in the
"just this week in the Purdue Exponent (in the article on students downloading child porn) someone wrote about how neutral and unproblematic the computer itself is, and that it can only be corrupted by the way someone uses it..."
Perhaps the hardware itself is 'neutral and unproblematic', but once you start loading software on it, then all pretense of neutrality has to be questioned. Even the hardware (Mac, PC) have their own symbolism. Like the commercials where they are portrayed as a nerd and a cool, hip guy.
or the symbolism of icons.
or the symbolism of icons. Think about the "Trash" vs. the "Recycle Bin"
My parents + David Hasselhoff=good times
Tom,
My dear parents recently got cable for the first time in their lives. I mean ever. Previously, they had two channels (and one was public television). So, the last few times I’ve gone home, it’s been a shock because they suddenly have all of this popular culture knowledge that they never had before. My dad used the term “metrosexual” and I about fell off my chair. When he and my mother told me about how they both agree that Paris Hilton was treated unfairly, I had to take the dog for a walk around the block to regroup.
Their latest thing, as of last weekend, is how great David Hasselhoff is and how much he classes up America’s Got Talent (their new favorite show). To get to the point, for years I’ve attempted to talk to my parents about random stuff, news, sports, current events, trashy celeb gossip, yadda yadda yadda (my favorite Seinfeld quote, by the way, that has also come up in conversation often but that my parents refuse to absorb). Nothing. Every time I come home I have at least a couple of People magazines in tow. Nothing. They’ve had the Internet for years and their pop culture knowledge has remained similarly nil. Suddenly, they get cable t.v. and it’s like this whole world has opened up to them that they’ve never even thought about before.
I’m starting to lose my point here, but I guess what I’m trying to get at is, observing my parents makes me wonder about the influence of different types of media. More specifically, my parents’ experience exemplifies McLuhan’s point, I think, about what a vastly different media t.v. is; he writes that, “The main cause for disappointment in and for criticism of television is the failure on the part of its critics to view it as a totally new technology which demands different sensory responses” (128). Maybe t.v. is different because of the difference in agency in decision-making that you discuss in your post. Maybe t.v. takes away some of that agency. We can choose to turn it off, but when we watch it, we’re just helpless to the lure of David Hasselhoff. There must be some reason why Baywatch had such high ratings, right? Other than the partial nudity, that is.
Jaci
Specializing in Antisociality
Jaci, I think that McLuhan's point that the artist, or poet, “whoever sharpens our perception tends to be antisocial" ties in nicely with these points you make about the processional/amateur. McLuhan claims that the antisocial are rarely "well-adjusted," and they cannot go along with currents and trends (88).
How is it that the antisocial ones—the ones who would seemingly exist on the outskirts of whatever had been termed the norm—are the ones who offer the words of wisdom that really do something to us? The antisocial here appears to dance between qualities of the professional and the amateur.