Media Starved

Media Starved!


Do you ever stop to think how much we are surrounded and influenced by today’s media? We live our lives not even realizing how exposed we are to all of the world’s types of mass media. Whether it’s through the television, internet, radio, newspapers, video games, or even the front of a cereal box, media has a huge impact in controlling our lives.

After journaling a normal day and realizing all the media I’m exposed to daily, it opened my eyes to the power it has in my life. I become aware of how impossible it is to go a day without music or television. How advertising encourages us to purchase products, and the amount of advertising that is sprung upon our minds daily. The internet, TV., cell phones, magazines, billboards, commercials, even text messaging, are some sources of media that we grown completely accustomed to. Americans have developed a nation completely dominated my mass media and advertising.

It seems that the more media and technology develop, the lazier we make our next generation. Everything is made more simple and easier for us daily. Remember looking in encyclopedia’s for information on your research paper? But now, it’s google this, and just get the directions off your iPhone, or don’t buy that CD, download it! As nice as it is for life to get easier each day, I feel it makes our nation lazier and dumber. For example; they actually sell peanut butter with the jelly already in it. Has America become so slothful that we can’t even do the three-step process of making a PB&J without help. Or the fact that 1 of 8 couples married last year met online. People can’t even get married anymore without the help of mass media.

Times seemed to be more peaceful in the past without the dependency of media. The fact that a week’s worth of New York Time’s contains more information than a person was to come across in the 18th century, startles me. Why have we become a nation that needs to know every little thing going on constantly? We don’t need to be aware of every political event, or Brittany Spear’s new hair cut, or the worst singers on American Idol. Hell, it’s all bullshit anyways. What we “know,” is strictly what we “hear.” Life might have been a lot simpler when they didn’t have the sources to find out every piece of news and information.

Personally, I’m so accustomed to media, that I couldn’t even go a full day without exposure to it. Like most Americans, it feels awkward to eat a meal without watching the television, or driving without listening to my music. Facebook and cell phones are my main types of communication, and a day without both made me feel antisocial. My life seemed a lot more boring without my iPod, or not being able to play video games at a friends’s house, even driving without noticing every billboard I passed.

Advertisements are literally everywhere. It’s why you buy the types of food you eat, it’s the reason you wear the clothes you like, it’s even the reason you like which beer you do. Think about how most clothes are designed now-a-ways. It’s all about the name brand. No one wears a plain white t-shirt anymore, they wear their Nike shirt, with their Hollister pants, and their vans slip-ons because of the name behind it, and the advertising. Everyone’s literally a walking billboard.

There was a lot of media I was glad to get away from. Not having my brain rot behind a TV screen felt refreshing, and actually listening to my car’s engine and not my radio was something nice and new. Although life is much simpler with the technology we have and the information we know, it still gets a little carried away at times. I would hate to be a celebrity and have media watching my every move and jump on a mistake like it’s a fat kid finding the last twinkie behind the vegetables.

I love the route technology and media moves in today, but I hope it doesn’t escalate to a lazier and more dependent society. We need to all be able to take a break from the media today, without having it drastically affect our lives like it did a little for me. It’s made to make life easier, but let’s make sure we don’t get too carried away with the easy part.