Marty Pelletier Essay Example For Students

Marty Pelletier Essay annonChannels of IdentificationWhen we see stories on the news of children murdering each other, whatmust we think in terms of responsibility and which influencescontributed to the decisions which left four children and a teacherdead? Who is responsible? How do we as individuals make decisions?What in our culture influences our behavior and impacts our valuesystems? More specifically, what exactly does it mean to beinfluenced? I have chosen television as my focus because I feel it isthe most successful media in terms of sculpting social values and,therefore, social relations. The examination of the televisionindustry, with an emphasis on communication (through perception andsubsequent identification), yields answers to these questions that areso essential to understanding core sociological themes. I will firstdiscuss how the process of acculturation produces the human need tocreate a personal identity every second, and the inherent implicationsof the role of communication toward this goal of self-identification. Iwill examine why television fits this human need so perfectly, as itpresents an incredibly safe place to identify without being judged inreturn. Television is notorious for its ability to create and alter our conceptof reality, but how did it become such a powerful influence? Whichhuman cultural need produced such a demand for a medium that can bepassively consulted for clues to our personal identities? What is thenature of the interaction that people have with television? The act ofwatching television highlights a number of phenomena that explain theculture of television. The key players are the programs on TV and theviewers, the latter creating a need for the former. After all,television would have no place in a world with no viewers. Televisionis a profound clue in to the inter-workings of the larger culture, aswell as to the nature of human behavior, in that it reflects ourweaknesses and goals, and the extremely exploitive nature of power. ^?Communication is a symbolic process whereby reality is produced,maintained, repaired, and transformed^?. This process is enabled by thefact that communication is necessary for human survival. The verynature of humans as a social animal accounts for such a need tocommunicate. The media^?s ability to influence the individual and serveas a cultural resource is the result of the individual^?s incessantsearch for identity, which established a permanent niche for televisionin society. In other words, it was our need to be influenced, to have aresource of clues as to our identity, which made television an authorityin values and ideas about reality. TV is important because we as humansneed to identify ourselves everyday and it is an easy and safe way toreinforce what you want to see. It is a basis for interpreting anddefining our environment, about which we are constantly having to learnand adjust. I will argue that inherent to human social relations is theneed to identify oneself in the m oment in order to know how to respond. All living organisms have a fundamental need to interpret theirenvironment in order to survive, and to do so as efficiently aspossible. This raises the issue of why humans have such a need to findidentity in sources outside of the self. The answer lies in the factthat humans do not have instincts, meaning that we do not have theluxury of having access to predetermined responses to stimuli within theenvironment. As such, we have to scan and consult our environment(culture) to learn a system of responses that appeals to usindividually. Orchestrated by the ^?self^?, our perceptual data from ourfive senses is filtered and interpreted based on how we need to see theworld. Every second we are efficiently interpreting only the necessarystimuli that must be responded to according to our self-createdinvestments. This is the reason you have not felt your feet in yourshoes until just now, there was no reason to. In a very real sense, weare controlled by our investments in that it is in our inve stments thatwe make or break our identities. Where we look then, what we listen tois almost chosen for us (and yet somehow by us) as we are driven tocreate an identity every moment based on the brain^?s incredible need toefficiently respond to its perceptions. We take clues from family,educators, role models, peers, and the media, among others. Televisionwas designed in such a way that it is easy for us to consult it forquick answers about who we want to be, what appropriate behavior is, howwe want our society to view us, how we want to spend our time. This isa critical aspect to TV^?s ability to impact us. It takes very littleenergy for us to turn on the TV, it allows us to forget about the stressin our own life, it does not require that we speak with anyone or haveto defend our ideals, it is optimistic in that it convinces us that wecan always be prettier, richer, better, and always more accepted byothers, only with the help of their products of course. The dead sea scrolls EssayConglomerates of businesses, thousands of jobs, all rest on productsales. Americans have become so addicted to finding our personalidentity in consumerism that Jerry Seinfeld has become extremelyinfluential to our economy. Is it too late? Are we already so conditioned to need to be influencedby the same messages that we can^?t see it? Are corporations already soinvested in their own growth that to take their ^?customers^? well beingin to account would be bankruptcy? A perfect example is the TobaccoIndustry. They are so incredibly invested in their worldwidedistribution of nicotine that they knowingly target children, heightennicotine levels, and then lie about its addictive nature and ability tokill if used properly. They were not born evil, I believe they havejust learned to identify themselves by not looking at the consequencesof their actions. This would be pretty easy with billions of dollars tospend and a true belief that one is simply offering a product for sale,as a public service almost. Smoking cigarettes is another perfect example of how the ^?self^? needs tofind identity. The act of inhaling cigarette smoke is incrediblydangerous to one^?s body and yet I feel that is exactly why kids do it. They know its not healthy, they smoke because it^?s not healthy. Smokingstarted out as a social activity but as it became a ^?dirty habit^?,suddenly it was attractive to anyone who wanted to rebel or make astatement, namely teenagers. They smoke because it^?s cool and importantto claim your independence as a teenager. What better way than to showthat they can successfully ingest one of the most harmful substancesknown to man. The recent uproar and court cases over tobacco, Ibelieve, only gives kids more reason to smoke as they see how easy it isto find identity in what others believe is bad. That is why they snuckthat first cigarette in the first place. What are the implications ofall individuals needing to find their own identity and a society soattached to its products? Are we growing in our consumerist need tofind our^?selves^? or will this trend result in an intense rebellion whenthe cards are finally laid on the table and everyone sees the truerelationship of a commidified cultu re to it^?s need to identify?To what extent does conformity promote a stable society and at whatpoint does it limit its possibilities? What responsibility docorporations have in sending messages that could easily harm socialrelations, such as the beauty myth, or the problem of drinking anddriving? What freedoms are granted by our Amendments and furtherreinforced by our government^?s subsidizations? What is myresponsibility? I hope to attack these questions, based on the aboveassumptions, in my next paper.