Amusing Ourselves to Death

I feel a particular irony in my natural inclination to blog about the book I just finished reading, Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death. Postman wrote the book twenty years ago in an age where email and the Internet were in their infancy from a modern perspective. I have been fairly technologically aware since age 10 or so; early computers were a hobby I shared with my dad, and I still remember writing programs in BASIC that changed the color of my TV monitor different colors. That was the mid-eighties. Postman wrote when my email address was a string of numbers, and about a decade before Windows became accessible to most of us on our PCs. For me, technology was a window to the world. I had a pen-pal in Peru whom I had met over the Internet.

To Postman, technology was not simply a means by which I interacted with the world, but shaped how I understood the world. Technology is bound up with ideology; ideas underlie every aspect of technological development. Ultimately, Postman argues that "Our media are our metaphors. Our metaphors create the content of our culture." (15) In other words, our understanding of the world is shaped--or perhaps even controlled or organized, to use Postman's words--by media. He is not talking about "the media" in terms of the paparazzi, but primarily about television. His lament is that the last half-century has seen a fundamental shift in our culture from the Age of Typography (characterized by the print media) to the Age of Television. One wonders what he would make of the ubiquity of computers and the Internet...though one also sees the way that these media are shaped in many ways by a television culture.

Postman's ultimate concern is that we do not know when we are being entertained. He is not worried about Cheers, he notes; 60 Minutes or the evening news are far more dangerous. The reason? People think these are educational. Go ahead, be entertained by television--that is relatively harmless, he seems to say. But beware Sesame Street and any other programming that presents itself as educational. The reason? It merely prepares children and adults to swallow the content of such shows without thinking critically about the biases and effects that the media itself has. It assumes that such a format is neutral. He suggests that it is imperative that school children be taught "to inquire into the ways in which media of all kinds--including television--shape people's attitudes and perceptions." (153) In other words, we must be educated in how to think critically about the message that the media is offering, which has nothing to do with the actual content.

I find this useful. How does the "And now...this" world of the nightly news shape my understanding not only of the world, but my ability to act in it? I receive far more information than I can possibly act upon. I might hear of the earthquake in China, the latest on the 2008 election (probably focusing on some controversial statement that a supporter of one of the candidates made that has little to do with the issues or candidates themselves), followed by some weather and the latest news from the local basketball team. How does this teach me to consider issues in depth? To think critically about the realities facing our world? To help others? I think at its best the news prompts me to pray, but even my prayer seems shallow...one arrow-prayer offered up on behalf of someone struck by tragedy, without further thought. The bottom line is that the nightly news may inform me of things that are happening, but in the process it cannot help but trivialize it all.

Postman argues for a distancing from our forms of information. (163) I wonder to what extent that has happened. There are now, it seems to me, far more forms of information readily accessible than there were when he wrote this book, but the principle is the same. Do I think critically, or do I allow the content of television shows--especially those claiming to be informative or educational--to wash over me? Joel made a point in his sermon last week that we as Christian people should only surf if it involves the ocean and a surfboard. We shouldn't allow ourselves to mindlessly surf channels or the internet, but to actively engage the world around us, thinking critically. These principles are bound together. Where is the information coming from? What primary sources are available? What is the agenda of the media itself? What impact does the form in which the content is presented shape my understanding of the issues or subject being explored? And, on a more basic level, am I turning to electronic media for comfort? For entertainment? Out of boredom?

I want to raise children who are aware the the forms that various media take are not neutral. I want Lily and Jack to think critically. That must start with me.