Thursday, February 5, 2009
Response to the Reading
I really liked McLuhan's argument about the media being more important than the message and how he thinks that on TV, for example, whatever is being broadcast doesn't make as big of an impact as TV in general. It's like it doesn't matter whether you watch cooking shows or violent shows or cartoons, just the fact that you are using that medium will change the way your brain sees the world. It reminds me of my brother, he's 3 years old and my stepmom has never let him see a movie or watch TV or play computer games or anything because she thinks that it'll screw up his development. So it's like it doesn't really matter whether he is looking at an educational computer game or porn, just the fact that he is looking at a computer will traumatize him. She says that images on television are too "schizophrenic," like they change too much and too often and it's too much for his brain to take in. I think I kind of agree with not letting him watch TV, etc until he is a little older, but I was wondering if you guys agree that all technology is "evil," or hinders children in their development. Please respond if you would like.
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3 comments:
Although McLuhan effectively supported his argument that the media used is more important than the actual message delivered, I do not agree, because I believe that either the message is most important, or the medium used and the message are of equal importance. I found this read to be clever but difficult to connect with the author, not only because of our different opinions, but because of his complex use of words and long, almost never-ending sentences. Overall, it was a very intellectual piece.
I thought it was interesting to read McLuhan's insight on how technology would change us.I enjoyed his details on what has happened to mankind,especially in this century, as our technology advances and modifies our lifestyles.Technology is part of our daily lives, especially in how we communicate with others through msn, skype, chatting rooms and etc.Myspace and Facebook are another great expample of how it consumes much of our time, which exposes our private lives to everyone.(well, atleast to our friends)
I wouldn't say that technology is necessarily "evil". I don't think there is an obvious right or wrong with technology, just different. Sure, a child who watches television will develop differently than a child who doesn't, but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It's really just a personal decision. People are different because of technology, and that's really it, I think. What McLuhan says about responding to the media itself more so than the message being conveyed makes a lot of sense to me. Reading this reminded me of all those cases of missing people that become so huge in the media, like Laci Peterson. People go missing all the time, and it's terrible, but the way that case got so huge was pretty astonishing! It was like it didn't even really matter what happened, and how not particularly unusual it was, it was the fact that it was in every newspaper, tabloid, and newscast that made people care.
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