From: Peshewegunzh <beaver.cs.washington.edu!gnosys!mthvax.cs.miami.edu!mamia!peshe>
Subject: Re: Northern Exposure
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 04:41:53 GMT

Original-Sender: Peshewegunzh <mthvax.cs.miami.edu!mamia!peshe>

>
> Original-Sender: vms.cis.pitt.edu!RASTROFF
>
> I teach media studies to a lot of students who believe all the rhetoric they
> hear that they think less well, and do less, than previous generations
> because their minds have been destroyed by television.  I argue against that,
> at the same time that I try to demonstrate how the corporate and organizational
> structures of television do promote participation in the consumer culture, and
> in fact reduce all sorts of potential to buying the right product (a current
> ad on tv says, "Change your lifestyle?...[to resolve the problem of poor
> digestions].. Nah!!! Take [whatever the product is, I can't remember]."

I don't think such carefully considered conclusions are mere rhetoric, much as
any of us whose livlihood depends upon a certain view of media might be tempted
to temporize about it. The problem is certainly deeper than the political or
economic perspective alone.

> But I do continue to argue against the idea that "tv" -- and most people
> mean the machine, or the act of watching tv -- is necessairly mindless or
> mind-destroying.

Hours upon hours spent in daily watching of television displaces far more
important activities. One is highly unlikely to become proficient at
anything at all by a life spent glued to the tube, or to become sufficiently
differentiated from anyone else to shine creatively and uniquely.

One thing I have observed is that many make a point of watching television
news broadcasts, whereby they satisfy their curiosity about the world
about them. Unfortunately, in most cases, they are woefully ignorant of
the important things going on around them in their own immediate
communities that they could have important and immediate effect on. Such
things occur on most reservations I know of all the time, to the detriment
of the people who are so well-informed about events far away that they
can have absolutely no effect on. The psychological effect of constantly
being exposed to events as if one is present at the scene while being
unable to respond to such "virtual reality" in any way leads to a kind
of ghost watcher mentality that conditions passivity and conformance by
default.

> A lot of the researchers who argue that -- and didn't
> someone mention Neil Postman on natchat recently? he's one -- also say
> that computers prevent us from writing, and from communication with other
> human beings, and we on this network are all proof that it is how we USE
> the technology, and who controls the technology, that inlfuences (but does
> not totally determine) the results.

It is true that use of a technology, or even non-use, has a certain influence
on the results. But like the robot Hel in Fritz Lang's Metropolis who once
unleashed could no longer be controlled by the amoral scientist Rotwang,
American society is a place where technically speaking, what can be done will
be done, no questions asked. A recent special section in the Wall Street
Journal featured developments in computer and communication technologies,
with one large article devoted to discussions with those tied
into The Well, a California based teleconferencing computer system.
Some of the foreseen developments include the ability to contact anyone,
anywhere, at any time, with the concomitant effect of persons being able to
be tracked and under surveillance by authorities at all times. Only a
paragraph was devoted to the latter, with the dismissal of it being
irrelevant, because "in any case, it's too late anyhow to do anything
about it." Thus, it is accepted that we are powerless to question whether
certain far-reaching actions should occur. We are faced with a technological
imperative. But, if there is instant, total information available to
authorities, then the result is indistinguishable from a totalitarian society
whatever pleasant melodies or exciting graphic images accompany it.

Now, I don't believe that these arguments are weakened by trying to
associate them with some folks who believe that computer use (aside
from arcade games?) decreases literacy and logical thinking. I don't
think that is the right kind of guilt by association! Most of those
who are writing these days do, in fact, use word processors, including
critics of the entertainment culture. However, we must be realistic
and acknowledge that the number of Indian children on Nativenet or
any similar use of computers is almost infinitesimal in comparison
to the number watching cartoons hours on end.

> I know people who are very creative and who are teaching their children
> to lead creative lives who have decided to not have tv in their homes.  I
> also know creative people bringing up their children in moral and creative
> environments who do have television at home.

I for one find that the problem is not confined to its effect on
children. Some societies do not have such clearly delineated lines
between child and adult, while recognizing the accumulation of experience
and it is hoped for, wisdom. I believe that my own understanding has been,
and can be severely skewed by relying on trying to experience reality
through the tv medium. I think of the Russians I work and correspond with,
who though they knew their former government only fed them lies, still
think everyone in the West is a capitalist pig ripe for the plucking. And
who in their justifiable haste to shuck off their former system, try to
set up a capitalist one based on all the distortions and caricatures they
were propagandized with! I believe it is important to be discriminating
what one puts into one's head - there is nothing truly inert about the
effect of any mis- dis-, or information.

> As for Northern Exposure -- the representations of the Jewish character
> drive me wild (I have found that character offensive more than once), and
> that particular episode, as Lyn mentioned, spent a lot of time talking about
> the terrible holocaust the Europeans inflicted on Native Americans.  I do
> think, though, that the picture was prettied up by the response of the white
> residents of Cecily -- smiling and wishing the tomato-throwers well -- but
> then again, no one claims Northern Exposure and its characters are meants to
> be representetive or "real".

I still think that the immaturity of a society which is increasingly a kind
of entertainment culture (by the American practice of rating according to
level of salary, entertainment figures of one sort or another are valued
most highly and have most prestige and moral influence) is revealed by
even intellectuals acting like school children whose conversations are
mostly about what was on TV last night! Has anyone else noticed this?

Television and film, even when employing Indians in its stories, is
*not* real life, as Roberta points out, but I think it is pretty
obvious that people are often more impressed with what happens within
its delimited flickering ersatz reconception than with
knowing through their own senses what is happening to real people
they might touch and come to know. As an actor, I have been approached
on the street by people who caught a glimpse of me in a film and now
believe they "know" me, though I've never met them before. They confuse
magic shadows dancing on a screen with the souls and bodies of real
persons.

> The question then must deal with the types of representations constructed,
> in the context of the history of represnetations of Native Americans, etc.,
> and in the context of the products of the mainstream television industry.

This does not question, of course, the underlying presumption that the
entertainment culture is valid, but is only concerned with giving it
a certain editorial direction. Cultural genocide can and has occurred
by the simple introduction of technology hostile to the culture, in
overwhelming amounts. This is occurring in many native cultures. What
positive influence would satellite dish American programs have on, for
instance, an Amazon Indian rainforest society?


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