Going to the movies anytime soon?
Do you ever think about what you are watching? Why you are watching it? What makes it entertainment? Where are the lines between entertainment and what is not?
There are social and cultural constraints on what "society" views as acceptable for entertainment.
Who creates these boundaries? By whose authority do these boundaries persist?
What is acceptable in one community or culture is different from another. For example, what is viewed on TV in your neighbor's place may be more gruesome or sexually orientated than what you may view at home. Likewise, what Canadians view on TV may be very different or even seen as wrong in the eyes of someone from Iran.
I went to the movies the other night thinking I was going for entertainment. Instead, I came out with my head exploding from sociological questions.
Gamer. On the one hand, it was seemly entertaining. On the other, what message about desensitization is it sending about our own society and the direction its headed in? Going into the film I remember thinking this would be a good discussion topic for graphic media. I thought it would be a good way to portray how "loose" media has become. Some have said that it won't be long before we are back to gladiator days watching real people fight and die. As I watched I felt my body and mind sway with the entertaining effects. I caught myself thinking "Whoa! Crazy! That was awesome!" Then thinking "No, if that was real as the film is portraying it to be, then it is demented and gruesome. Why is this okay to be viewing? What is it teaching our youth?"
It fights fire with fire aka just as gory and desensitizing as any other action film.
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I totally agree with you! It's scary when we think about the media that's being portrayed to the youth these days through television, movies and video games. But what's concerns me most is the fact that what they see is going to be brought into the classroom. They see violence in their video games and they think it's cool to reenact it during recess and all of a sudden, you have children being rushed to the hospital! Unfortunately, there is nothing we can do. As teachers we can advise our students to see the differences in good and bad media, but in the end, they are going to watch what they enjoy and sometimes that isn't necessarily what's best.
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