Sunday, July 1, 2012

Tune to Your Own Channel

Happy July 1st, y'all.  End of fiscal year for many... or should I say, beginning...

So I guess I'm not well informed.  I don't sift through the news trackers with a fine tooth comb.  Never did, really.  But now, I don't watch television, I don't check out the headlines on Yahoo more than a couple times a month...  The only way that I gather "news" is through social interaction, either talking with other people or "sharing" on "facebook" with "friends."  So I guess I kind of have my head stuffed in the sand, by today's standards.

The media as we know it in the United States is a machine that produces thought control, perspective control.  It shrinks the world into little chewable bits for the easy consumption of its viewers.  The process of "making the news" is one of filtration and processing.  Gone are the days of the unadulterated content, everything is washed and sanitized and edited and enhanced and embellished.  Even when nothing happens, there are countless channels producing shows about everything that didn't happen... yet.  Or what might happen next... Or what will surely happen if something isn't done, soon...

We're a bunch of drama junkies.  Right now I'm sitting on the couch, laptop in position, listening to our neighborhood traffic whisper and the neighborhood mockingbird review its repertoire.  There's a pleasant breeze now and then that adjusts the scents in the air and tickles the hair on my arms.  This is not a film to be broadcast at eleven.  And yet, I am enjoying it immensely, more than any newscast I have ever experienced.

I used to listen to talk radio a few years ago.  And I would get all worked up about perceived wrong doing in the world.  Now that I don't tune in, I'm more well-balanced.  I still have opinions, and hear about news stories through different means (I am still on a fair amount of email lists that I can't seem to get rid of...), but I'm acting more locally and assessing my environment locally.  I hear the cries from Washington, and it seems that the discord will always be there, no matter who is president or speaker of the house or on the supreme court.  There is no end-all fix for this system.  It's a system that has to be moving, in flux, in order for change to happen.  It is a process, not a destination.  If we could all think a little more along those lines, we might get more work, positive work, done.

So I've developed my own critical thinking abilities, thank you very much.  No thanks to the mass media.  In spite of it.  Through relationships and conversations and writing and questioning myself.  I can do this without the aid of someone who is getting paid to tell me what I "need".  How would they know the answer to that, when we've never even met? 

But what do I know?  I'm just a blogger out here, with no advertisers, and about twelve regular followers.  I don't even "count" in today's society.  My voice is not being solicited by the masses.

Well.  Not yet, anyway.

1 comment:

Deb said...

So true, so true. I still read news, but I am tired of the TV. You have done well by getting rid of yours. Wish I could do the same, but the 4 males in my house would not allow it. Anyway, I take everything I read in the "news" with a grain of salt. And I much prefer fiction.