TV

Back in 1964 Marshall McLuhan catchily observed that "the medium is the message." The key truth he aphoristically conveyed is that, regardless of the content or programming of a particular medium like TV, just the fact that we employ that medium has some sort of an effect on our society.

To illustrate McLuhan's principle via television: When a person turns on the TV, that person generally does so for self-satisfaction ("entertain me"), regardless of what program is watched. In other words, just the mere fact that TV exists helps facilitate or promote self-serving activities (i.e., narrow self-absorption or selfishness).

Watching television, by its very nature, is generally not a socializing activity; it is an unsocial "passivity." When we watch TV we generally do not actively do things with others; instead, we passively let things be done to us. We let ourselves be amused, informed, etc.

Because TV is not exactly a socializing medium, it is entirely possible that TV, far from uniting us in some sort of global village, is actually dividing or balkanizing us. We not only seem to be becoming more selfish (evidence: the "me decade," "do your own thing," "make your own rules," "determine your own truth"), but we are segregating into distinct groups. There are separate TV channels for African-Americans, Hispanics, women, devoutly religious people, pornography-lovers, intellectuals, sports fanatics, etc., etc.

Instead of our developing more common interests, generally speaking we are developing less common, more separate interests. For example, we have numerous special interest groups pushing their own agendas, which agendas frequently conflict with the agendas of other special interest groups. (To illustrate: A greater affirmative action quota for African-Americans or Hispanics leaves less "room" for other minority groups in an affirmative action program.)

Now, listening to the radio and reading are also somewhat selfish activities, but their divisive effects on society are not nearly as profound as those of TV. These activities are not as isolating. One can read a book to someone, like a son or daughter. One can dance with someone to music and look into their eyes. TV, on the other hand, demands our undivided attention. It needs to be seen. It needs to be heard.

Besides television being a divisive medium, an excellent argument can be made that it is also a desta­bilizing medium, a revolutionary medium, and thus a medium not very receptive to conservatives. Let me explain.

Take a camera, film the goings-on of the average household, and observe how few people are interested in viewing that film. The "normal" is relatively boring.

Consequently, for television to grab and hold our attention it needs to parade before us the abnormal, the weird, the shocking, speaking generally. But the more we are exposed to a particular shocking thing the more we become desensitized to it, the more it becomes ordinary background noise and loses its power to shock. When the once-shocking no longer shocks, TV has to reach out to even further extremes to grab and hold our attention.

Thus, for television to thrive it needs to keep pushing the envelope, needs to keep challenging/upsetting the status quo.

Now, conservatives, almost by definition, wish to conserve or maintain the status quo. They do not want to "normalize" the abnormal, the weird, the shocking. That is one reason television is so dominated by liberals. Conservatives just are not a good "fit" for TV.

Another reason you will not find many conservatives in the television business is because TV is a corrupting influence (I'll explain) and conservatives value morality not corruption.

(TV corrupts because it desensitizes us to immorality. E.g., it has desensitized us to violence, sexual exploit­ation [i.e., promiscuity], foul language, etc., etc. The immoral is not as repulsive as it used to be. We are less averse to engaging in immoral activity, if we even remember what immoral activity is.)

The corrosive effects of television on society are so potentially fateful that we need to start taking this medium much more seriously than we currently do. Perhaps it is time we considered putting warning labels on TV sets (said earnestly). They could read something like: "Turning me on will help corrupt your morals." This proposal is not so farfetched when we look at what television is doing to us.

TV programmers go to great (questionable) lengths to capture and hold our attention. That is somewhat understandable because getting our attention is their job. But it is our job to give more important matters our attention: our spouses, our children, our civic duties, our own physical and mental health, etc.

Yes, it is easy to just turn on the TV and escape from reality. That is one of the problems we have to overcome through education. We, as a society, are currently educating people about the negative consequences of alcohol abuse, drug abuse, smoking, unsafe sex, etc., etc. Since TV is so pervasive (and so potentially perversive), isn't it time we added TV to the list of things we assiduously caution people about?