Smores
What is Media Literacy?
Media Literacy (Smore #1)
I’ll be honest I have absolutely no idea what media literacy. To me when I first think of media literacy, the first thought that pops into my head is a newspaper. I think of a newspaper because, media in my eyes is a form of communication and literacy is being able to read and write, and back then a form of communication that was written was a newspaper. I also think of Benjamin Franklin, because he was an apprentice working in a newspaper company. Another thing that I think media literacy could be is breaking a piece of literature down, because in our media center there is an immersive amount of books and they are all broken down and categories into different sections. Media literacy could be analyzing and examining literature.
Since I am not one hundred percent certain what media literacy mean my definition of media literate may not be accurate. Media literate to me is being able to look at a piece of media or literature and taking the time to break it down. I think being media literate is an extremely hard quality to have because anyone can read literature it takes a lot to really analyze it and fully understand the author’s purpose for writing the fine piece of art. Although it could be hard to become media literature, it could also be very beneficial. It could benefit a student in college so they could look beyond the pieces of literature and comprehend what the author was trying to get the reader to understand.
Breaking Media Literacy Down
Desribing Media Literacy in 25 Words
The Power of Being Media Literate
What Can I Do? (Smore #2)
Super Bowl Commercial Precis (Smore #3)
Super Bowl Commercial: T-Mobile
In T-Mobile’s commerical they used Steve Harvey, well known comedian, to argue that Verizon had messed up on the results and that T-Mobile has the better data plan and results. Steve Harvey supports his claim by mimicking himself in a humorous manner, he does so by holding the results in our direction so the audience can confirm that what he is announcing is true, and by showing he is relieved that he didn’t mess up this time like he did in the Miss Universe pageant. T-Mobile used Steve Harvey’s well-known mistake in order to grab the audience attention; when first seeing Steve Harvey in the T-Mobile commerical i asked myself what he was going to mess up now. T-Mobile’s audience is anyone who is familiar with the Miss Universe mistake, anyone who is an unsatisfied with their phone server who isn’t T-mobile or anyone who is looking for a phone with a better data plan.Gendering in ADs affect on Society (Smore#4)
Advertising Manipulation
In my opinion I feel as though advertising has a huge impact on society. Commercials are usually not longer than two minutes because after that the audience begins to lose interest. Once you think about it two minutes is not that long, so companies have to get into our heads in order to convince us to buy their product. Companies manipulate us and we don’t even notice it. They play catchy music, or put famous and attractive people on their commercials, or sometimes they do crazy things in order to get us to buy their product. Commercials are very helpful for a company because they get the word out about new products they want to sell or discounts they are having. Commercials have become very popular to watch because of the Super Bowl; companies go all out spending millions of dollars on commercials. But sadly commercials are mainly out selling products then by spreading awareness. For example many of the commercials seen on television are about selling materialistic things, rather than no texting and driving commercials or no smoking commercials. These commercials aren’t as common because sadly these aren’t topics that people are interested in. They rather watch the goofy Doritos commercial than the serious research commercial that could save someone’s life.Media Manipulation (Smore #5)
Manipulation
Commercials are there to get us informed with new products, news, and studies. One topic commercials haven’t been so successful on are getting the awareness out of dangerous things that could save someone’s life. For example we are all aware that cigarettes are bad for us; we have all heard the things that could happen if we smoke cigarettes, yet we still buy them. The same thing goes for no texting and driving videos, we all heard about how many people die and although it’s a huge issue we don’t seem to give it much interest. I’ll be honest when I see these commercials I think about them for a little while and then I go on with my life. I guess another reason why people don’t do much to stop these issues is because smoking is such a common thing now a days that there is absolutely no way you can get rid of it. The cigarette business is a huge one and they aren’t just going to stop selling them. We all know what is good and what is bad but sadly we don’t seem to care as much to stop this. I don’t blame them though I am guilty of texting while driving sometimes, and this doesn’t seem to be a huge issues because we all think that it won’t happen to us.Should Apple Unlock iPhone? (Smore #6)
When first hearing about the whole San Bernardino situation, I was extremely shocked that Apple refused to hack the iPhone right then and there. But after reading articles I’ve completely changed my mind. You see, when you ask someone whether or not Apple should hack the shooter’s iPhone, to save other lives and to find out who else might be involved, the most human answer would be yes. But then I began to think today it’s one phone tomorrow it could be all our phones. Then you begin to think what will happen in the future when similar cases like this occur? The government will get carried away and they will began to hack the phones of criminals who commit minor crimes. Our iPhones that we protect some much will be easily hacked and then it will be like the PATRIOT Act. Our private information wouldn’t be private anymore, it will be right in the government’s hand and in the hands of people around the world. (Apple claims that any system allowing the FBI to get into a select few phones would eventually become available to anyone in the world.) Although hacking into the shooter’s phone could give the FBI information about anymore terrorist attacks, it will diminish our privacy.
Agree or Disagree: Freedom for Security? (Smore #7)
Get it Straight: Reflection on Candidates (Smore #8)
Ain't Rebellion Fine (Smore #9)
Back in the 1940s many Jews were attacked just for being jews. The worldwide known leader for the catastrophic things that were done to these Jew was, Adolf Hitler. Hitler easily broke down millions of families. He did this by separating the children from their fathers and sometimes even their mothers and then taking them to awful concentration camps. In these camps everyone was to have their hair shaved off and to be given specific prison like clothes. Millions of Jews died in these camps for lack of food, water, sanitation, and for being sent to gas chambers. As a result of seeing their family members and even friends die, the Jew began to get fed up. They began to realize that the chances for them to survive were slim, so why not die fighting? Being attacked as a whole race anger the Jews, and therefore made the urge for them to fight stronger and powerful.
A common technique that was used to get Jews to rebel during the Holocaust was fear. Although many German soldiers used fear to keep the Jews in the concentration camps, many Jewish activists used fear to their advantage as well. Another technique that was used was unity, since all the Jewishs were being tortured and killed they all decided to stand up together and fight for what is right. Love for one another also gave many Jews the strength to keep fighting. As I mentioned earlier millions of families were broken apart and the hope of being able to see their family members again was a huge factor to the Jews acting out. But the main thing that made the Jews act out was anger. Anger toward the German soldiers, anger towards their family members dying, anger towards being tortured and anger towards being innocently attacked were all reasons for the Jews to act out.
Thankfully no current events in our society have happened like the Holocaust but their have been events where a certain race has stood up for what is right. Both African American boy Mike Brown and Trayvon Martin were killed by white males and once they were taking to court both trials let the killers go. This whole scandal was on the news because everyone felt as though the sentences of the killers would have been different if the race of the killer and the boy were different. Many other African Americans were mad about the sentence so they protested and acted out for something to be done. As a result people should stand up for what they think is right, because there could be other people out there who want to stand up but don’t have the courage to stand up.Government Wins Again: (Smore #10)
Although many governments differ from methods of supervising their citizens, governments around the world supervise their people regardless. And sometimes people working for the government are placed in a position where they question whether or not the government abuses their power to supervise their people. Edward Snowden was placed in a position like this, Snowden worked for the government(NSA) but was disturbed by how much the government was supervising Americans. Snowden debated back on forth trying to decide what to do, and so he published valuable information about the government. In the book 1984 Winston is also placed in a position like this. Winston’s job in the book 1984 is to change history so that he could make their government seem innocent. A few similarities between Winston and Snowden is that they both work for the government and that they are both placed into positions where they question their governments. Now the one thing that is different between these two is that unlike Winston, who realizes there is something wrong but doesn’t do much about it, Snowden leaks certified information to the public. This difference is very important because when comparing Winston to Snowden it makes Winston seem weak. Snowden has the guts to do what Winston won’t; Snowden puts his career at stake by publishing valuable documents. While Winston knows there’s something wrong but his only way of rebelling is by loving Julia and joining the Brotherhood in secrets.
Now when comparing O’Brien to Snowden they have the few similarities such as, they both notices that their is something wrong with their government. Although O’Brien doesn’t work for the government like Snowden does, he does however live a good life like Snowden, when being compared to how Winston lives his life. Although O’Brien stands against the government he does it in a secretly manner, as opposed to Snowden, who wanted other people to know how he feels about the government.Is Technology Really from Heaven? (Smore #11)
Winston’s view of Science and Technology
I personally feel as though Winston is saying that technology relies on us. Technology relies on us to come up with new inventions. Winston realized that technology stopped developing because people were to busy being controlled by the government. If the government controls your thoughts they control your technological developments as well. I also feel as though technology relies on us because inventors need to come up with things that almost anyone can use and afford. There really would be no point in spending billions of dollars inventing something that not everyone needs. In the book 1984 the science and technology is used to control the citizens of Oceania. And overall what I feel Orwell is trying to say is that, although technology keeps advancing it isn’t to benefit us: it is to control our thoughts, our opinions, our actions and us in general.Happiness v Freedom (Smore #12)
Happiness vs. Freedom
I would like to say that happiness is obtaining freedom. I don’t really understand how someone can be truly happy without being free. I don’t understand how someone can be happy being told what to do and more importantly what to think. If you think you can be happy without freedom, you are lying to yourself.
In the book 1984, the reason everyone in Oceania obeyed the ridiculous orders wasn’t because of their love for Big Brother; it was because they were manipulated by fear to love Big Brother. This may seem like a huge stretch to make a connection, but when I think of Big Brother I think of the abusive husband and the citizens of Oceania are the defenceless wives that try to make the best out of their current situation. When we hear of these abusive relationships that deal with domestic violence we critically judge the victim’s stupidity to stay in the relationship; and when asked why they stay with their abusive husbands the answer is almost always that they “love” them. That is exactly what happens in the book 1984.
In today’s society I do see the concept of happiness being more important than freedom. I feel as though the only reason for that is because our government isn’t fully taking away our freedom, and the few parts that they do take away aren’t much of importance to the citizens. The government is sneaky enough to take away a few rights like listening to our conversations and reading our texts, without citizens making a huge deal about it.Gas lighting (Smore #13)
Gaslighting: Another Form of Manipulation
The definition of gaslighting in small and simple words is: a form of mental abuse that makes someone doubt his or her memory. Research shows that men are typically the abusers of gaslighting and women are the victims. An example of gaslighting will be someone constantly saying things about someone else; eventually leading to the person doubting and questioning whether or not certain things are true or made up. Besides Donald Trump, who is an expert at gas lighting, I think other experts of people who use gaslighting would be comedians. Often in parodies comedians make fun of a well known case. Then when the audience sees it it could confuse the viewer into think that certain things the comedian said have always been true. For example when I watch a parody I automatically have another perspective view for the person they are making fun of. To avoid this issue, one should always do a lot of research so we don’t end up second doubting ourselves. Another thing that could be done is getting another perspective, asking another person whether or not certain things are true or not. And last but not least don’t be so gullible, don’t always believe everything you hear.