The Medium and the Message Pt. 3

How do people acquire the information that affects their choices? Who is most manipulated by the political ad or the thirty-second sound byte? A few years back the people of the state of California voted against educational vouchers. When the campaign for this voucher system first started the polls showed huge support, a large majority. That's not how it ended. Somehow Tom Sawyer got Huck Finn to whitewash his fence. The teacher's union outspent the pro-voucher side by millions and changed people's minds. Television holds the minds of Americans like the swinging watch of the hypnotist. By the time, the marketing gurus finished molding the putty-like brains of California voters, they sidestepped vouchers like landmines in the Korean DMZ. At last, the message didn't matter; the medium did. The citizens were "persuaded" by doing "research," i.e. watching TV commercials.

We have created this monster. Politicians count on a dumbed-down electorate who won't read. As stupid as they are, they won't know the difference when a politician makes one of his moronic arguments. Here's my favorite as an example: bigger tax cut for the rich. That will always work with the large imbecile segment of the population. What is ironic is that the rich can afford more television advertisements to combat these deceitful commercials. Unfortunately then, the more they see, the stupider they get. The crowd most happy with all this is the marketing establishment. They love election season. And don't count on the public schools to change anything, they are the same characters who talked parents out of vouchers. If they can do that to parents, you've got to know what they are doing to the kids. We've already been mentally disenfranchised. You've heard "We the people;" now think "We the dupes."

The medium has become our culture. Every message is framed by this new environment in which we live. It's sights and sounds bombard our senses. It is akin to Lot in Sodom where both seeing and hearing, he vexed his righteous soul. Our souls become desensitized by the muzak on elevators, the screens at the grocery store check-out, theme songs for every event, and the slick, brightly colored ads stacked in our mailbox when we get home. Most young people find it impossible to pull themselves out of this context to carefully consider the exegesis of Scripture. They are plugged into the culture and its philosophy and thinking, unknowingly becoming part of its artificial world and speeding on its conveyor belt toward one shocking moment in time. The day they die.