In his book, "Media Literacy," James Potter attempts to analyze entertainment content. And for the most part he does a good job of dissecting entertainment and it's various components. However, when it comes to his portion on controversial content elements, I feel like he is missing something huge.
What Potter does recognize and provides a detailed analysis for is the amount of sexual content, homosexuality, violence, and language in media today, with specific focus on television. With this analysis he also makes comparisons to entertainment content of decades past, claiming that "what offended viewers in the 1980's hardly gets their attention today.
What Potter fails to recognize is the way in which political correctness has penetrated nearly every aspect of entertainment and media. While we as a culture have less and less inhibition on what controversial content we produce with regards to violence, language, and sexuality, we are more stringent on political correctness. It seems that many media outlets are trying more and more to avoid offending people based on demographics such as race, religion, gender, and sexuality.
Take, for instance, the Rick Sanchez incident that occurred in the last week. Sanchez was a TV news anchor for CNN up until this week when he was fired for comments he made as a guest on an unaffiliated radio show. Here is the transcript. Essentially, what lost Sanchez his job was his comment regarding Daily Show host Jon Stewart (calling him a "bigot") and his insinuation that CNN, the network who employed him, is controlled by Jews.
To me, his statements, while unwarranted, aren't completely outrageous--especially when compared to the entertainment content that airs on television everyday. We are subject to much more controversial content all the time, but not in a fashion that is designed to offend one particular demographic.
In the 1970's television aired much less controversial content with regards to violence, language, sexuality, etc., but programs like Sanford and Son and All in the Family perpetuated racial stereotypes and bigotry, especially by the sensitive standards of today. Many of the racial references made in these shows would never air on television today. It is my opinion that our current media climate regarding controversial content is due to this politically correct censorship seeing a sharp rise, while at the same time other forms of controversial content (violence, language, etc.) are subject less and less censorship.
good job on your blog Dustin. I completely agree with you that Politics plays a major role in the media nowadays, more so than ever before really. I remember hearing about the Sanchez incident about him calling Jon Stewart a "bigot" and thinking to myself,
ReplyDelete"Okay...why are you calling him that, what do you have against him?" It seems as if we are becoming a "politically correct" culture too.
Yes, you can definately see how the views have shifted in censorship. Take for example what we talked about in class about tv shows. Beavis and Butthead was highly controversial in its time, but by today's standards it is tame compared to what goes on in shows like South Park.
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