"Since when has news become entertainment ..."

In class we were exposed to an episode of the 1980’s science fiction series Max Headroom. Though futuristic and somewhat implausible, the show comments on many aspects of media literacy relevant today.

In the particular episode we watched entitled “war”, we were introduced to a society overwhelmed by media influence. One of network news channels, BreakThruTV, stages a terrorist attack in order to increase the number of viewers during the global ratings sweeps.

The concepts that first came to mind were the four traps that result from automaticity, Since we are bombarded by so many media messages everyday our minds program themselves to automatically filter out those deemed unimportant. As discussed in our class lecture, this state of mind has four traps that make discerning important messages difficult.

Since society has developed such a strong sense of trust with television news channels, we have “a false sense of feeling informed and in control” which eventually leads to “faulty beliefs. Since we have no way of actually knowing the truth, we whole-heartedly believe what we see. As illustrated in the episode, playing on these information traps is a dangerous way to get viewers to believe anything you want them to.

Another important issue resulting from this episode is media ethics. This just goes to show that networks will do anything for ratings. A question of ethics can be asked of most of the reality shows that appear on television today. The line between what is ethical and what will make money continues to be unclear. As Edison Carter asks, “Since when has news become entertainment?”