Module 2
The third chapter in the text book, “Connecting Social Problems and Popular Culture” by Karen Sternheimer (2013) talks about bullying alot. To be more exact, she talks a lot about cyberbullying. This is a topic that I love learning about. I think it is a big problem that we are having. I have always thought that it was underplayed though. But, the way she makes it seem is that when a teenager is pushed to the point of suicide by cyberbullying, the media goes crazy. I really thought the statistics involving suicide was interesting. According to the text, “fourty-five to fifty- four- year- olds were the group most likely to commit suicide”. Yet, we hardly ever hear about news story involving older people taking their lives. Any time a teen commits suicide (which are the group less likely to take their own life), the media jumps all over it. I am not saying that it is not a big deal, don’t get me wrong. However, I do think that if the media is going to make it seem like teens are “the most at risk”, they should really put the true statistics out there. Karen Sternheimer (2013) talks a lot of about sexual orientation and how people are cyberbullied for it. Which leads to to them taking their life. I love how she talked about the subject, however, there are many other reasons people get cyberbullied, that I wish she would have talked about. Although, I understand why she did that. The media, usually only talks about big news stories. So of course, if a teen is bullied because of their sexual orientation, the media is going to jump all over that. Cyberbullying is something that really hits home for me. I was bullied a lot in highschool and some people would say some mean things. I had a friend kill himself and people who all of the sudden decided they did not want to be my friends anymore, would say things like “You should go kill yourself like Matt”. Or another great line that stuck with me throughout the years was, “If your dad had two legs, he would run away from you like everyone else!”. They seriously picked on the fact that my dad lost his leg as a teenager. They would post these comments on my Myspace. Karen Sternheimer, mentions how cyberbullying effects children because not only are they experiencing bullying at school, but cyberbullying provides a way for the bullies to follow them home. I remember feeling so embarrassed because this was all online. So everyone could see what these “friends” were saying. Have any of you had any experiences with cyberbullying? If so, how did you deal with it…did you tell anyone?
To go along with bullying, stereotyping can be a form of bullying. However, generalizing is not. I do agree with Cortes (2000) in the article The Children Are Watching. That there is a big difference between stereotyping and generalizations. I think people mistaken and confuse the two a lot. It is normal to make generalizations. I think that because people confuse the two, they think that we should not be making generalizations about people because it is stereotyping (which could be considered bullying). Coretes (2000) says, “We all generalize. We all need to generalize. We create categories of items, actions, or ideas, and then develop generalizations about common (although not necessarily identical or universal) characteristics of those categorized items. After reading this piece, I learned that it is completely normal to generalize, which I had always tiptoed around to avoid any controversy. Did anyone else confuse the two terms generalizing and stereotyping? Or am I alone here?
In today’s society, we are surrounded by media. It is all around us. Karen Sternheimer (2013) talks about how popular culture is making people “lazy”. She says that “many parents are made to feel guilty for choosing to allow some television viewing when there is no concrete evidence of harm”. She also says that certain technologies like video games or texting are “unfamiliar” to adults now. Although, they have some experience with video games, their video games are not as advance as the ones today. Also, they never had texting growing up. I can see where it is easy to blame these technologies for changes in youth. However, I think youth are different just because they have different experiences and have these things available. Of course, it is not going to be like how it was when their parents were their age and they would go outside and play. They have the internet now, unlike their parents. So, at times, they may want to stay inside and play on the internet because it is available to them. I do not believe it is fair to blame media, just because the media is available for them to use. “The average American adult spends several hours each day in this television world, children spend even more of their lives immersed in its “fictional reality”.”Gross (2001) He is saying that television has became the primary source for people to get their information. He also mentions how the “assumptions, beliefs, and values of heavy viewers of television differ systematically from those of light viewers in the same demographic groups”. So you can see where the beliefs of Karen Sternheimer and Gross vary. Gross is blaming media in a way for the change of thoughts due to technology and Sternheimer is saying that television has no effect. I can not say where I stand with this topic right now. It is something that I would like to learn more about.
“The biggest problem that Americans are facing is that we have a hard time believing in possibility and imagining that things could be otherwise”- Tollefson (2008). I really liked this sentence, I completely agree with it. I think that people get stuck in their everyday routine that they do not often stray from the path to question things. The media gives people power. However, we need to try to take away some of the medias power to impact people. “The media environment for children and teens has changed dramatically in recent years, and so, too, has the advertising environment.” (Common Sense Media 2014) Advertising today is crazy because of the help of media. The media uses certain techniques to attract children to see their ads. They post them on gaming websites, videos the children watch on Youtube, banner ads and children’s networks on the television. The way we can take control of this power that the media has, is to research how often young people are exposed to advertisement and what age groups companies are targeting. Children are the “financial runners” of the household today. They can manipulate their parents into buying things they see advertisements for. This is why I believe it is crucial, that we teach the children how to be media literate and see the “hidden messages” in the media they see.
