Theos-Talk Archives (June 1994 Message tl00005)

Avoiding the news and to live a reclusive life are not necessarily the
same thing.  Of course, a real reclude feels repulsion to the news of
the world.  Before we accept or reject the mass media of communication
we should do some analysis of the news.

At the abstract level the media of communication is a very good thing.
The practice of it is not so nice to look at.

The first fault is, that the global news agencies are commercial
enterprises, so they have to sell what people demand; and what sells,
we all know.  The news' value is not its objective information but, how
it "entertains".

The second fault is a cliche, that the news are one-sided.  In order to
find out the truth, we have to engage a painstaking task to dig up
every thread of news on the topic from different sources.  Then we have
to run an analysis on them, and then judge what is right and what is
wrong.  That is a very good mental practice to do, but to do it
properly and regularly takes very, very much time, time that you could
use to do something more of benefit, for example to help one's
fellowman.  I think that people in general are too lazy to do very
serious cross-checking on the news, they just form their opinion kind
of randomly, depending on their world-view.

The third fault is that the mass-media is so huge and overwhelming
organisation that nobody can monitor all the news it has to offer, so
the few important news buries under the roar of insignificant ones.  In
practice mass-media is a one-way road, you just take the news, you
can't comment to them directly.  So you have to listen many things you
don't accept and things you consider as lies, but you can't really do
anything about it.  If you try, it is a one man against the rest of the
world.  This internet-kind of information service is far more
different, you can select automatically what news you get, and you can
comment them if you feel urge.

The fourth fault is that the majority of the news are not important.
What do you do with the knowledge you gain from media? How you can
direct your life by them? What is the essential knowledge and
information you really need to live a good life? I believe you don't
find it from the mass-media.

The fifth fault is that people's comprehension of news is corrupted,
there is e.g.  sport-news.  I don't care to mention worse examples of
"news".

The sixth fault is that modern technology is so advanced that we can
bury our senses ultimately by mass-media and entertainment, or have to,
if we want to stay "up-to-date".

The seventh fault is little more complex; I believe that there is a
tendency that by global, homogeneous mass-media, culture and
entertainment we create a human race that reacts very much according to
expectations.  Then, the whole human race is more easy to control and
to lead.  Also, to market different goods is more easy when people have
similar tastes, etc.  In schools they teach students to follow
mass-media, they have exercises how to collect information from them,
etc.  So, after a lifelong conditioning an individual may feel bad
conscience if he/she doesn't follow mass-media.  Also, an individual,
who doesn't follow media, may be a little bit dangerous to society,
because he/she may think in a different way.  Of course if everybody
would have his/hers own way, the nations and governments would be
impossible.  So, it is absolutely a good thing that we have this kind
of unifying media, otherwise we would have chaos and anarchy.

How to stay up-to-date? I have found that if something really important
happens there is practically no way to avoid knowing about it.  The
information is in every news-broadcasts - many times per day, in every
newspaper, in current affairs programmes...  And lastly, people talk
about it.

Today there is a lot of suffering, violence and accidents displayed at
mass-media.  You might say, that not to read, watch or listen about
them is to avoid fellowman's suffering.  What you see on tv is not
really the suffering, it is the image of the suffering.  Just look at
to people you meet at the streets, offices, work, home...and you see
suffering.

My choice, four years ago, when I noticed some of these things, was to
reject all "information".  What I got instead? Lots of free time to
think by myself.  Now my thoughts have cleared so much, and I have
built a healthy criticism to mass media, that I don't mind browsing a
newspaper now and then.  To tv, I'm still allergic.

A human being is in perpetual evolution, yesterday we were different
beings and tomorrow we shall be different from now.  So, maybe I'm now
just going trough some modern, reclude phase in my life.

Can you live without television?

Peace to all creatures.

Aki