The screening 12 Angry Men was an interesting one. I did not like it at the start. It grew on me over time. The one man who raised all the questions in the beginning was my favorite character. For a lot of the movie he was the only one doing some deep thinking into the trail. The jury was 11-1 after the first vote not in favor of the defendant. And by the end it was 9-3 in favor of the defendant. That one man very well saved that that 18 year old boys life. A lot of the men did not think about different aspects of the case until it was forced upon them to do so. I also noticed the jury was all men. Why were there no women? were women not on juries back then? I also noticed in comparison to now, the English language was spoken differently back then. They used the word suppose more then we ever would today, also had more manners.
I don’t believe all the men on the jury were angry men. I think there were two angry men out of the twelve. You could tell the two who were yelling the most and trying to convict the boy were set on doing so. They would not be open to the ideas the other men raised. I also believe among the twelve men there was only one dumb man. The man with the hat who wanted to go to the baseball game. He was not taking the matters seriously. He kept saying unnecessary comments and that bugged me. He is the kind of man who believes everything he hears and is apart of the problem with our society. Men like him, who don’t think for themselves and make decisions for the wrong reason are the ones who mess everything up. The people who do things for the wrong reasons and have the wrong motives.
I would have ended up voted not guilty, solely based on the lack of legitimate evidence against the boy. I would never vote for someone to die with not enough evidence against them. Those two angry men had something dark inside them to be able to vote guilty. I also thought that was very clear the one man did not like his own son very much, leading him to want to vote guilty for this young man. Which is wrong, you can not bring your own emotions into something like this. He was not fit for the jury.
In regards to this class, I enjoyed it. I have learned a lot of valuable information about media I did not know before which is good. I can say I learned a lot. I think you (Professor) taught the class well and always went into great detail when explaining things. Class was always interesting and full of good discussion. My favorite chapters were the movie and tv chapters. I found a lot of that stuff interesting. The book chapter in the beginning was good too.
Fandom is a subculture composed of fans characterized by a feeling of empathy and passion with others who share a common interest. The subject of fan interest can be narrowly defined, focused on something like an individual celebrity, or more widely defined, encompassing entire hobbies, genres or fashions. Everything today has fans. Famous authors, directors, certain movies, tv shows, athletes etc. From my own exitance, some of the most loyal, die hard fans are fans of the Yankees, Red Sox, Star Trek, Star Wars, the Grateful Dead, Dallas Cowboys, and Alabama fans. Radical fans form from a strong love for the thing they are admiring. Fans for tv shows or movies often gather for conventions and they get together to celebrate their love for said group.
When it comes to weather or not media uses us or we use it, I think we use each other. Media uses humans to thrive and make money. They use advertisements on all the media nowadays, websites, social medias etc. Humans use media to fill a void of boredom or self oppression. People like to go to media platforms for entertainment as well. Media is so broad now that you can find anything you like somewhere to put a smile on your face a fulfill your fix. Media also now uses AI to draw you in and keep you there with more things they (AI) know you like.
Fandom coming from fanatic and and the first fans being baseball fans intrigued me. I have been a baseball fan ever since a was a young child. Felt a connect to when I read it. Also hard to believe those were the first “fans”. I am surprised it took that long to create that term for admiring something or someone. Fans are just like social groups in a way. It the being a part of something that connects them. They “fit in” together and feed off each other. When I am out and about and I see someone wearing a Yankees hat or a Grateful Dead shirt I feel a connect to that person. I was at the gas station the other day when I saw an older man wearing a mask with the dead skull on it and I had to say something to him about it. Especially at my age there aren’t that many fans of the dead but just to see someone who has the an equal appreciation for the same thing I do puts a smile on my face, and I am sure it was the same for that man so that is why I felt like I had to say something to him.
In the reading Fandom the writer talks about if a fan is qualified to produce media on a topic. I think if you are a super fan of one topic or genre then yes you are qualified. Say you love Star Wars, you have seen every movie and know all the ins and outs. You have dedicated a lot of time informing yourself about Star Wars, then yes you are qualified to produce media on such topic if you know enough. The author of that reading seemed like a smart-ass and wanted to exclude “non intellectual’s” from being able to produce something meant to inform. Anyone who is informed on a topic to the level that would make them an expert would be a reputable source of information.
The genre of rock is responsible for moving America forward when we were “stuck in our ways.” Life had become predictable, people started wondering “there has to be more to this” (referring to life). The term rock n roll was used as slang in jazz and blues lyrics to mean, or to engage in sex. African Americans owned the jazz and blues genre. At a time when discrimination and racism was very strong America, the 1950s, adults did not want their children listening to music by African Americans with suggestive, sexual lyrics. This is why the genre was under so much scrutiny in the beginning.
Before rock n roll, the music scene consisted of pop or easy listen musicians, like Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin. Big band, which was a music ensemble of jazz musicians country music, with stars like Hank Williams. Blues music, which was founded by African Americans in the 1860’s. These genres continued on with popularity into the early 1950’s.
Blues, along with rhythm and jazz were very popular among kids growing up in the post-World War II era. Young boys across America trying to emulate this blues beat they were hearing on the radio. The next sound was bound to be rock n roll because of this. The southern blues beat could only be heard on the black radio stations across America. The genre of blues is the back-bone of rock n roll, and without it rock n roll doesn’t exist. Famous blues artist such as B.B. King, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Freddie King and Buddy Guy were crucial components to the genres evolution into rock n roll.
Some early rock musicians who had played a huge part in moving the genre forward were Elvis, Buddy Holly, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry and many others. 1954, Elvis came onto the scene, and not long after was deemed the King of Rock n Roll. Elvis was way before his time in terms of the sound he was putting out on the radio. With a sped up, new and improved sound along with a pretty white face singing like Elvis, the younger generation went mad for it. “When I heard Heartbreak Hotel, it was the end for me. Once I heard it and got into it, that was life, there was no other thing. I thought of nothing else but rock n roll,” said John Lennon in an interview. The sound, the beat, it was something new and fresh. With the lyrics being about love and full of sexual innuendos, younger generation was looking to rebel against their parents ideology and wanted to express themselves in a different way.
The younger children who were influenced by the 1950s rock n roll, by the 1960s, were producing music of their own. The British Invasion which included The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and The Kinks were reinventing the sound they grew up on and throwing an R&B twist on it. The Beatles thrived in America, topping the fame of Elvis and selling millions of records. “Nothing affected me until I heard Elvis. Without Elvis, there would be no Beatles,” John Lennon famously said about the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll. Although they may have become more popular, The Beatles had much respect for The King and made it known they were big fans. The early 1960s sound was catchy, upbeat, and usual was about loving a girl. The industry loved that stuff, mostly because it made them money.
The Beatles really young, notice the Elvis hairstyle
The upbeat, catchy, good loving rock n roll sound continued up until about the mid-1960s, and then something changed. The beatnik culture throughout the 1950s and eventually turning into what we know as the counterculture movement in the 1960s loved rock. In fact, Rock n roll was the center piece to this movement based around peace, love and enlightenment. The 1960s brought something totally new to the table with rock. The lovey-dovey rock jams were out and social change was in. Rock artists started to use their music as a way to address the social problems that America was facing at this time. Groups like The Doors produced a song Five to One referring to a generational takeover by the young. Five to One being the ratio between young protesters to law enforcement. The point being about the ratio and how they have the older generation outnumbered, nothing can stop them and change will come, peace will prosper.
The drug LSD, played a huge part in changing the sound of rock n roll again. The bands indulging in it found that people enjoyed a solid jam with an electrifying guitar solo to take you to “that place” while on the drug. This was the start of psychedelic rock which meant less lyrics, loud guitar, and eerie yet pleasurable sounds that make you wonder what instrument created them. The main hub for this sound was coming from Austin, Texas and San Francisco, California. Every artist in the mid to late 60s was moving out there. San Francisco became an epicenter for rock music and the counterculture, it was peace, love and rock n roll all the time. Janis Joplin, and the 13th Floor Elevators were two groups to make it big from Austin after moving further west. “As the front man of the 13th Floor Elevators, Roky Erickson helped define the outer limits of psychedelic rock” (Erlewine, 2019). Other bands who had success from San Francisco included the Grateful Dead, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jefferson Airplane, and Steve Miller Band, all main stays in the rock genre for years and years to come.
As the years went on, the rock genre continued to develop, change and evolve throughout and into ‘70s, ‘80s, and ultimately saw its demise after the ‘90s. Without artist like Muddy Waters, B.B. King and the popularity of blues, rock n roll would not exist. The blues musicians are the original rockers who set this great genre we call rock in motion.
The two part documentary showing the private investigators hunting down the people responsible for rating movies was very interesting. Also, pretty graphic but, being a 21 year old male I didn’t really mind.
I thought it was really messed up how the rating system works for movies. People forget movies are an art form and the director is doing something for a reason, everything in a movie has a purpose. That is one element to movies I love. I also wasn’t totally shocked that when it came to the gay sex scenes opposed to male and woman scenes that the rating would be different. People have always been harsher when it comes to stuff like that. There is a factor of uncomfortableness that comes along with that and some people end up getting really bothered by it. But why are those people, who end up being uncomfortable with that get to “dictate” the ratings. If all humans are equal, like we say we are then there should not be a different view when it comes to gay or straight sex scenes. Imagine being a gay director in Hollywood trying to make a name for yourself and the movie doesn’t end up being seen by a large audience due to the rating in which it received because of a sex scene.
I also don’t believe it is fair to keep the privacy of these raters names. Basically all information today is public and if not you can request information. The names should be known and the people should not be in the shadows while directors get angry by their decisions. If these people and directors had a decent relationship and co-existed among each other then maybe there wouldn’t be some much hate from the directors in the raters decisions. The directors and raters could share information and directors would not be so surprised when their movie would get rated, and they could help each other out. But at the end of the day the director has a vision on where they want to take their movie and that tends to be more important to them than pleasing the people rating the movie.
Movies and film is a huge part of my very own life and millions across the world. Everyone loves movies and they are a great form of entrainment. Movies have come so far since the early 19th century. For instance, categories have broaden and the acting as well as the directing has improved. The whole operation of making a movie itself has evolved from a person holding a single camera. The whole city of Hollywood is an enormous hub for making movies.
Adolf Zukor was the first director who turned out really successful. He was a great business man as well. He was the first director to go to wall street for financial backup on his movies. He also made actors into celebrities. Zukor was one of the first “independent directors”. Independent directors were directors who worked for foreign studios and would road show their features as a way around the “Trust” that was set up by Thomas Edison. The Motion Picture Paten Company was intended on having complete control over the film industry. These directors were rebels sticking it to the man which was Thomas Edison. Movies are an art form and art can not be monopolized and controlled. These directors were essential in moving this industry forward.
The raise of Hollywood in the early 19th century was also a huge turn in the movie industry. The location seemed to be perfect for movie makin’. The weather was always warm, the sun was always shining, and the land was cheap. The land also was diverse for all different kinds of movies. Hollywood has woods, mountains, lakes, beaches, and ocean. What more would you need? There is also some sort of mystic sense that goes along with it being way out west and wondering what goes on out there. The famous movie actors living all in one area with so much spotlight on these people, it was and still is a city full of stars.
The concept of silent films really interest me. Silent films make the audience really have to engage with the film and pay attention. Eliminating the sound and the actors having conversations without words really make you dial in and focus on the story. You have to rely on facial expressions and your own mind to put the story together. This version of film (silent film) also leaves room for you to have your own view that might be different from someone else. Someone else might interpret the movie different because of having to figure it out on your own. Silent films also use music to show tension and help the audience get a feel for the scene and moment. In 1925, the industry was looking to expand and then started making movies with sound. With the amount of focus a silent movie takes to understand, these films would not work for todays audience. We as humans are very easily distracted with the technology that we are surrounded by and would never be able to actually enjoy a silent film.
Film also was treated differently compared to how people view film now. In the early 19th century up until about the 1990s, going out to the movie theater was a popular thing to do. Especially in the early 19th century, going out to the movies was fancy and a special occasion. Now we will put on a movie just for the hell of it. It is not as special now to us as it once was and that is because we have every movie at our finger tips. The sense of doing something special and out of ordinary no longer exist with movies.
In today’s society we have two worlds one can choose to live in. You can choose between the beautiful, real, incredibly hard world or the easy, behind a screen, tailored to your liking, fake world which is the social media world many young adults and teens get trapped living in.
When applying for a job, the employer only know what you tell them or what they have heard about you from others. At least that is how it used to be. What was private was private and that just doesn’t exist anymore. Online today, everyone has a trail of some sort, unless you haven’t associated with any platforms. When employers are hiring they now look for any reasons on your social media you could possibly not be a good fit for the job. People in the early days of social media weren’t the best at content control. Photos from parties, inappropriate language and other content you wouldn’t want your grandma to see. That is why nowadays it is so harped on that you have to watch what you are posting on your social media. It is as simple as searching someone’s name on google. You will be able to find their accounts in just a couple of clicks. It is important to look somewhat professional on your social media for this reason. You can tell a lot about a person by looking through the photos they post, and their comments.
The internet started with little to no rules in place. You could throw anything out there truth or lie, right or wrong, it doesn’t matter. And chances are, since the internet has millions of users, there is bound to be a couple people out there just like you throwing the same bullshit out there. This causes a grey area of what is real and fake on the internet. The phrase “you can’t believe everything you see on the internet” exist for a reason.
Susan Boyle, the YouTube sensation went from nothing to something because how of popular her singing video became. My aunt would listen to her all the time around 2009 I can remember. So I saw that first hand. Social media in this instance really helped someone out and worked in a good way. The problem with going viral is that so many people are lazy now, they spend time trying to go viral so they can have life set up for them that way. Teens on Tik Tok have gone viral and have made a killing off it, millions of dollars for dancing seductivly for a couple seconds. At the end of the day, sex sells.
My problem with the internet is that it is so tailored to the user. The other day I searched for guitars on the guitar center website. Today what do I see on my Instagram, a guitar center ad for a guitar. I don’t like that. Instagram now has a feature where you can shop directly from the app itself. The app is consuming peoples lives and there is not a reason to get off the app. People even get uncomfortable when they go a while without their phones. People crave the connected feeling and get stressed out when they are not connected to the world. People nowadays don’t wanna miss anything, going sometime without your phone and that feeling starts to set in.
The internet has brought the world together. It has so many great impacts on this world. Like for example online shopping, music online, and marketing business. The internet has also had a tremendous down side. Humans are addicted to their phones and social media networks.
There is a lot of good on your phone. But everything on your phone is consuming your time instead of doing other things. Like instead of scrolling Pinterest you could be reading a nice book or going for a nice walk with your dog. Something further improving yourself instead of scrolling on your phone. The mind isn’t made to be starring at a screen for as long as humans do.
I also believe social media is terrible nowadays among young adults and teens. It has been created to make you want to be something they want you to be. The platforms control trends and what is cool and forcing it on you with ads and your own followers. A lot of people follow people that they have no idea who they really are. It is a bunch of fake relationships for the most part. People also spend so much time worrying about how many likes they are going to get on a photo. This has turned people into Instagram’s robots. People doing activities just for the fact to take of cool photo so their followers will think they are cool. It has become so much about status and how cool you are and the stuff your doing. Materialistic items are so sought after for status and people can’t cant refuse not posting about them. Like for example, a girl gets a new pair of shoes, sure enough you will see them on her Instagram story letting everyone know about them.
I can appreciate how far technology has come and the evolution of the internet and social media. It has turned into something completely different from the start. Instagram used to not be filled with ads and it was simply about posting pictures you wanted to share. How intelligent the platforms have become is amazing. Now it is so easy to market your company, contact people, and purchase items. You can literally clothes shop from Instagram now. Instagram can basically satisfy any need you would have. Instagram in the beginning didn’t even have videos. Instagram today is all videos or “reelz”. Just having videos alone allows you to be able to post so much more.
I think the worst thing Instagram has done is they have become the status of trends. People care more about what they look like on their Instagram’s than they do in real life. People will go to extreme lengths to look cool. Trends shouldn’t even exist. It should matter if something is cool or in style, people like what people like and that is the cool part about being yourself. No one today is being themselves. And if you are then you are the cool one. Everyone has been brainwashed into believing what is trendy.
The episode Hush was like something I have never seen before in modern television. Shows communication and how hard it is without words. Imagine if we couldn’t speak and had to get by, by hand motioning or even everyone had to learn sign language.
The Pioneers of Television episode Funny Ladies spotlighted a few famous women from early television. Carol Burnett, Lucy Ball, Betty White, and Joan Rivers along with Marla Gibbs. Joan Rivers changed the comedy world, telling jokes women had no business telling and bringing a new kind of humor to the stage. She did not plan to even work in comedy. She was a Broadway actress at first. She was already comfortable on stage and saw an advertisement for a comedy job for $6. She took it because it was just as good as her current job and thought it would be easy. She ended up having a long and successful career as a comedian. Lucy and Betty did very well for themselves too. Betty had her own show and had a talk show along with working as a producer. Marla on the other hand struggled to get jobs on television because of her skin color and age. She got on an episode of The Jefferson’s and was quite funny. They kept her around after that.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden stand on stage a the end of their first 2020 presidential campaign debate held on the campus of the Cleveland Clinic at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S., September 29, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
In regards to the discussion we had in class about the Presidential Debate- it was absurd. The whole time watching it I would think to myself, Trump is clearly just trying to not lose votes and Biden seemed more open and not afraid of that. Trump wouldn’t comment on certain areas like Black Lives Matter and white supremacy groups. Trump also has still not laid out a health care plan, Biden at least has a plan and laid it out for people to hear. Trump will continue to say “we have a plan” when there is no plan. Trump would also make comments to Joe like “you just lost the far left” referring to statements Joe made that would cause him to lose voters. Yet, Trump was the one staying away from topics and not making statements to lose voters. When Biden spoke on the issue with law enforcement Trump yells “Oh you just lost the far left”. Joe did what Trump was afraid to do which was address real problems instead of just sit up there to stratify his radical left voters. Trump would not offend his radical right supporters because he knows he needs them to win. When asking about the white supremacy and he said “stand down and stand by”. I don’t believe he supports those groups but he knows those groups heavily support him. By saying stand down and stand by “was not going to lose the radical right”. By doing that he made it very evident he really only cares about be re-elected and not about helping our country get out of this terrible time.
Both candidates were guilty of interrupting, but Trump was way worse. He seemed to not be able to follow simple directions allowing for a civil debate to take place. Based on how many times he was reminded of the rules and how many times he interrupted, he had to have planned to do that to not let Joe get his points across. It was extremely disrespectful and embarrassing. Embarrassing because we can’t even have a real debate with what was going on.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden stand on stage a the end of their first 2020 presidential campaign debate held on the campus of the Cleveland Clinic at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S., September 29, 2020. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
This weeks topic of television is an interesting one. My views on television have changed from my childhood years to now. I used to watch a lot of television growing up. My favorite shows included Drake and Josh, Suite life of Zach and Cody, and Wizards of Waverly Place. I did not read much growing up and in fact every time I got bored I would just watch TV. I don’t know if it is because I got bored of it or what but I don’t spend much time anymore diving into shows on TV or a streaming service. If i want to watch something it is typically a movie and a documentary that is informative to something that interest me.
As a young child I often spent time trying to emulate those “cool” characters I would see on television. I can recall a show on Disney, Zeke and Luther. I thought those guys were the coolest thing since sliced bread. The show was about two teenage boys who would skateboard. I fell in love with the show and would spend my summer inside watching these episodes all the time. I finally got my mother to buy me a skateboard and a mini ramp. This started my little skateboarding phase. I started to try to dress like these characters and attempted to skate like them. I was no skateboarder. This shows how television can make an impact on a childs life.
Today I don’t seek out that influence I was did. This is mostly due to because I am becoming my own man and do not need to try to be like some character on television. Who mind you, isn’t even a real person. The character is created by the directors and producers and writers of LA. I think television can be very damaging to kids. Kids that have grown up with television in its prime don’t even know what it is like to naturally gravitate towards what you actually like. They are told what they like and how they should be by the shows they are watching. The young mind is so undeveloped to see the difference. You grow up wanting to be like other people and the whole time your parents are telling you that being yourself is cool thing to do. You don’t even understand that until your in your 20s most of the time.
The Doogie Howser, M.D. show is clearly a fictional show, having a kid doctor as the main character. They took a real life non-fictional event and put it into a fictional show to explain how it would have been to be working in a hospital during the LA riots. The show is targeted towards kids in their teen years and the episode could have been a way to dumb down the event and explain it to a younger audience without it seeming overwhelming.
The Twilight Zone episode with the dead Rod Sterling and his wife narrating was interesting and it explained his death to the people who were consistent watchers. I have only heard about The Twilight Zone never actually watched them. I think it was also a bit morbid as well but that is kind of how the show is.
I had just finished watching Spotlight, phenomenal movie. It kept my engagement all throughout. That is because it was such an interesting story. I did not know how much goes into writing a story to this caliber. The fact that the whole city of Boston knew about this huge scandal and it was being covered up is appalling. I loved Mike Rezendes’ (writer from the movie) passion to cover this story and expose the Catholic Church system. It is crazy that those houses for those bad priest existed. Where are the good Catholic ethics when it comes to your own priest molesting children basically in the name of God. Ruining the church for all the victims. The film also did a great job at depicting what it is like to be a reporter and many things which go into working for a newspaper. I also love when reporters dig up scandals like this and exploit people for wrong doings. I am in an Environmental Journalism class and have to do a similar thing just with an environmental topic. I viewed the film as a guide on how to track down sources and documents. I have never done this before and I was able to get some tips on how to go about it the right way.
Although I do not read the newspaper, I think they are essential to our society. Without them, our world would go uninformed on so much. The news writers spend hours, months, and years working on stories. They dedicate so much time to the stories they write, taking time away from their friends and family. To be a writer/reporter for a newspaper truly takes a different breed of a person- someone who is completely passionate about their work.
Johannes Gutenberg’s printing press started everything with the distribution of news to the general public, and fast forwarded things a lot with reading in general. The newspapers nowadays can at times be biased depending on who is the one controlling the content. I would like to think that doesn’t exist but at the end of the day people are people and we have our own opinions.
Yellow journalism is so necessary in this world we live in. These are the stories that grab peoples’ eye and they are eager to read. In other words “the juicy stuff.” But I don’t like how these reporters are sometimes diving into peoples lives and reporting on topics that don’t need to be reported on. Such as a celebrities’ sexual orientation being front page news, when in reality it is nobody’s business. At one time we thought it was okay and it happened frequently and I think it happens less now. Because times are different now from compared to 10 years ago. But say something like a Jeffery Epstein story, that needs to be put out and heard about. Ethics is not a huge part of yellow journalism, sometimes you have to hurt feelings in the process. I wouldn’t like hurting people, especially if they didn’t deserve to be slandered.
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Mass Media and American Life 