"TITLE-38" AN ANALYSIS OF THE MASSIVE MEDIA IN OUR LIVES AND ITS EFFECTS ON IT

Massive media nowadays is something very familiar for us because it makes part of our daily life, thanks to all the technological advances developed during all human history, begging from the development of the writing and the oral body languages. With important event like the creation the printing machine in the XIV century, which allowed us to reproduce books and texts in a higher rate than before; the industrial revolution in the XIX and XX century, which allowed us to print books and newspaper, by these time was created the newspaper and it was developed by people like Joseph Pulitzer, in a massive rate like hundred or even millions of copies; the creation of the internet, the cellphone, the television, the radio and the computers during the same period of time, which opened us the doors to others ways to communicate and inform people and allow us to be connected everywhere at any time. The massive media has a great responsibility due to the power it has, which is, for me, the power of creating criterion, the power of influencing the peoples’ way of thinking and due to this also the way they act. An example of this was the massive panic that suffered the habitants of New York and New Jersey when the adaptation to radio by Orson Welles of “The war of worlds” of H.G. Wells was transmitted in 1938, many people believed that aliens arrived to the earth in the real life due to the urgent character of the narration but this was because they tuned the radio once the program had started, because Orson Welles at the beginning of the program said that what follow were going to be fictional. This example shows the effects that the media can produce even if the information is true or false.
“Put it before them briefly so they will read it, clearly so they will appreciate it, picturesquely so they will remember it and, above all, accurately so they will be guided by its light” (Pulitzer).
As Joseph Pulitzer tells us in this phrase, the information we receive will guide our actions, we answers to the stimulus that we receive. And as nowadays we find this information in the different channels of the media, which not only gives us information of our surroundings but of the entire world, thanks to the interconnection we have currently. As I said before, the media we base our actions based on the information we receive of our reality, for example if in the newspapers, the news on the television, the social networks and in the radio were said that something terrible, something unacceptable had happen, for instance the case of the murder of the native girl Yuliana Samboni, the case of the false positives in the government of Alvaro Uribe Velez and the murder of Jorge Eliécer Gaitán and many other political characters, we will show our regret to it, as it was made, via parades or strikes or any other conceivable way. But what would happen if the media showed always something that was or could be false, where everything that was published or showed was in favor of the government?, what would happen if we lived in a world were “All the history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary” (Orwell, 1949, Pg. 40)1 ? Maybe we would not notice it, or not if we don’t have the opportunity to know the real past, because to know something is wrong, you have to demonstrate its counterpart, to know that you are in the darkness you have to know what the brightness is. But lets place ourselves in the place of Winston Smith, a governments’ worker in a world that in other words is a dictatorship were the leader is called as BB or BIG BROTHER and the party is called INGSOC, in this society every aspect in your life is controlled and supervised as is narrated in the next quote “You had to live-did live from the habit that became instinct-in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard and except in darkness, every moment scrutinized” (Orwell, 1949, Pg. 3)2, where even your couple had to be accepted by the party if you wanted to marry him or her, and if showed that you were physically attracted by your couple, surely you would not marry him or her, because the only objective of the marital union was to create children for the party;  where the pleasure was tried to be vanished and where you have to make what the party tell or if not you will be “vaporized” or in other words been killed and all your registers on earth erased, and where “Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date” (Orwell, 1949, Pg. 40)3 so you could not assure if something was truth or not even if you’ve personally lived it, because all the registers, every document have been “Rectified”. And how would you convince a complete society that something isn’t if everything says that it is? And there more of this, you surely would not try it because in Winston’s world if you contradict the government, you were committing a though crime and then you should be vaporized.
In this reality the media is not used as currently, or like it should be currently, it was used as a “light to guide” as Pulitzer said, but in the wrong way. I mean, it wasn´t a mean to inform people in the best way possible for it be able of been autonomous and act in the correct way according to the situation but as a tool for controlling the thought of people and as a consequence, their actions too, because in the system of Winston’s world the government don’t need people that think by their own, they need people that do what they say and no more , because otherwise if all people thought as Winston do, if all people saw that they were been oppressed, that they were not free, that they have been tricked during all their lives. The regime of BIG BROTHER would fall. But as reality was not like this, the government had to take advantage of it and ensure that it continue been like this. Due to the search of maintaining the society as it was, they have to extinguish every flame of rebellion that could exist because if they did not, they flame would spread like a disease in a healthy organism, this is the justification of the “vaporization” of the people who did follow the rules and the constant supervision of all individuals; and keep all the rest of the candles wet so they would never catch a fire, this is the justification of first, the capability of the government of “rectifying”  and “forging” the history whenever they need it , so any suspicions would be made due to the government would be always right, and second, the use of the television as a tool of spreading the “true” news of the society, due to its massive range. In this metaphor, the massive media is like a sprayer in a garden of candles. But fortunately, from our point of view, this is not our reality. Luckily we have truth register of the events in the past which do not change a long time. But even with these useful references, there are still massive media channels which distort the information and even create false information. Examples of this are in the social networks every day, where people publish that don’t have a real antecedent, or that interpret a speech or a situation in the wrong way. But which is the objective of these people or organizations? As far as I can see, its objective is to disorient, to confuse people, taking them far away from truth, and then far away from the correct way of acting due to the distort the stimulus that they should receive. And as the Popular said says “Divide and you will reign” (Julius Caesar) if you separate a big group of people into smaller ones, its power will decrease, and this is a way of doing it. Also a way of maintaining the candles turned off is to entertain them, so they don’t see the truth for been watching other thing clear example of this was the censorship of the radio in the 6th of November of 1985, during the Palace of Justice Siege, where a group of member of the M-19 guerrilla group took the palace of justice, they were transmitting and informing about this event while the soldiers and the guerrilla members were in combat but they were ordered to stop the transmission, according to Yamid Amad, and instead of it they, as well as television, broadcast a soccer match of the national soccer championship. According to the minister of communications of that time: Noemí Sanín, said that she didn’t told that to Amad, but that she do call the two principal radio stations of the country and asked them to take care with the information due to it could upset the people and create a second “Bogotazo”. Even if the 1984 book’s reality is not our reality, nowadays we still have “vaporizations” because there are people that try to make the others see the reality or try to encourage them to change it, but during this process they are murdered, examples of this are Jaime Garzón, Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, Carlos Pizarro, and Luis Carlos Galán Sarmiento among others. And if they are not murdered, they can be despised by the media, or they words can be twisted so the people don’t trust them.
For overviewing and for ending I want to show you this quote, that for me summarizes a big portion of what I have said “To keep them in control was not too difficult. A few agents of the Thought Police moved always among them, spreading false rumors and marking down and eliminating the few individuals who were judged capable of becoming dangerous;” (Orwell, 1949, Page 71)4. The ones that promote and boost all these ways of maintaining the most of possible candles turned off, for me are the powerful people, who, because I imagine not all of them are equal, what to stay in the position they are, as INGSOC as well. But there is still hope, and if there is hope we ought to struggle for it. As I said at the beginning of this essay, we answer to the stimulus we receive, today this stimulus is the information that the media gives us and as currently many of us wake up and instantly check the cellphone to know what is new, were are in constant contact with that stimulus that will guide our actions. But talking about that information “How could you tell how much of it was lies?” (Orwell, 1949, Page 73)5, how could we scape from the trap that the party place in front of us? I think that a strategy would be follow all the rules that the INGSOC party, in the book, impose us but in its opposite way. I know that you may say “I will base all my actions in a fictional book?” and I answer you, if we had made all these previous analysis, and we have found historical events that proves premises showed in the book, why no to do the opposite thing that the party command Winston to do?
There are two commandments that I think that are really important to disobey: “The heresy of was common sense.” (Orwell, 1949, Page 80)6 and “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command” (Orwell, 1949, Page 81)7. If we use common sense, we will not be ticked easily, this was why Winston assured that Syme would die even though he believed with all his hearth the principles of the party (Orwell, 1949)8 , and we are always attentive to what we perceive of the reality, we will al way be conscious of it. A good reference for acting, for me, would be to analyze: What would be my correct behavior, according to my stimulus, in every aspect of my life? In addition to these I think we also have to know our history and learn how to work in group. Because as the George Orwell tells us, the hope is not in the enemies of the BIG BROTHER’S regime, because they would never come together or even identify each other; nor the legendary Brotherhood, which was an underground network of conspirators of the state, which number of members could not assembled in more than twos or threes; nor even the party members because, most of them believe fanatically that what the party said was truth and who argue otherwise should be vaporized; but yes in the proles. (Orwell, 1949)9. “If there was hope, it must lie in the proles, because only there, in those swarming disregarded masses, eighty—five per cent of the population of Oceania, could the force to destroy the Party ever generated” (Orwell, 1949, Page 69). WE ARE THE PROLES, with this note I am not saying that you are poor, but I do say that we are the majority which is disregard but that one day will rise up, and will change this country and the world.


References
1 1984, Orwell George, 1949, Signet Classics, Page 40
2 Ibi Dem1, Page 3
3 Ibi Dem 1, Page 40
4 Ibi Dem 1, Page 71
5 Ibi Dem 1, Page 73
6 Ibi Dem 1, Page 80
7 Ibi Dem 1, Page 81
8 Ibi Dem 1, Page 54
9 1984, Orwell George, 1949, Signet Classics
10 Ibi Dem 9, Page 69

Good argumentation, this essay delivers a good message and it is easily read. Be careful with your grammar, there are a couple of mistakes, especially in the beginning of the text. Your overall grade is a 9.