#avt-180

This reading really resonated with me. Media has a profound impact on our day to day lives. Of the plethora of effects elicited by media, one of the strongest and potentially most damaging is framing. Basically framing is The way in which a story is presented (the specific words and images used). In turn, the way in which a story is framed influences how the public will react to it. A prime example of framing is the U.S. media’s depiction of the Iraqis in the Gulf War of the 1990s. Much of the media’s discourse was aimed at depicting them as brutal savages that killed babies and would not engage in diplomacy. The sheer amount of stories framed in this way allowed for the widespread dissemination and overall acceptance of this narrative, making war the only “logical” choice. We know now that it was all lies to get the U.S. into the middle east, probably for oil. But this show the power of media framing. It can be so powerful that it mobilizes a nation to fight for false reasons. It’s quite dangerous, people’s entire worldview can be shaped by media framing at the expense of the “bad guys” who might not even be bad at all, at least not for the reasons the media says they are.  

Another thing this article got me thinking about is mythology. Mythology, for the longest time, was created in times before science as a means to explain the world around us. Mythology was also used as allegorical accounts of things that may or may not have happened (though they may have been considered truthful around the time of their inception) to impart lessons or morals upon the listeners/readers. With that being said, is mythology nothing more than stories simulating events of the times that again, may or may not have actually happened. Is the point of creating these stories to simulate events that might occur in our own lives? To some extent, yes. They may not simulate the events to a T, but they use characters as templates for ourselves so that we may learn from their mistakes. Take The Odyssey as an example. Odysseus was punished for his insolence towards the gods (specifically Poseidon) and was scattered all over the Grecian landscape for 17 years. It was meant to teach people to be respectful of the gods lest they incur their wrath. To us, these are just stories, mythology, if you will. But at the time, this was considered an account of history and was revered as such. But again, it’s just a story. You can see how fictitious tales meant to be allegorical can become reality if one believes it really happened. The same idea can be applied to other works of mythology and even religion. So what is real? Is all that we touch and see real or is what we simply believe in without any confirmation from our senses real? Or can they both be real? Can stories in history be reduced to mythology thus making them nothing more than simulations of events that could happen? Not exactly, but the morals these stories impart have a very real impact on our lives.

Essentially, what Baudrillard is saying is that people no longer distinguish between reality and a constructed representation of reality or a simulacrum. He uses Borges’ fable of the cartographers to bolster this point. I think he’s really on point with this analogy. People can pick and choose which world events they pay attention to (if any at all) and base their worldview on whichever information they have. It reminds me a lot of the theory of Cultivation Analysis in communication. The theory states that people will construct their view of the world based on what they see on TV (or other media). It follows that those who watch shows depicting a variety of violent crimes or violence in general, they will come to see the world as more violent and dangerous. Our perceptions of reality are based on what we know and what we have experienced. But how do we know what we know? How do we know that reality itself is not a simulation? Epistemology, the branch of philosophy that examines how we obtain knowledge asserts that our senses are valid and that they are our only means of obtaining information about the outside world. But how do we know that our sense are valid? What if everything is a simulation and we are living in the matrix? Questions such as this are impossible to answer but I liked that the article tackled the idea of simulation and it got me thinking about this sort of stuff again.