Editorial
May the reader use discerment
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May the reader use discernment
A crucial aspect of human nature that clearly differentiates us from animals is an innate ability for creative expression. This can be in the most simplistic form of doodling on a page or creating new sentences to describe experiences or even complex musical patterns to impart emotion. All humans are capable of expression in some form or another; some have gone further and realised the unlimited potential for power this provides, a fact that few are consciously aware of. A simple and much referred to example of this is the ‘ministry of propaganda’ employed by Hitler’s Third Reich during the years leading up to World War Two. World views of a minority were successfully fed to a nation through entertainment. Patriotic posters, news reel footage and films were common tools used to unify the people and to conform their values to fit National Socialist ideology.
The psychology behind this lies in the fact that humans thrive on sensory stimuli rather than arbitrary enforcement. For this reason, advertisers rarely provide mere blocks of text realising that to create interest and motivation requires that it be presented in an appealing, trustworthy and entertaining manner. Hence, in addition to a news-style format the use of eye-catching photography, creative design and emotion and humour are common. A logical result of this has been a gradual blurring of the lines between what is proportedly informative or educational and that which is for advertising or entertainment purposes. So-called ‘informercials’ and other advertisements appear in newspapers and television under the guise of being purely informative or humorous when in actuality their objective is commercial. Similarly, advertisements in newspapers have been constructed to appear exactly the same as the news stories beside them to generate credibility.
Yet, if a comparatively small newspaper advertisement or a thirty to sixty second television advertisement is a widely accepted and most successful tool to promote ideology and values, what about other larger and less obvious mediums such as news stories, television programs and feature films? The fact is that these are far more powerful yet less obvious means of promoting a message through creative expression. Feature films now commonly contain subtle advertising, exposing the audience to brands of commodities, in addition to the message the film contains in regard to the depiction or promotion of gratuitous violence and other vices.
Few people doubt what they read in a newspaper or hear on the radio. And yet, news media, either in the print or audio-visual form, has been utilised to an increasing degree with pseudo-documentary style propaganda. For instance a recent television program proposed that the Apollo missions were a hoax and that man has never been to the moon. A large percentage of viewers have been gullible enough to believe it, not realising the hypothesis was based on scientific ignorance, twisted facts and blatant emotionalism.
In more recent times, a practical application of ‘power to the people’ has become reality with the internet allowing almost anyone to post their individual ideology for the world to see without any constraints to enforce truthful representation of fact. Thus, a proliferation of dubious and unchallenged material exists for the ignorant or careless surfer.
In summary, while humans have been endowed with a natural talent for artistic declaration and an ever-increasing variety of ways of representing it, their weakness seems to be an inability to identify that beneath the obvious may lie a subtle message. If we do not discern the intent, then we are being unwittingly swayed and hence influenced for good or bad by the power of creative expression.
May the reader use discernment.
>> Look at Melange appears in a local newspaper Guardian on 16 May 2002
