El sgher, Mohamed
Instructor Mohd Muzhafar Idrus (Mozac)
English Gold A2
17 April 2010
The mass media have an adverse effect on moral standards
Barely hundred years ago, if you wanted to stay informed about what was going on the world, we had to rely on word of mouth, at best, newspaper. Because communication technology was very basic, the news we received was days or weeks old. The mass media, especially television and internet, are now the most important source of information. Every day they provide people with pieces of useful and valuable information. But in recent years informative and education programs have given way to immoral and sensational shows. Therefore, the influence of mass media on our kids, teenagers and society becomes widespread.
First of all, television has quite an impact on young people because more and more TV programs are bombarding people with images of sexuality. They become sexually active. According to Bleakley’ study, “The studies have found that children who watch a lot of sexual content are more likely to hold gender stereotyped attitudes toward sex, and become sexually active” (344). Furthermore, many people also assert that the portrayal of sex promotes promiscuity and undermines moral standards. Likewise, Newspaper use images of death and grief to attract readers’ attention. Consequently, we consider such behavior as normal and we are becoming accustomed to this.
Secondly, the mass media have an extremely negative effect on children. It is a fact that there is too much aggression on TV. Their nature becomes more violent. There are many examples when children created havoc in their schools in shooting accidents. Children could think that they are super heroes and jump from high rise building thus creating a threat for their life. They may become more aggressive and rude in nature. Their health may be spoiled due to watching excessive television. They may concentrate less on their studies. Its excessive use may decrease their memory retention power. “In the past years there have been some cases of kids carrying a gun at school and even hurting others with it. Those kids have been linked to excessive use of violent video games and war images” (Rayuso). Another problem is that real war is used as a form of entertainment by the media, we should make our kids and teen aware that war is not a form of entertainment and that there is no win or lose like in video games, in real everyone lose.
Moreover, newspapers have to use provocative language and striking pictures in order to guarantee high sales. Therefore, mass media affects teenagers by this way, they buy what they see on newspaper, and what is acceptable by society based on the fashion that the media has imposed them. These cause children to behave badly. For example, they buy what they are told to be good for them. “Young people are in a stage of life where they want to be accepted by their peers, they want to be loved and be successful. The media creates the ideal image of a beautiful men and women and tells you what the characteristics of a successful person are; you can see it in movies and TV. It is a subliminal way to tell you that if you are not like them you are not cool yet so it is time to buy the stuff they buy and look like they look” ( Rayuso).
Finally, kids who watch more TV start smoking at an earlier age. The relationship between television viewing and age of starting smoking was stronger than that of peer smoking. For example, one of my friends started smoking at age 10 because he was watching movies a lot and saw people smoking on movies shows on television. Say researchers who analyzed data from a four-year study of more than 1,200 youngsters by the University of Massachusetts Medical School, “children who are allowed to watch movies are more likely to smoke” ( Chyke).
To conclude, it is fact that the mass media do not have much beneficial effect on us. They constantly show us scenes full of violence and devastating images of death. But television and the newspaper will always have some adverse effect on us if earning money is media’s sole aim.
Works cited
Bleakley, Amy. “The Relationship Between Exposure to Sexual Content in the Media and Adolescent Sexual Behavior.” Media psychology 11.4 (2008): 443. Web. 12 Apr. 2010.
Doubeni, Chyke. “Watching R-Rated Movies Boosts Kids’ Smoking Risk.” 23 Feb. 2010. Web. 16. Apr. 2010.
Rayuso, Join. “Mass Media Influence on Society.” n.d, Web. 12. Apr. 2010.
