Toxic Media: Turning Off Input (Editorial)

TOXIC MEDIA: TURNING OFF INPUT

To have a balanced, healthy and meaningful life, one must also have down time, quiet contemplation, time and space for reflection. Having a constant, never-ending live feed of blabbering media counters that goal.  More and more, I am aware of people who no longer want or need unnecessary "junk information" around them.  If what you put in your body such as nutritious food or harmful drugs indicates health or a potential for disease, wouldn't the same be true about what you put in your mind?

A society is only as healthy as the individuals in it. Stopping the "bad" behaviors long enough to realize what sick materials we visually/audibly ingest without thought is like when someone suddenly becomes aware of where and how that meat got in to a cheap hamburger and decides to be a vegetarian. We've become "Info-addicts" without applying the critical-thinking necessary to adapt and survive.  We've become passive in responding to the undue influence media has.

There is a difference between finding out something and learning something. Finding out is watching the evening news and hearing about what the news-people want you to know about.  You sit.  You listen. An hour later -- so what?  Learning something becomes a life-long intellectual tool, information that has practical applicable and there are incalculable ways to get that.  It's what Higher Education is supposed to be and the best way to learn is to do it yourself, hands-on approach. Have you found yourself forgetting what TV show you are watching during the commercial? Have you found yourself coming home after a long day of dealing with people and mindlessly turning on noise just because the house seems empty? This response is part of the numbing of your mind and senses, separating yourself from the consciousness of the body and environment.  What can you do?

1. Question Everything: Do I Really Need To Know This? Being out-of-the-loop should be a badge of honor, not a social embarrassment.  Hold you head high, look the incredulous in the eye, and state without hesitation, "I no longer am a slave to the Industrial Age/consumerist media machine." Just as you watch what goes into your mouth, watch what goes into your mind.

Most media is passive.  "Liking" is not ration and reason and serves to cater to the lowest denominator of a false sense of "belonging". "Social Media" is NOT socializing, even though it may feel that way.  A text, a phone call, a skype, an email, etc. are not face-time.  Rethink your relationships in the context of media.  "Friends" actually know each other, know where they live, physically go to the same place at the same time. Who are these "electronic people" in your life?  What are they telling you?  What are you saying to them?  Isn't your time more valuable than that?

2. Stop Reading The Newspapers And Magazines.  Besides being ridiculously biased and a front for commercialization of information, the supposed news sources have a long history of not getting it right and a slow erosion of morals. The goal of media is to get you to spend money, mostly by perpetuating an antiquated lifestyle of consumerism, not enlighten you. If fact, Oprah's "O Magazine" will tell you EXACTLY what is wrong with you and what you should do -- think like Oprah who espouses upper-middle class, Judea-Christian, pseudo-pop-psychological self-centric diatribes.  Who is she to tell any of us anything? Or Martha Stewart?  Or Donald Trump?  Or any Kardasian?

And why buy a product you are just going to throw away (and kill a few trees and fill landfills in the process), when you can get the exact information for free on the internet?

3. Don't Believe What You See On The Internet.  As a classic example, yahoo will do a "news feature" about the reclusive street artist Banksy on the FINANCIAL page of their website.  How does yahoo know this information about what this guy is doing, especially since even people who work for him don't know what he is doing?  Yahoo knows because BANKSY TELLS THEM in press releases, PR representatives, and proxies.  Yahoo doesn't have the resources to do investigative reporting, so the supposed reports are unsubstantiated. Why the financial page?  Banksy is a bankable brand name.  Yahoo wants hits, wants consumers to buy whatever it is he and they sell, want collectors to think the artist is gaining popularity to increase art sales...except the whole process is a hall of mirrors and has no substance.

4. Facebook Is The Devil.  Sold to us as a simple tool for socializing with friends and family, we unwittingly give up all self-restraint and expose way more than our true selves to the general public (and the government) and hand the keys to our privacy to a mega-conglomerate with an avid asocial leader at helm.    Why would anyone ever do that? The real problem is that once you let them into your computer, it's too late. (I predict predicts: One day there will be massive lawsuits into the billions against facebook and lives will be destroyed.)

Facebook should be used only sparingly to redirect all real personal and business contacts to elsewhere.  You shouldn't even put a picture of yourself on there as they are going to use it for face recognition reason soon enough and they can do it because facebook is considered a "public space".

Guess what?  I don't care that you're off to Starbucks, that your kitty is cute as can be, or whatever it is that Miley Cyrus is or isn't doing. Stop bothering me about it.

5. Murder Isn't Entertaining -- And Neither Is Injury, Self-Abuse And Victimization.  Why are there still wars in the world when we should all know better by now? Because we still have a steady diet of movies, tv, books, magazines and other media that "normalizes" destruction and the devaluing of human life.  Everything from the allegedly harmless America's Funniest Home Videos to the latest action movie to sports like football and hockey glamorizes the us-against-them brute rationalization which leads to a warfare-minded culture.  Rap music isn't music.  It's an broad-brushed indictment of anyone who doesn't live/think/behave like the violence-loving judgmental idiots who aren't smart enough to pull up their pants who make that crap.

6. Put The Phone Away.  For the love of all that is holy, who the hell are you talking to and what's so damned important? Stop the freakin' texting already! Just drive a car, eat your meal, check out of the store without a second and third conversation going.  You have to live at least a few minutes of a life to be able to report on it.

7. "1984" Was Just The Beginning. Conspiracy theorists don't seem as crazy as they used to.

The way to combat the non-sense invasion?  Just say no, turn off the white noise, and re-connect with the sounds of nature.  Focus on one thing at a time.  Relax on your own terms.