This afternoon on the way in I was listening to St. Louis Public Radio, St. Louis’ local NPR station. There was a live broadcast titled “Early Childhood and Media”in concordance with Media Literacy Week. The conversation was wonderful about how we can teach children about this world.
I enjoyed the whole discussion, well, the twenty minutes I caught, which happened to be the final twenty minutes of the piece. I cannot wait for the whole to be posted online.
I liked where Dafna Lemish pointed out about behavior and the Internet. Online interactions are just as real as in person interactions – if you wouldn’t say that to someone in person, you shouldn’t say it online – and how online interactions have emotional and social impact. I also like how she noted augmented reality could be used to teach empathy as well (putting someone in someone else’s shoes), but often the only recollection is regarding first person shooters when people think of augmented reality.
The other major point I enjoyed came from Deborah (or perhaps Debra) in Jennings. She brought up the topic of media impacting our emotions and attitudes towards others, and is often overwhelmed with such toxic levels of negativity.
I absolutely loved this talking point!
There is already so much negative and unfortunate in the real world. We do not need producers fabricating reality shows and scenarios to poison the media many of us use to unwind after a stressful day.
So much more can be done with these powerful tools. Why not instead, producers, choose to educate, inform, entertain with positive methods? Train wrecks are low hanging fruit. You’ll always get gawkers. Challenge yourselves and create something positive and engaging.
For me, I love reality television shows that are upbeat. I do not watch the shows where there is backstabbing, betrayal, and hatred. I cannot recall which of the gents said it on the show, but, yes, it is soul crushing. There is just too much of that in the real world. Why fabricate more negativity for us to consume?