johnny9fingers | (no subject)

(no subject)

More on the decline of Western Civilisation:

http://www.theinquirer.net/gb/inquirer/news/2008/02/19/tv-gives-kids-attention-span

Perhaps TV should be limited for the under 18's: only allowable on prescription and under supervision.
Or perhaps it should be banned completely (for the under 18's, that is) just like Alcohol and Tobacco.

Now I don't actually believe that such is necessary, but I do think we should be aware of the course we are plotting, and the amount of 'drift' in the equation.

Thanks to

shoarthing for the link.

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Says Sigman: “It doesn’t really matter what programme you watch, it’s flashiness is going to affect your brain,” says Sigman.

Ironic sentence to find in an article that's basically a spittle-spewing rant about how dumb kids these days are.

I think it was talking about the rapid-fire editing techniques and how they affect cognitive development. However, it is a rant of a slightly different kind to mine....excepting it does place the blame squarely on us, that is the middle-aged people who run society, and not you young folk.
It's our marketing, and our obsession with style over substance that leads to this: it is our institutions, our values, our need for excitement which is driving down the attention spans of you young folk, and those of the generation below you. The accountants demand that we maximise profits at the expense of thinking.
All praise the almighty dollar.

Well, I wasn't so much disagreeing with the article as taking exception with their tone. I mean, I can understand feeling a panicked about this situation but they sounded like they were shouting on a street corner.

One thing the article said that I agreed with was that TV shows teach children to disrespect their elders. Personally I think a little disrespect is good for elders, as it is for everybody, but most TV these days goes too far and just hammers the message home, over and over: "Kids, your parents don't know anything! Parents, your kids think you're stupid! Girls, boys are barbarians! Boys, girls are aliens! Nevertheless, you're inevitably going to fall in love, and the more you deny it, the truer it is so nyah, nyah, nyah!" I get so tired of that. They're so out of touch with reality it's not even funny. Really. Not. Funny. Make it stop.

...My goodness, I am getting preachy. That's an old pet peeve of mine (the everyone-at-everyone-else's-throat thing, I mean). I forgive you for shortening my attention span. I'm sure you didn't mean to. :P

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Not a problem with them adapting in general merely them adapting to this awful system of values we've bequeathed them. Designer shoes and happy-slapping thuggish hedonism. The values of our society program our children, alongside family values.
Which is a relief for Madison Avenue.

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Again I can't but agree with you about the information gathering and the scanning and discarding of much of what they regard as useless. It's what they regard as useful and useless that I'm worried about. You are so right about 'as we did in school', and to a certain extent that is part of my problem: as young folk, perhaps we didn't take advantage of those facilities allowed us. Now in my case I've had the time and inclination to do something about that subsequently. Not everyone gets the sort of second chances I've managed. I've been fortunate and somewhat privileged, and that doesn't appear to be everyone else's lot. I'm all for other folk having the time to develop in their own way and in their own fashion, but for some reason or other, not everyone has these advantages. Our society doesn't appear to be geared to allow the majority of folk this sort of luxury.
Practical solutions for ensuring that young folks get educated are obviously going to require more than a knee-jerk and blimpish apoplexy. But sometimes the apoplexy has a rhetorical point, or is even a vehicle for humour of a kind.

I find I'm turning more and more
Into Auberon Waugh.

While I may question the grammar, presentation and media ;) - I do not fault the results.

I think I may post this. Cheers!

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