So far, our reflections have been on the, let’s say, “positive” spectrum. This week, our focus changes to the “darker” side of our culture. For many of you, this week’s reflection will force you to see beyond the “smoke and mirrors” of our media, political system, and often misguided understandings of our culture; looking at both domestic and international agencies.
Being honest, informing you on all of the lies being propagated by the media and our political system would take more time than we have in this course. Additionally, many of you would have a hard time believing the extent of manipulation and oppression being advanced by those in “control”. The truth is sometimes hard to believe when it forces you to accept that for the majority of your life you may have been lied to and seen more as a commodity than a human being. However, this can only change when you become informed and possess the critical thinking skills necessary to decipher fact from fiction and recognize your own oppression.
This is not to imply that all media is bad or is based on lies. On the contrary, media can serve as a valuable source of information. The key is possessing the critical thinking skills required to acknowledge our own bias, to look at an issue from multiple perspectives, and to try to find out who is the source from which presented information occurs. Not just who is presenting the information, but who is providing the information to the persons presenting the information.
Back to this week. The documentary you are assigned for this week will hopefully start to open your eyes to what is going on behind the scenes. I can’t pretend to know all of what is going on, nor how to properly connect all the pieces. What I can do is provide you with a starting point that allows you to begin to see the bigger picture for yourself.
Getting to this week’s reflection – You are to watch the very insightful documentary“Requiem for the American Dream”(can be found on Amazon Prime & other online sites). Heads up, this is a very dense documentary. I encourage you to watch it with friends and discuss its implications afterward.
Once you watch the documentary respond to the questions below. 500 words min. and feel free to write as much as you’d like.
(1) What is your overall takeaway from watching this documentary? Give specific details that indicate you watched this documentary in full.
(2) What is the connection between this documentary and the Culture of the United States?
Now, please watch this short video and then respond to the last question.
(3) How do you feel about the current state of the U.S. media? Why do you feel this way? Can you provide empirical evidence to support your beliefs? (if so, please provide it)
For your peer responses, focus on questions 1 and 3. While I encourage healthy disagreements it is very important to me that you remain respectful to one another’s viewpoints. People are more than just their ideas. Separate a person from their ideas and the person still exists.
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