How Profoundly Does the Media Influence Society?

The influence of female pop singers from Madonna to Britney Spears and beyond has been co-opted by their fan in increasingly upsetting ways. Superstars from Madonna to Shania Twain spend millions on everything from personal trainers to plastic surgery in an effort to transform themselves into unrealistically attractive and desirable objects for male attention, and these attempts result in trickle-down effect of making the acutal romantic possibilities for these men believe they have to go to equally ridiculous lengths in order to approximate what is seen as the ideal object of sexuality and beauty. It is a sad commentary on contemporary American society that so many young women and men are unable to apprehend all of entertainment is based on trickery and fakery and that the image projected by these women isn't any more real than the stories taking place in their favorite movies or television shows.

It is all about the advertising image and not the reality of authenticity. Scientific research has been conducted into the effects of modern day advertising and image consulting and the conclusion has been almost unanimous that social groupings are almost to the point of being manipulated by what the media portrays as the acceptable norm. The media consistently transmits images of normality that are, in fact, patently unattainable for most viewers. Even worse is that over the last two decades the media has been very consistent in placing a higher worth on social attributes that have traditionally been deemed undesirable from a social cohesion perspective. Critics hold 20^th century advertising responsible for creating generations of youth culture that ever more distinguished by crash materialism and the search for status. The result is an increase of pressure on people to conform to these unrealistic ideas of normality. The concrete result is that more Americans are in debt to credit card companies than ever before. Those vaunted economic figures that the government likes to roll out showing consumer spending rising and rising are facades; if people had to live without credit cards like their grandparents did the number of houses with computers, DVD players, big screen TVs and any number of other luxuries would be greatly diminished. There is a huge difference between outright ownership and debt.

Popular culture is devised with the purpose of making profits and uses advertising to encourage the audience to spend money. Increasingly, the line is blurring between straight advertising and the entertainment media that is supported by the money that advertising brings in. That is why people will be inspired to buy products they have seen their favorite stars use in movies or television shows. Profitable television shows are made that way only if they are also supported by sponsors, and therefore requires popularity; therefore, the most popular shows are those aimed at a passive and uncritical audience. Those aspects of the society's culture here represented are familiar interpretations either of reality or of real issues. It is only to be expected that that demonstrations of pop culture will be popular with audiences and advertisers alike.

The Greek philosopher Plato feared that people would not be able to distinguish between reality and imitations of reality. In certain situations that inability has led to individuals to act in deranged behavior, but those should be viewed apart from their connections to media influence. More disturbing and ultimately dangerous to society is the mass influence that media has on society and the individual's unwillingness or incapacity to question just how profound is that effect upon them. There can be no question the media does have an impact on society, but too often the concern about that impact is approached from the too narrow perspective of whether a book or movie led a person to commit a crime. The very fact that so many billions of dollars are spent producing, marketing and advertising during entertainment presentations should be enough to convince society that the influence of media extends far beyond whether a few songs and video games were responsible for children invading their school with guns and bombs. The influence of media is so deeply ingrained that the real problem lies in the fact that most people never stop to question just deeply the influence lies.