The Effects of Mass Media in Society

Mass media on the subject of pollution has changed throughout the years. However, in most cases we have allowed those with a biased and un-biased account as to what pollution does on the environment and what it doesn't. No matter what the question always will boil down into the basis of politics. You are either for what is considered to be the Liberal Left, which supports the concept that pollution is bad, and that pollution is the mainstay behind global warming. And in the "other corner" you have the Conservative Right, which says that global warming is a complete myth, and pollution is acceptable, in modest terms. The Conservative side, (Which name on the subject is fully ironic!) likes to believe that "Obama, the zealots, and unfortunately for them, House Democrats, have swallowed this purported man-made connection whole" And of course the Liberal left will retaliate with "No matter what, the most important thing we can do for ourselves, our children and our grandchildren, is to stop burning fossil fuels." And in the end we are only left with the two sides, albeit in the media in any shape and or form arguing with side versus side, rather than concept to stop the problems versus another.

It used to be the concept of conserving the environment and stopping pollution used to be the voice that the conservative press had shown, but for some reason in the 1970s it stopped reflecting their namesake and ended up being more of the liberal press point of view. Now I say liberal press as an ad-lib in the situation, as people who are on the conservative press like to facilitate that anyone who reports the bare facts, and doesn't allow for an opinionated conservative view is automatically referred to as a "liberal, left press" that in fact is just the reverse of what people would want to hear if they are not being lead to believe that their sources for free, clear and unbiased news reporting was in fact being "sculpted" by a political party, or in the case of nature conservation actually being told via the right winged press that pollution is in fact almost non existence, because they want to keep big businesses such as the oil company free and clear from public scrutiny.

The public of course reacts to these accusations in what can almost be shocking by a third part observer, as you will see oil companies advertise more and more on the conservative channels, and the channels that the conservative channels deem "liberal" are in fact under the payroll of the big businesses such as "big oil". And the big oil companies like Exxon know their product no doubt generates mass income for their company and investors, it also knows that their product destroys the environment, after all that is why they in 2006 posted a report by their "credible think tank of Scientist" showing that climate change due to pollution was false. However, after more than 12 of these scientists came forward and admitted the report was a falsehood, the company Exxon later tried to fire and let go of those scientist. This in the long run has probably made the biggest dent, in the media which chooses to refer to the thoughts of pollutions impact. Not being a source of climate change to alter their (The public's) way of thinking about the matter. And yes over the years many different forms of the media have shown the impact that pollution has upon the climate changes. So in turn the public's reaction has changed from the old train of thought in which humans believed we could burn whatever, dump whatever into the atmosphere and planet and be perfectly safe without any chance of repercussion, to a concept of thought that whatever we do, burn, or dump into the planet will no doubt cause us to suffer in one way. And one of those is simply another view of food for thought!

Well, not actually food for thought, or maybe just for thought, either way, food! That's right we can start at food. We all like to eat the stuff you know. Most of civilization was built upon the concept of people being able to grow, raise or gather more food than we can eat, and sell it to someone who is willing to trade or purchase the food. But one food in particular is very special, because unlike the farmer who grows it, or the farmer who raises it, one source of food that we would hunt so to speak, but more or less gathers when we went for it, and that food was fish. Now you may be asking yourself, the reader of this, has this man gone insane? What does fish have to do with pollution? Let alone how does fish, pollution and the media all mix? Because on April 20, 2010, someone working on an oil platform, in the Gulf of Mexico made a mistake. And that mistake, caused a lot of damage, so much damage in fact, the news crews were told "No, stop filming" by contractors of BP Oil. And it wasn't just local cameramen who had problems of the matters; it was members of the press with names like CNN, MSNBC and CNBC (surprisingly Fox News did not promote active coverage of the disaster), so in retrospect, the situation has become a media disaster for not only the heads of British Petroleum (BP) but even for the President of the United States, Barack Obama, as certain media outlets even tried to state that he was in fact at fault in the matter, which of course was found to be completely false.

However, in the end the media outlets showing a complete non-bias approach toward the BP oil spill kept focus on the company of BP. And even general public opinion through the use of social integration web sites such as Facebook allowed people to literally speak for themselves on the matter, rather than being forced an opinion through a normal media outlet, as the quote "Who lives in a pineapple, under the sea? No one, thanks to BP" became the most popular Facebook quote during the month of May and June in 2010. Which is one of the reasons why humans interaction can sometimes topple the effect of mass media. However now in modern times, old companies think in newer ways, such as stealth marketing, some of the media outlets will have employees purposefully go onto public speaking platforms and lash out at those who do not "support the current view", cases such like this were actually first seen in the early days of the internet when NBC-Universal had purchased controlling stock in Google, then Google had purchased IMDB.com and a user would speak negatively of a film or TV show owned by Universal. It was later reflected in politics when President Obama was running and there were "Democrats" who had posted highly negatively things about him. There were later traced back to ISPs' that were owned by the G.O.P.

However, in light of that and other events, the public still has a tendency to follow mass media in whatever persuasion it wishes to go. On the subject of pollution and its effects, we have seen the public's opinion go from fear, to relaxation, only to have it become a political side on which it depends on how you vote that basically enters yours, much like the rest of society's decision on the matter. Only through keeping astute by reviewing mass media sources, and reviewing other sources such as the basic opinion one can gather through social networking websites, the public can finally come to a solid decision on the matters concerning pollution, and more importantly, the effects that pollution has on the planet and where you, I and everyone else lives. The important part is recognizing when the mass media is feeding you the facts, and not a political attack disguised as facts.