Amusing Ourselves to Death

i think it's interesting how the foreword by A. Postman is essentially half justifying the book for the "modern" (2006) condition of film and entertainment. i fail to necessarily see the use in that, though maybe the average reader is less convinced of that point.

it's pretty good, and it (obviously) argues well the points it makes, though it's quite american-centric, not only in terms of references, but also in terms of how it relegates the ways that Orwell's predictions have actually come true, and it is certainly a product of a more optimistic viewing of the media culture where 1980s US news media wasn't under the thumb of the White House.

the introduction of this book is, for some reason or another, filled with testimonials from students. unclear if they were taking an advanced high school course or were in college, but, i must wonder, is that what Andrew thinks the target audience of this book in 2006 must have been?

there were a lot of theorists, and theories, for that matter, included name-dropped in the book (Ong, McLuhan, several early media theorists, Mumford), but they, aside from maybe McLuhan and Ong, don't get much more mention in the book. this is probably a good thing overall for the book's readability, but it frustrates me because Mumford, somebody who i'll definitely find interesting provided i actually read him, is barely mentioned.

another incoherent review. ah well.

I'm primed to be skeptical of any claim which sounds like the core one in this book: that there's something pernicious about The New Communication Tool, and that it will erode our society and culture.

But. Postman published Amusing Ourselves to Death in 1985, and has been specifically correct about several… let us say… arcs? of transformation in culture & communication; in the way we value wisdom, knowledge, information, and data; and in our approach to disagreement, debate, and argument; among others. Postman clearly isn't exactly right in the particulars — the cultural role of television has changed substantially, and even newer new media has further adapted down this path. He didn't specifically anticipate Twitter or Facebook or TikTok, but his heart is in the right place by extrapolation from television.

Still. Is society worse, or just different? Are the ways societ has improved supported by new media, and how does that compare with its support for the ways society has degraded? Did television & social media cause misinformation & polarization, or did they just happen simultaneously? I'm not going to come down on Postman's side here. But I also have unusually-easy access to unenshittified media, and I might be more tempted if I had to live through the way normal people experience the Web all day.

Regardless of valence, I don't think these changes are reversible. We can't go back, we can just adjust our paths forward. "Old man yells at TV." is a trite tale. "Dysfunctional society no longer able to coordinate changes needed to survive the changes causing dysfunction." is probably more distressing. And the problem with all questions about how to improve society somewhat is that so many of the levers of change are locked out for various reasons, so "What should we do about this?" ends up always having deeply radical answers because nothing is superficial. Or perhaps that's just because almost all simple problems have been solved, and we keep being left with more and more challenging ones.

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Amusing Ourselves to Death is a book about the corrosive effects of television on our politics and public discourse. Now, with television joined by more sophisticated electronic media—from the Internet to cell phones to DVDs— it's more relevant than ever.

Despite being published in the 80s, this was a great read.

The Internet is the “new” technology that’s accelerated us on a path we’ve been put on by TV initially, many years ago, and ever since then, the way public discourse happens has changed drastically, and not for the better.

The people who get elected today aren’t well spoken orators who can reason about the tough societal issues we’re faced with, they’re Twitter trolls.

This didn’t just happen over night and for no good reason. Neil Postman believes that TV (and if he was alive, he would be pointing the finger at the big tech companies I’m sure) is in part to blame for this and through his words he convinced me of this as well.

TV and the Internet are here to stay. The question is: what can we do to stop it from helping bad faith actors from getting and retaining power and ruining things for the rest of us?