He gets it every time.. pretty much…
In 1988, Neil Gabler wrote a seminal book.
At least seminal to my mind.
It was is called An Empire of Their Own.
It’s the story of the founding of the 5 big Hollywood studios in the 1930s.
Fox, Warner Brothers, Paramount…. and the men who made them. People like Jack Warner or Louis B. Mayer.
They were all Eastern European Jews.
In fact, they were all from small villages in a 50 mile radius of Pinsk.
They came to America knowing nothing of what the country was really like, but with a very strong idea of what they believed the country to be like. The ‘streets paved with gold’ idea.
And when they went on to make movies, they didn’t make movies about the USA that was real – they made movies about the USA that they imagined: white picket fences, Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland, good basic values.
Now, the weird thing is that their image of what America was became the way Americans saw themselves. When Ronald Reagan, a generation later, would hearken back to ‘that shining city on a hill’ he wasn’t talking about Cleveland in 1933, he was referring to the America that Adolf Zuckor and Louis B. Mayer had imagined and created and placed in the mind of Americans.
The Jews’ imagination became the American’s reality.
That was the power of the movies, and perhaps that was no bad thing.
But in the 1930s, people only went to the movies once a week or so. Even so, those flickering images became so deeply engrained in their consciousness that it became their shared memory and their shared perception of the way the country was, and indeed with Reagan, what is should ‘return’ to.
Powerful stuff.
Well, if going to the movies once a week was enough to embed that certainty, what then is the impact of people watching TV 4.5 hours a day, every day, for 40 years?
What image have we emplanted for another generation of Americans?
Strangely, and frighteningly, if the overarching characteristic of 1930s Hollywood movies about America was a basic sense of decency and good and nobility, the over-arching characteristic of our television built world is that all problems are solvable – and all of them are solvable in about 44 minutes.
Take House. A very popular series.
Yet every episode is pretty much the same as every other one.
Someone comes down with a terrible disease. House makes the wrong diagnosis – patient almost dies. Wrong diagnosis- patient almost dies. Wrong diagnosis- patient almost dies. Off the cuff comment. Close-up on raised eyes. Right diagnosis. Patient survives.
Every week. Same show.
Law and Order is no different. Crime, wrong person arrested, new evidence, right person arrested. Conviction.
Every week.
Same holds true for CSI, ER, even House Hunters on HGTV.
For the past 40 years we have spent 4.5 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, educating viewers over and over and over again that even the most complex and life-threatening problems are solvable – in 44 minutes, (less commercial time).
Real life is not so easy.
But our perception of what real life should be, as opposed to an honest understanding of how real life really is, created a terrible kind of dichotomy in our culture.
When George W. Bush announced ‘mission accomplished’ in Iraq, it seemed to everyone that that was a pretty good, and pretty reasonable conclusion to to the Iraq Invasion Show. Good ending.
When the ending turned out not to conform to reality on the ground, the Bush Show was cancelled.
It was replaced with The Barack Obama show, starring Barack Obama in the Hugh Laurie role.
But now Obama is in trouble. If Vincent D’Onfrio or Hugh Laurie can solve really complex problems in 44 minutes, what is wrong with Obama?
This may sound facetious, but we have inculcated ourselves in the very deep belief that all problems, no matter how complex, can be brought to a swift and good ending within an hour.
The voters in Massachusetts voted not against health care or the Kennedys. They simply voted to change the channel.
Next!
It’s a world of instant gratification.
There is a reason we are a culture deeply mired in debt, that we borrow and borrow endlessly with now visible way to ever repay what we have borrowed, and not really caring.
There are not real consequences for actions.
Not really.
There is always going to be a solution within the hour -from somewhere.
As we spend 8.5 hours a day staring at screens, (and 4.5 of those each day watching TV), we are living in a dream world.
Sadly, it seems, it is a world from which we may never awaken.
Instead, we simply plunge ever deeper into the fantasy.
If It’s A Wonderful Life cast our vision of America for the 1940s and 50s, perhaps The Matrix and Avitar all too well cast our image or our own future.
9 Comments
fosca January 26, 2010
HELLO MICHAEL,
PLEASE CENSOR MY WRITING IF YOU MUST BUT I JUST FOUND AN EXAMPLE OF A PETICULARLY SAD FUCK IN ONE OF YOUR GOVERNMENT POSITIONS.
http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/scarce/lt-gov-south-carolina-dont-feed-poor-theyll
Kevin January 25, 2010
I reject your reality and substitute my own.
Avery January 25, 2010
“we spend 8.5 hours a day staring at screens, (and 4.5 of those each day watching TV), we are living in a dream world. — Michael Rosenblum
“Thou shalt have no other gods before me.â€
– God
It’s as if we (mankind) have replaced Deity with the Tube.
We trust in the “arm of flesh†and have been lulled to sleep as it were.
It is as simple as that.
We’ve got to fill the void in our lives with something, if not God then what?… I don’t know, how about a screen? Yeah, we can fill our lives with images designed to pacify or excite but ultimately to shape our view of the world and help us forget what is important.
By the way, Michael, I don’t agree with your interpretation that of the voters of Massachusetts are simply board and want to “turn the channelâ€.
It seems there are still a few people left who yearn for freedom and to suckle at the Governments tit is repugnant to them. Even though they were duped by Mr. Obama once, they want to try and correct their error and I am grateful they still had enough faith left in Government to do it at the ballot box.
I realize bringing up our Creator is passé these days and some may label me simple minded for bringing up this point of view. Thats OK, I understand, its just that I know how much better things would be if we turned off the tube and turn to God…
Michael Rosenblum January 25, 2010
Perhaps if we applied the Commandment on ‘no grave images’ to TV, we would all be a bit better off.
fosca January 26, 2010
why not add a commandment reading:
“thou shalt not make your fellow readers puke”
you´d break it, you´d break it, dadadadadadaaaaaaaa-rghhh
Michael Rosenblum January 25, 2010
Oh man!
I can’t believe it!
peter January 25, 2010
saw this on BBC and I am humbled – you were right all along:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8472000/8472831.stm
fosca January 25, 2010
aside from the big hollywood studios jews from europe founded most photo-agencies in the us too. those on the other hand were not so much into the fabrication of dreams and lies but photo-journalism. displaying what went wrong and where. many, many years ago they had customers in a great variety of magazines that were eager to print the frozen atrocities snappers from all over the world delivered. today with all the corporate lies printed and broadcast the depiction of truth disappears. supported by the broadcasts on everyones idiots-lantern (telly) those who are glued to the screen are being made obedient. believing everything as the truth, better a researched and thereby substantiated truth, makes us no better than calves who decide which butcher they prefer to be hacked to death by. not only that, we even hone the axe that will eventually kill us. by complying we applaude to the extinction of our citizen and human rights, personal freedom becomes obsolete for security reasons. our mails are read, blogs are scanned, telephone conversationes listened in to, moves are tracked. when all over sudden someone starts asking questions an ill shaved person from a seemingly far away place pops up like a devil from a box and farts.
comfortably numb as we already are, instead of smelling what really stinks, we beg for laws implementing stronger filters.
Arla January 24, 2010
There aren’t many people I know willing to make these kind of observations. I applaud you for it and agree heartily. Good work!