Deliberation’s Darker Side

Ahh… (sigh of relief). A more modern read, not to mention the Q&A format made for an interesting style. The reading was rather straightforward, and by the end I wasn’t quite sure what to take from it. I think one of the most relevant points that is pointed out in deliberation is the perspectives of some are pronounced far more than others, even when a diverse group exists. Opinion and bias occur simply from representation, not just stereotypes.

The part concerning people doubting “the evidence of their own senses” was almost gross. How people can be so easily, without even realizing it sometimes, persuaded to think a certain way based on the majority’s opinion, is dangerous. People continue to lose the ability to think fro themselves, and in essence, create new ideas, instead of recycling the same reconstructed ones.

 

Fung Reading Response

I definitely enjoyed this reading more so than the last one. The setup too was cool, having it set up like a question/answer format. There were also some very interesting points, especially when it was mentioned that election day should be an actual holiday, and I definitely agree with that. One of the biggest reasons, the voting booths don’t get a great turnout is because people are at work, or at school, and simply don’t have the time afterwards to go and vote. If election day was a holiday, there would be no school or work to hold people up. There are other holidays, such as Presidents’ Day, or Columbus Day, that we all get off for, and yet, we don’t really do anything during these days. There isn’t even much meaning and significance to them, especially compared to election day and voting. Another interesting point made in the handout was the lengths to which town hall meetings go to get people to attend. These included different hours (though holding it in the night really doesn’t increase the numbers as, though they’d gain the 9 to 5 workers, they’d lose others, such as parents, or night workers.) They also would change the town hall’s location to more accessible and hospitable places, so it’d be easier and more comfortable for them. They would also have food and other sorts of goodies, which makes me wonder just how and where the town hall gets the money to spend on these things.

 

Deliberation’s Darker Side

I really enjoyed the part of the article in which the ease of deliberation was discussed.  It was pointed out that meetings and deliberations would go much faster and would be much simpler if the people at the meeting were all of the same race, socioeconomic status, and background, who all shared the same ideas.  This isn’t the case although, and people should not strive to make it so.  Diversity is needed to better serve the need of all citizens.  A representative population would be ideal.  If 30% of the community is hispanic then idealy 30% if the people at the meeting should be hispanic.  In this was people would be comfortable sharing their ideas knowing that they are not alone.

 

Seems Fitting It’s Election Day…

…And I’m blogging about democratic participation.

I enjoyed the article as it delved into the aspects of democratic functioning and small time running of the backbone to society–the working class guy/girl.

Participation is vital to keeping the flow of society running for Americans, and voting is just one of the factors. Sociological issues that need to be settled with attending to needs might be changing townhall times or placing a holiday to promote participation.

I’m curious why that’s not been set in yet. For a community to grow, I guess it does depend on the psychological factor (like New England).

I agree with Young that exclusion comes in 2 different forms of External/Internal. Views seem to be under the shadows of the overwhelming majority with Internal, and the word cannot be spread appropriately in External.

I like the part with Consensus and will from God to show that even your lone opinion should still create an impasse since nobody can look into your eyes at a situation. Seems familiar to my life.

 

Response for “Six Questions for Iris Marion Young & Jane Mansbridge”

I actually enjoyed and understood this entire article, probably because it was a simple Q & A session. However, the questions asked of these experts were relatable for out class. For instance, in college we are taught that we should give a damn about what is going on around us, for us, and to us. This article exemplifies these views. This article discusses how and why the whole nation should get together in smaller groups to make decisions. Since we all have our own lives to deal with, it is obvious that many Americans don’t pay attention to politics. Or, they may think that their one view does not matter. However, in the Kennedy election, one vote made him president. Therefore, each and every view on a subject does matter. That is what Young and Mansbridge are trying to prove.

In order to get more people involved in local and national governments, people are going to need to see the actual outcome of the involvement they put forth. I think it is a good idea to make a holiday for the nation in which they decide smaller matters for local governments by people from that small town. If it is them who are affected, they should want to be involved. This is the exact problem, getting people to come to the meetings. They brought up how night meetings interfere with mothers and fathers who work during the day, and so on. That is why the holiday would work. Higher up authorities should deal with budgets and more serious problems; they should not be bothered by minute decisions that make more sense for smaller groups to decide. With the nation as it is now, hopefully people will start getting more involved in what will happen to them, their kids, and so on. If not, slowly and surely, we will lose even the little bit of power we still have.

 

Fung Reading Response

I can honestly say out of the readings we have done in this section of class, Fung was my favorite reading.

The idea of deliberative functions are very interesting and I think they make a very valid point throughout the article. I especially liked the ideas that if we want more people to become politically active and take the time to care, we should shorten the work week or create national holidays for political affairs. As the article states, we have holidays for all other kinds of historical events, why not political events as well? They bring up interesting incentives.

It is true that in today’s society, many citizens choose not to be deliberately active because they do not have the time. After being a parent, working full-time, and taking care of other interests that may come first, what times is left to be active in different groups?

Overall, I was able to relate, understand, and agree with this article in many ways. They brought up a lot of points to think about.

 

A Propaganda Model Response

“A Propaganda Model” article reinforced what I learned in Introduction to Mass Communication. It is known that a plethora of information is feed to the press at every instant. However, there are stake holders or people in high places who decide what information does and does not seep through to the mass public. They can even sit on information until they feel the public is ready for it. And of course, the rhetoric used in some articles can be bent and changed to fit what the authority feels acceptable to the public. These practices are woven into the news room so heavily that journalists may think that they are being as unbiased as possible, when in fact they are not.  There can be definite stains on some information without the journalist even knowing. For instance, some sources could lie to journalists and either know they are lying or actually think they are telling the truth. There are sketchy techniques all over the place.

The fact that there are 29 media corporations that own over half of all the rhetoric that is thrown at us repeatedly scares me. How can we as a mass population get all the information that we need and deserve, if half of the media already has its’ mind made up on certain subject matters. Therefore, our views on some subject are slanted. I mean look at Septemeber 11, 2001; most Americans, I am willing to bet, didn’t even know we were fighting with the Middle East. This just frightens me for the future. Things are only going to get worse. More and more information will be hid from us to keep us ignorant. Because ignorance is bliss, right?

 

A Propoganda Model:

This was the most difficult piece for me to get through this entire semester. I just could not seem to grasp the majority of the ideas the writer was trying to get across. I did however, pick up on a few important opinions or statements that Chomsky. After discussing the media in my mass communication class, I liked the idea of the “news filter” when explaining how the propoganda model works. I thought it connected me to my other class in the fact that the news filters are mainly affected by the size of the concentrated ownership or the owner’s wealth. With that being the first issue regarding the propoganda  model, advertising plays the next important role. This was the one idea that stood out to me the most and brought me back to the Persuaders video and how advertising helps to emotionally get the consumer involved in the products/services that a producer is selling. Although I didn’t quite understand some of the reading, I did pick up on the advertising aspect and how the propoganda relates to the way a service or product is sold. I also found this relatable to the way Bernays tried to establish his opinion that the Propoganda model was a positive aspect toward making a product wanted, and making the language apparent and pleasing to the eyes and ears of the average citizen.

 

Gramsci : From Prison Notebooks “The Intellectuals”

After reading this piece, I found myself extremely confused with what exactly the writer was trying to get accomplished concerning the personality types of an intellectualist. I did however, find it eye-opening that in his opinion every man is considered an intellectual and that every man is a “philospher” in his own state of mind. Every human has a taste and a philosophical point of view regardless of whether one thinks that they do or not. I loved the line, “There is no such thing as a non-intelluctual person. I also found it interesting that Gramsci says that many times people that think they are creating a new group of intellect involving individual beliefs, they are really just centering themselves in an existing group of intellects. Many times intellectual people are involved in a lot of the same groups and have a lot in common regarding their own beliefs, moreover I disagree slightly on his opinion because i think that every individual has different types of intellect and can apply that to their own lives in a variety of different ways. It’s interesting that Gramsci was in jail when writing this, however I think some of his opinions and theories are a little skewed from the actual theories in society involving intellects.

 

The Intellectuals Response

Upon reading “The Intellectuals” by Antonio Gramsci, I found it to be very intriguing. In addition, the fact that he was in jail when he wrote this, also added to my intrigue. Like I have said for previous articles, the idea of class distinctions and groups was brought up. I like the idea of “essential” intellectuals, in that specific groups are experts on subject matters first, and then it is passed down throughout history. We are not born with knowledge in our brains, it is handed to us; moreover, it will only work if we want to absorb it. We need those “essential” intellectuals to show us the way. On page 9, Gramsci states, “All men are intellectuals, one could therefore say: but not all men have in society the function of intellectuals.” In my opinion, he means that everyone can have knowledge on a subject matter, but that doesn’t make them know everything on the subject matter. If the society or the model does not incorporate that specific knowledge into the system, this intellectual can advance the knowledge of the whole. There is never wasted knowledge. I like how Grasci brings up the idea that although we may do something as a hobby that does not mean that we are an expert. The expansion of the mind is essential to making the world keep going.

 

The Intellectuals

Well, i must admit that I’m a bit relieved to see that I was not the only person to struggle with this reading. Gramsci has a very schizophrenic style of writing, and often ,makes paragraphs out of entire sentences. This goes without mentioning the sophisticated nature of the content itself.

SO, the content. After reading through many parts, several times, I took from it what I could. I think Gramsci is laying out the “what is and isn’t” an Intellectual model, as well as providing examples as to how they are formed, forged, expanded, made functional, etc. One of the most standout points he makes is explaining how Intellectuals are usually determined, or assumed to be, based on a higher position or political party, when in fact they may not be this at all. Along with this point is the ignorance of the intellectual ability of others due to lower class, whether peasantry or a member of the labor-force.

He makes this clear when he writes, on page 9, that each man “carries on some form of intellectual activity, that is, he is a “philosopher”, an artist, a man of taste…” This is entirely true when we break down an industry according to its specific function, rather than by wage or job declaration. Many of these functions are essential, and would disrupt the flow of many lives if discontinued. Shouldn’t these people just as well be recognized for their production and contribution to society? Do they not fit the “criterion” for an Intellectual?

 

Gramsci Response

Like the previous article, this one was pretty hard to get through. Most of what Gramsci had to say sort of flew right past me. However, I understood that each social group consists of intellectuals, which in turn gives the said group its meaning. Gramsci then went on to list the certain characteristics which make up an intellectual, one of which was organization, which explains why every group has and needs them. There are also different kinds of intellectuals, one being the organic intellectual, though I wasn’t really sure what all they do. There is a bit of history in this article, which I thought was very interesting, of how intellectuals have evolved over time, from feudal lords to ecclesiastics and so on. I did like how Gramsci mentioned that some of the intellectuals are of peasant origin, which goes to show that anyone, regardless of their class, race, etc, can be an intellectual. Clearly, not everyone is an intellectual, however in everything a person does, there is some amount of intellectual activity occuring, which I had never realized before reading the article.

 

A Propaganda Model

This article was undoubtedly the most difficult for me to get through, as a lot of the statistics and numbers seemed to go right over my head. All I really picked up from those parts of the article was that they were supposed to support his argument concerning large scale media companies. With this being said, however, the discussion that we had in class about the article was the most interesting conversation that we had all semester thus far. I really enjoyed discussing the idea of an “expert”, and how it is a relatively socially constructed term.  The model that we used concerning left and right media coverage was a great visual, showing that the focus is not on whether the media is left or right oriented. The focus is on the bigger picture, and the concept that by looking at a conversation as black or white, or left or right, true discussion and debate is repressed. To bring “experts” from opposite sides of an issue and have them discuss the issue at hand does not highlight every area of debate. For the most part, however, the uneducated public does indeed believe that by viewing two opposite sides of a debate, they are hearing everything that could possibly be said about the issue.

 

Gramsci Reading Response

I have been reading piece of Gramsci all weekend, trying to get a sense about what it is he is trying to say. After reading the article and going back over certain passages several times, I can still say I have no idea.

I took notes throughout my reading process and in the beginning when he describes the two types of intellectuals that are most important, I tried to dumb it down. The first type is that new groups form smaller groups with their own identities while still carrying the ideals of the larger group. The second are groups created by following groups that have existed for centuries.

The middle of the reading was where I was most profoundly confused. I really have no idea what was going on there, other than the fact that he consisentuly reiterates the importance of intellectuals at all levels.

The last 7 pages,  Gramsci compares intellectuals and the birth of intellectuals in countries throughout the world and compares them. This part of the article was most sound to me, and that which I found most interesting.

All I can say is I hope that tommorrow in class I can figure out what it is Gramsci is trying to say.

 

Intellectually Charged Response

For writing a piece in prison, this is magnificent from Antonio Gramsci. Who knew ideas on this could invoke precise thinking?

What I took in from the work was that the term ‘Intellectuals’ means a certain bellwether to society; leadership with a capacity of knowledge that can shift societies. He questions whether intellectuals are an independent group or broken down into a specialized category.

He starts by saying every social group has a root of some sort of entrepreneur, which I agree. Someone out there needs to provide inspiration to a group by making progress by bestowing confidence.

He also lists the typical class of intellectuals–Eccleciastics. They are chalk full of religious ideology, morale, charity, justice, and public school agendas. They are organized & settled through Arisocracy.

Determining ‘Intellectuals’ and ‘Non Intellectuals’ according to Gramsci is weighted by what direction professional activity goes by, not just immeadiate social function. (Elaboration/Muscular Nervous Effort)

I like his analysis on the problem.

People today all can be enlisted as self-conceived ‘intellectuals’ but there needs to be a stopping point because a surplus of jobs would be inferior to one’s choosing. Gramsci nails it by declaring measurement has to come by innovation of physical & social world for a new foundation to be accounted for. The modern times are swimming with experts, pundits, and intellectuals but it becomes a riddle for myself deciding who the real voice of arguement (or logic) may be.

 

Monetary Gain = Monetary Mind

I’ve read chunks of Hermann & Chomsky’s profound article and I found it quite in detail of some ideas I formulated long ago but without the credibility of my own scope. I do enjoy the fact that Chomsky diligently spliced all the details and showed off charts, statistics to prove his insights.

A few words that I need to look up in random thought would be–Aggregate and Contingency…they seemed to be keys to a better understanding of this article in my outlook.

Aside, my main objective going into discussion is what Hermann & Chomsky are trying to open to an audience. Are they saying propaganda is a mechanism systematically used with gadgetry (as in the filters) to spread a macro message that takes away other thoughts concerning local news? Is it certain ownerships and trades seek out affirmation from the wealthy and zip line the most ‘worthy’ news to the public?  (One point does say “the mass media are interested in attracting audiences with buying power…”). There is a central theme or point these authors come across, and it is the dead of night so I will try to figure this dilemma out later Wednesday afternoon if I can.

 

Response to “A Propaganda Model”

Though I thought this article was a little difficult to understand, and get through, it did prove some interesting points I didn’t know about before reading. For example, the fact that the propaganda model actually has crucial ingredients in order for it to succeed; without these steps, it would crumble. This is actually true for a lot of things, now I think about it; every single part is essential. For the media, these steps are even more important as competition has become more fierce, since there are a lot more outlets than there have been in years past. Some outlets have even been threatened and directly attacked, which I think is a bit extreme. However, this proves just how desperate people are for recognition, and most importantly money. Besides the different ingredients, the media is also compiled of different tiers, the top tier supplying the lower ones with important international and national news. Not surprisingly, the television makes up the top tier, as most people receive their news from it. However, since this article was printed in the 1980s, I have to wonder if the internet has surpassed the TV, as nowadays people seem to constantly be online.

 

Money is the Root of all evil.

Reading “A Propoganda Model” I had an epiphany.Either money is the root of all evil, or we just tend to choose what comes natural–self preservation, the pursuit of hapiness, love and all that good stuff Bernays touches on which money can definetely help achieve in today’s society–over something that Americans have been forced to create in order to live in a somewhat organized fashion: Democracy.
Media executives, Chomksy and Edwards point out, is tiered. The top of this tier which is dominated by the prestigous and the wealthy and heavily influenced by those who are suppose to inforce our democracy. Through several filters, this tier decides whats newsworthy or not and feeds it to lower tiers of media, who may or may not be practicing new productions in an ethical manner themselves. This means that the elites manage our public discourse, does it not?
With media taking advertising dollars from companies, this adds another set of elites that have a say on what is new and what is not. And the private citizen, who is not all-knowing, absorbs this information as news, and not polished and influenced information.
So why does this all happen? I think its simple–as simple as defing life in one sentence– its starts with our human nature for preservation and advancement the basis for most people’s rhetoric. If I was thown money to keep my compnay alive I just might fall into the same trap that private media has fallen into. Manufactured government stands no chance against instinctual rhetoric. We are all curroupt in our small ways. It just happens to be on a bigger scale when you become an elite and ther’es a ton of money involved.

 

Reading Response

I just finished reading ‘A Propaganda Model’ and I will admit I was not a big fan. The reading was very rough to get through, but I understood what it was the authors were trying to say.

The biggest theme I took from the article was that the mass media is controlled by many other individuals and companies. So while they are trying to control and manipulate the public, someone bigger than the media companies is trying to control them. I think it is interesting how this process works, and in all honesty I think it is fair. Media companies should be exploited just as we are being exploited as the public.

Overall, I think this article was slow but proved several good points and I understood the overall themes of the article.

I am rushed for time right now which is why I can not think of what else I would like to respond about.

 

in response – rough draft

This is What Living Like This Does
Swaying public opinion nowadays is an everyday routine for most of the population of this world. Whether it is in forms of religion, politics, fashion, musical trends, lifestyle choices, cultures, etc., public opinion can be molded and changed in the matter of a second. It can be swayed in many ways, acting upon any number of emotions, morals and logical reasons. As a society, we strive to act wholly together to support our homeland values and nurture induced patriotism for our ‘ beloved motherland.’ Although, acting wholly for a main concern, we each have individualistic views and purposes our ‘selves’ work into the whole, giving many perspectives in to the “American Dream.” Edward Bernays talks about this when he says; “We repeat constantly our habits and beliefs until they become a cumulative retrogressive force.” But, to advance society further and flow with the ever forceful inertia of the changing of times, we as a civilization are constantly administered products and services by means of advertisement and the public relations swaying us to lean where the leaders want us to, to move our society as a whole further in an advanced state of total choice control. Bernays also states, “It is the power of the small group to sway the larger public in its attitude towards ideas,” in which, “New Ideas, new precedents, are continually striving for a place in the scheme of things.”
To get to the point where a group can sway public opinion, there are many steps and strategies used to come about the plan to do it. There are many ways, but mainly you must understand the psychology of the public itself: what are they, who are they in society, what are their jobs, what is their place in the world, what do they want, what do they need, etc. To sway public opinion you must understand the public, before you understand the idea/product/service.
In turning the views of people, you have to hit the source, and the rest will trickle down from there. Bernays was a master of this craft, affecting what fasionistas and sophisticates were wearing as well as the lower and middle classes. By striking Paris, the capital of fashion he could make American products more wanted then trying at home, because Americans naturally will buy something American mad, instead of buying foreign, especially “if the French approve.” Although already available and know in America, American velvet wasn’t doing too strong, but after premiering American velvet lines at the Louvre in Paris, they became the cat’s meow in America.
Another way to look at this is through Walter Lippmann’s approach of the disenchanted man, or private person, “In the cold light of experience he knows that his sovereignty is a fiction. He reigns in theory, but in fact he does not govern.” This is a notable quote as to the American public are in fact, dumb. We mold and shift opinion so many times, it has become an everyday ritualistic frenzy. We are force-fed advertisements by the millions a day; most we are not even aware of. Thinking of just logos alone, I could rattle off a bunch and a regular person could associate them to the specific company in which they represent. The private person may not feel as though they are a big part of society, but in he grand scheme of it all, they represent a number, a percentage of who is being active in public. It can range if they buy from certain retailers; grocery to clothing, or in politics, religion, and regular morals and beliefs.
An example would be the Abercrombie and Fitch Company (A&F Co.), an upscale retail store that has up-to-date fashion trends for multiple age ranges, from kids to grandparents. One thing you won’t see that existed in years prior were advertisements for them. A few years ago, you would see television commercials, magazine and circular ads also. After the big commotion they caused and how they affected fashion across America, they no longer needed it. They did what was mentioned in The Persuaders, “create loyalty above reason.” They don’t need many advertisements any longer, because they’re so widely known and acknowledged by their followers, that now, the most simplistic for of Public Relation is implemented at no cost to the company, not by the company but by it’s own public, the consumer; that is word of mouth and consumer wear of the product. A&F Co. sold well indeed, appealing to sexuality and intimacy among the public, as well as comfort and fashion. How else would they get a guy to spend 200 dollars on a single pair of jeans, if it were not to impress a woman with a, “Hey look what I’m wearing, I can afford this, and I look ‘damned good’ you should date me mental.” Millions of people are devoted to stores like this, also including Hollister, BeBe, American Eagle, it is the appeal of wanting to be something rather than a speckle in this big blank minded canvas of a nation. Lippmann makes a great statement that ties in to this when he says about the private person, “I shall not denounce him further. My sympathies are with him, for I believe that he has been saddled with an impossible task and that he is asked to practice an unattainable ideal.”
Politically, as a nation, we are not political, this democratic freedom we so love to have, we rarely use, as we elect officials on principle in the beginning and trust then to execute throughout their entire career as that official. We intentionally hand our lives over to a few hundred people, to decide our present and our future. Lippmann basically says later on that we as a public believe what we are told, because we have an everlasting want for knowledge. Also, the difference between an executive and regular member of the general public, if something is hard to us, for instance, astro-physics to me is like the Chinese language, I don’t understand it, nor do I need to, but as long as there is someone who does, that can tell me what I need to know, and not why I should, then I am fine with that. That person would be the executive in that field as where I would be the member of the general public. In retrospective, if it came to matters of Public Relation, the role would be reversed.

 

Rough Draft: Theoritical Sequence of Persuasive communication

Logos vs. Pathos:
The Battle of a Lifetime

The art of persuasion may be the most intricate and most complicated art in mankind’s existence. Why? Persuasion exists in every aspect of life, with every private, public, or executive decision (as Walter Lippmann would explain it), and will continue to exist as long as rhetoric exists. Our society is based on communication, and that communication will always have a purpose for coming about, also known as the rhetoric of one’s actions. And as long as rhetoric exists—with public and private forces to steer it—there will always be issues in marketing and advertising, politics and governing, and any other aspect of life that requires decisions that affect large masses of people. How these decisions are made are based on a simply complicated theory I call Logos vs. pathos.
When private interests are involved in decision-making, it is not rare to see someone act according to their own interest: pathos over logos or emotion over logic. When and advertiser markets a product, he or she wants to appeal to a consumer’s emotions and create “loyalty beyond reason,” a prime example of someone taking advantage of pathos winning over logos. Humans are run by emotion, and sometimes this emotion does not have a logical base, and The Persuaders know how to take advantage of this, a sign of logos over pathos, it maybe—maybe not.
The Persuaders:
The clutter crisis in advertising can be credited to advertisers themselves. The more they try to reach and audience, the harder it is to reach the audience who is presented with so many acts of persuasion. I personally do not see a solution to the clutter crisis because advertising companies will not back down and cannot back down if they wish to stay competitive in the market in which they are competing in. An advertiser’s only hope is to appeal to a consumer’s emotion and hope they bite.
The second part of the video dove into persuasion in politics and there is a reason why the general population is skeptical about politics and governing. Although they are public figures with great responsibility, politicians fall into the same trap that every human is vulnerable to: the battle of pathos vs. logos. Every politicians wants as many votes for their cause as possible, this cause is specific to the person, they will try to persuade as many people as possible that they are the best candidate to head whatever operation they deem essential “for the good of the good of the community at large.” The problem is that the community at large is so mentally diverse that they will all have differing ideals and priorities. The Persuaders known as advertisers turn to something called narrowcasting: appealing to specific demographics’ priorities and interests. The problem with this is that it promotes individualism over a common agenda for the general population (the way broadcasting can). But as long as politicians get their votes, they are happy to get them however possible: pathos over logos yet again.
A prime example of a tie between pathos and logos would be Luntz’s Word lab. Luntz uses logos over pathos in analyzing what words affect people the most and get the most positive reaction in favor of the people he is working for. He is appealing to a population’s emotions (pathos) but his rational and research is completely logically based.
Bernays vs. Lippmann:
Bernays believes that there are simple reasons for people wanting to control public opinion: “The basic instincts of self preservation, procreation, and love…” He defines public opinion as “the power of a group to sway larger publics in its attitudes towards ideas,” rhetoric at its finest. He emphasizes the amount complex and undefined research that goes into analyzing the affects of a person looking to sway public opinion. In reality, all kinds of publics have differing opinions so, I think, they all balance out. Which is somewhat along the lines of what Bernays is saying when he wrote “ a public that learns more and more how to express itself will learn more and more to overthrow tyranny of every sort,” by tyranny Bernays means any person or persons seeking to sway public opinion in their favor.
Lippmann, on the other hand, believes that most private citizens are helpless in the world of public opinion. They do not have the knowledge to know what is being decided by persons in positions of power and only care about what directly affects them: Pathos over logos in the sense that the private citizen cannot be all-knowing of every public opinion influencing bit of information. They have a good reason to not know everything that’s going on because quite simply they have their own matters to take care of, their own opinions to influence. Lippmann says that public opinion is run by those in positions of power and only matters to those in positions of power and the private citizen is left out in the cold. Contradictory to what Bernays believes.

 

Reaction to Lippmann, Luntz, Bernays and Lakoff

I enjoyed reading the parts of each reading when they spoke about the art of language. I find it interesting how people take things differently from only one piece of work. I very much enjoyed Luntz’s ten rules. “Good language is like the Energizer Bunny. It just keeps going…and going…and going”. Rule four did make sense in that lengthy explinations for certain things to create language that is different, and sometimes difficult for the reader to process. Repetition is a huge principle in advertisement. Without it, consumers won’t stick to a brand or a product. When picking a new brand or a product, consumers want to hear catchy first impression lines that stick to them. I guess another reason why tag lines are a huge part of the selling business is because it helps people remember what they bought before. For example, whenever i go into the grocery store to pick up a pack of towels, I usually see tons of brands on the shelves. If a certain brand had a certain logo or catchy phrase, I might turn to that brand as oppossed to another. Honestly though, if I were to walk into the grocery store and see the Charmin Brand, I would most likely pick up a pack of Charmin towels because they are the only towel brand that I know of that has a catch song… “Charmin Ultra…!”

While reading Lakoff’s article, I found myself very confused. I felt like the piece was repeating itself, just saying that the thinking process in the consumers’ brain is stuck between analyzing and picking apart language, and coming up with how to say something and making an idea. He seems to think that language has a huge impact on our ideas, which is basically what Luntz was saying to begin with.

 

Lakoff Reflection

Lakoff pulls off a sharp association to how and why framing is done in American politics. To be honest, I can’t hold a candle over my knowledge of politics. Conservatives, Liberals, Right Wing/Left Wing is something far from my scope, but I’m slowly understanding.

For Lakoff, I believe he wrote in the sarcastic tone that fuels this article. His metaphor was spot-on as in Bush’s tax relief and wasteful spending garnered cheers and jeers from either side.

I like Lakoff’s analysis of how (from Conservatives) that Nurturance & Care it is immoral to proliferate social programs. With a wity tone, Lakoff says they aren’t greedy…or stupid (which exactly gels with the article) to prove a point that the language (and excessive) of insults illustrates who they are in his opinion.

Lakoff might be trying to illustrate that the downfall in some communication may be that the USA is too self-interested? The ways of mapping out what a certain nation might be in terms of a child or adult also elicits some reasons to why the scale goes well in-favor of us sometimes on how we manage our authority.

(I might be posting further response to this later….just catching up right now)

 

Lackoff’s Response

After reading Lakoff’s “Framing 101″, I found myself a little confused and also a little angry toward some of the issues that were brought up. When James Dobson’s “strict father model” was brought up, I was definitely feeling opposition. His model suggests that parents are supposed to punish their children physically. Parents are able to teach their children right from wrong, morally without using physical means of punishment. Sometimes learning by experience is physically abusing enough depending on the situation. I am also on the fence about the statement that a strict father should “protect the family from a dangerous world”, because of course a father should protect the family but only to a certain degree. I think that some readers would take this too seriously and could create a more threatening problem to the families across the globe by almost protecting too much? Therefore when Lackoff gives his speech before being exposed to the readings of Dobson, I felt that it was his right to base his own perspectives of what a “strict father model” should look like. I had a little bit of difficulty understanding the progressive stand-point that Lackoff put forward but I did however become interested in the way he had a break-down of what each type of progressive person is and how they react to the different situations at hand.

 

Lakoff Response

Upon reading “Framing 101: How to take Back Public Discourse,” I felt like Lakoff talks in colloquial terms that we can all understand. One part that made me both laugh and ponder was when brought up Nixon saying, “I am not a crook.” Since Nixon called himself that, we all immediately connected him with that word. He gave himself that negative connotation. This connects to Sarah Palin in the precious election because she constantly made herself look like an idiot. When asked what types of newspapers she read, she could not give an educated answer. Thus, through deductive reasoning, the American public connected her with a less intelligent crowd. Honestly, I think that had a blunder on McCain’s platform.
Later on in the article, Lakoff starts to throw many philosophical terms at us. On page 13, he lists 6 values that we are born into which make us moral people. However, if we were to ask many government officials, I am sure that they would not agree that they have all of these values. As a nation, every individual should share these values, but that is not the case. If it were that way, we would not be in the war right now. It will be interesting to see how the 2012 election will be, since we will surely be in the economic depression still. What new phrases will be brought to life? I guess we can all sit back and wait a couple of years.