Herman and Chomsky Post Class

One quote that immediately stood out to me in our discussion of Herman and Chomsky was that in which: “Amusement always means putting things out of mind, forgetting suffering, even when it is on display. At its root is powerlessness” (57). I feel as if this idea is one that is discussed about frequently throughout our CMC major, an idea which poses amusement as a parallel to a sense of mindlessness where he who is being amused is able to lose himself within such mediated forms as film and forget about the important things, things such as the pain and suffering, which are simply pushed aside in replace for a simple laugh or two. This immediately reminds me of a reading we discussed in CMC200 which is a content analysis and audience reception analysis of the film “Rush Hour 2”. This piece is an actual literal articulation of the problem with the mindlessness of contemporary society’s most infamous form of amusement (film) by describing how this comedy desensitizes its audience to the shock of its blatant racial stereotypes. The film is littered with race-based ignorant assumptions and powerful racist insinuations, however, because it is expressed in a joking manner, the audience merely accepts the offensive language instead of what it should/needs to be doing, that being, taking on a critical approach and questioning the implications of such a blatantly bigoted discourse. As Herman and Chomsky suggest, the audience becomes so entrenched in the laughter brought on by the film, that the obvious underlying message is completely overlooked. I think the problem with this is the fact that although, yes, it is just a movie, we are still being overtly exposed to problematic themes that may very well be entering our unconsciousness and embedding themselves within our own base of knowledge without us even being aware. With the absence of a critical position, the media is able to do exactly what these two authors fear; their propagandistic message can manipulate our individual thought and is able to inconspicuously replace its thought with that of our own.