Voodoo Ritual 2

The state is a mythical concept, a jejune concept, one that humanity needs to find the maturity to grow out of. The unquestioning acceptance of this myth, one saturated with internal contradictions, is that which defines the ‘TVZombie’.~Willy Whitten

THE GOLDEN CALF
Television as an Altar

[] Media and the Pathological Society

In the technocratic society, the culture is merely the scum grown in a petri dish.

“The exploration of media content is a focus of some scholars who examine how current and dominant views may be perpetuated through mass media as a form of ‘normality’. Such as views of sex and gender, certain professions and social classes, race, ethnicity and culture. This extends to the global arena in how news and entertainment frame countries and cultures to the rest of the world.”~Ella Shohat & Robert Stam

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_medium_is_the_message
THE MEDIUM IS THE MESSAGE
"The medium is the message" is a phrase coined by Marshall McLuhan meaning that the form of a medium embeds itself in the message, creating a symbiotic relationship by which the medium influences how the message is perceived.

The phrase was introduced in his most widely known book, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, published in 1964.[1] McLuhan proposes that a medium itself, not the content it carries, should be the focus of study. He said that a medium affects the society in which it plays a role not only by the content delivered over the medium, but also by the characteristics of the medium itself.

For McLuhan, it was the medium itself that shaped and controlled “the scale and form of human association and action”.[2] Taking the movie as an example, he argued that the way this medium played with conceptions of speed and time, transformed “the world of sequence and connections into the world of creative configuration and structure.”[3] Therefore the message of the movie medium is this transition from “lineal connections” to “configurations”.[4]

Extending the argument for understanding the medium as the message itself, he proposed that the “content of any medium is always another medium”[5] – thus, the content of writing is speech, print is that of writing and print itself is the content of the telegraph.

McLuhan understood "medium" in a broad sense. He identified the light bulb as a clear demonstration of the concept of “the medium is the message”. A light bulb does not have content in the way that a newspaper has articles or a television has programs, yet it is a medium that has a social effect; that is, a light bulb enables people to create spaces during nighttime that would otherwise be enveloped by darkness. He describes the light bulb as a medium without any content. McLuhan states that "a light bulb creates an environment by its mere presence."[6]

Likewise, the message of a newscast about a heinous crime may be less about the individual news story itself — the content — and more about the change in public attitude towards crime that the newscast engenders by the fact that such crimes are in effect being brought into the home to watch over dinner.[7]

Hence in Understanding Media, McLuhan describes the "content" of a medium as a juicy piece of meat carried by the burglar to distract the watchdog of the mind.[8] This means that people tend to focus on the obvious, which is the content, to provide us valuable information, but in the process, we largely miss the structural changes in our affairs that are introduced subtly, or over long periods of time.[7] As society's values, norms and ways of doing things change because of the technology, it is then we realize the social implications of the medium. These range from cultural or religious issues and historical precedents, through interplay with existing conditions, to the secondary or tertiary effects in a cascade of interactions[7] that we are not aware of.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Arguments_for_the_Elimination_of_Television
Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television – Jerry Mander 1978

Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television argues that the technology of television is not a neutral or benign instrument or tool. The author argues that in varied technologies and institutions such as militaries, automobiles, nuclear power plants, mass production, and advertising, the basic form of the institution and the technology determines its interaction with the world, the way it will be used, the kind of people who use it, and to what ends.

The author argues that far from being "neutral," television predetermines who shall use it, how they will use it, what effects it will have on individual lives, and, if it continues to be widely used, what sorts of political forms will inevitably emerge.

The four arguments are:

1.While television may seem useful, interesting, and worthwhile, at the same time it further boxes people into a physical and mental condition appropriate for the emergence of autocratic control.
2.It is inevitable that the present powers-that-be (or controllers) use and expand using television so that no other controllers are permitted.
3.Television affects individual human bodies and minds in a manner which fit the purposes of the people who control the medium.
4.Television has no democratic potential. The technology itself places absolute limits on what may pass through it. The medium, in effect, chooses its own content from a very narrow field of possibilities. The effect is to drastically confine all human understanding within a rigid channel.
[]What binds the four arguments together is that they deal with aspects of television that are not reformable.
“It {television} affects the psychology of people who watch. It increases the passivity of people who watch. It changes family relationships. It changes understandings of nature. It flattens perception so that information, which you need a fair amount of complexity to understand it as you would get from reading, this information is flattened down to a very reduced form on television. And the medium has inherent qualities which cause it to be that way.”~ Mander

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_psychology
Media psychology draws from multiple disciplines such as sociology, anthropology, neuroscience, political science, rhetorics, computer science, communications, and international relations.

How TV Effects Brainwaves
“Formal Features” are the camera cuts, pans, zooms, etc. used very frequently in TV and movies. Because these “formal features” are so novel, and different from normal everyday reality, they trigger the brain’s “orienting response”. The “orienting response” is an important brain reflex that alerts us when there is a change in the environment. This “orienting response” is an essential survival mechanism because it forces us to pay attention to any (potentially dangerous) changes in the environment. Because of the involuntary nature of the “orienting response”, another name for it is “involuntary attention”.

It turns out that the “orienting response” has a particular brainwave effect. Namely, when the “orienting response” is triggered, the alpha brainwaves decrease. This decrease in alpha waves has the effect of making the brain more alert. Once the brain ascertains that whatever triggered the “orienting response” is not a threat, the Alpha brainwaves quickly return to their previous level.

Also, during the “orienting response” (“involuntary attention”) the Gamma brainwaves disappear. This decrease in Gamma waves has the effect of breaking the person’s focus. Unlike the Alpha brainwaves, the Gamma brainwaves have a harder time returning to their previous levels. If the “orienting response” is triggered too often (as with TV watching) the brain stays unfocused.
The greater the frequency of these formal features, the fewer the number of fast brainwaves, the less focused the mind. An important feature of the Orienting Response is Habituation.

“Gamma waves are fast, high-frequency, rhythmic brain responses that have been shown to spike when higher cognitive processes are engaged. Research in adults and animals suggests that lower levels of gamma power might hinder the brain’s ability to efficiently package information into coherent images, thoughts and memories.” – Science Daily (Oct 2008) See also Associated Content (April 2008) http://tvsmarter.wordpress.com/2009/02/21/how-tv-effects-brainwaves/
http://www.tvsmarter.com/documents/brainwaves2.html

http://www.tvsmarter.com/documents/brainwaves.html

Brainwave Types

Alpha: 8 Hz to 12 Hz, associated with relaxation

Lo-Beta: 12 Hz to 15 Hz, normal waking consciousness

Beta: 15 Hz to 18 Hz, normal waking consciousness

Hi-Beta: 19 Hz to 25 Hz, normal waking consciousness

Gamma: 26 to 100 Hz, associated with perception and consciousness and higher mental activity

Brainwaves: A Comparison of the Samples

Drawing [D] – Reading [R] - Watching TV [T]

Alpha:
D -1.53
R - 2.16
T - 1.43

Lo-beta:
D - 1.43
R - 1.30
T - 1.24

Beta:
D - 2.67
R - 0.85
T - 0.98

Hi-beta:
D - 4.61
R - 4.50
T - 2.41

Gamma:
D - 1.18
R - 0.23
T - 0.06

Diabolical Results on Society
Pandora's pandemonium of pandemic curses; physical, psychic, and spiritual. Exponential complexity overdrive. A multiversal explosion of manifestations. Every possibility realized.