The Media Is Making Us Crazy
By Junious Ricardo Stanton

"The Beautiful People Syndrome is attacking the psyche of television-addicted America. For a man, if you are not 6'1'', handsome and wealthy you are not ideal. Any woman who isn't bone-thin with a large chest certainly is below the standard. Television is warping the American mind. Unfortunately, the Americanization of the rest of the world may contribute to mind-warping worldwide.

Everyone wants to be one of the beautiful television people. What is the result of The Beautiful People Syndrome? A lot of unhappy citizens. Post-traumatic-television depression can set in after you realize that your life isn't as wonderful as it, TV says it should be. The ubiquity of television is transforming our lives. If you are not one of the "Beautiful People," you're an outcast."- the Beautiful People Syndrome, Ron Kaufman

Africans in AmeriKKKa spend an inordinate amount of time watching television and consuming mass media in general. The content, imagery, values and music in the programming are taking a massive toll on our psyches and nervous systems.

First and foremost, the programming we are watching is designed to promote a white supremacist worldview. Secondly the programming offers a major distortion of reality that even the white media and social critics call "the Beautiful People Syndrome", a situation where the images on the screen depict whites or people of color who either look and act white or look and act stereotypically black, Asian, Latino etc however the white producers or their Negro clones deem they want to portray us.

For white people, this presents a major problem because when you stop to think about it, most whites are not thin, are not well dressed, are not wealthy and do not live exciting, glamorous and adventurous lives. This coupled with the subliminal anxiety and inadequacy-causing messages inherent in all the advertising that accompanies the programming on television are enough to drive us insane.

For people of color and especially Africans, The Beautiful People Syndrome creates even more anxiety, depression and escapist flights of fantasy because we don't look like nor do we live lives anywhere near those depicted on the small and large screens. For example, obesity is on the rise in AmeriKKKa in general and in the African community in particular. So images of thin, well coiffed, scantily clad, vivacious light skinned females create major issues for black girls who don't look like that.

Even the hoochie mammas in the black music videos conform to the Hollywood and Madison Avenue standards of body size, shape and lighter hue. Imagine how diabolical the programmers must be to create images they know most AmeriKKKans can not possibly duplicate nor be but yet they offer via advertising and merchandising the make up, clothing, cosmetics, diet and exercise products to entice them to spend their money trying to be something they are not!?

To make matters worse advertisers have targeted toddlers in their nefarious branding and consumer loyalty programs so the children being exposed to more television at an earlier age have no idea what is in store for them. Unfortunately neither do their parents, otherwise they would not expose their children to so much media.

In his book Coercion Why We Listen To What They Say Douglas Rushkoff explains, "The real intention of target marketing to children and babies however goes deeper. The fresh neurons of young brains are valuable mental real estate to admen. By seeding their products and images early, the marketeers can do more than just develop brand recognition; they can literally cultivate a demographics's sensibilities as they are formed." page 196. Of course Rushkoff meant sensibilities formed by Mephistophelean commercials. This stuff is dangerous don't take it lightly.

According to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation, "American children and adolescents spend 22 to 28 hours per week viewing television, more than any other activity except sleeping. By the age of 70 they will have spent 7 to 10 years of their lives watching TV." For African-American children the number is even higher. Watching that much television is dangerous. It dulls your brain by discouraging use of one's own imagination and critical thinking skills.

We are being programmed to passively assent to what is shown on television, movies and video games. With high definition TV, special effects, computer generated images the line between reality and fantasy is being blurred daily. The news has been reduced to sound bytes and pictorial images to reinforce corporatist (bipartisan government and corporation) propaganda.

The corporations and media are in cahoots with the ruling elites to fashion a dummied down, zombie and fascist society. The key to their success is to disinform, distract and deceive the masses so we don't know what they are doing to us. We need to become discerning consumers of media.

First and foremost, we must understand it is a tool of global white supremacy. If you understand this, you will limit your exposure to the media unless it is an African centered liberation oriented medium. Limit your family's television viewing and media consumption. Spend family time together discussing current events within the context of our experiences at the hands of racist white folks.

Explain these historical implications as you watch television together. Explain the special effects and decode the CGI you can identify as well as the values they are trying to get across in the programs. If we don't teach our children to decode the images and messages inherent in the media, who will? If they can't understand what is being pumped at them, they will end up like the children in the Pied Piper children's story.

© November 2005 by Afromerica

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