Media is not corrupting our society2

The main reason why people feel that the media corrupts our society is due to our disgust and anger in its displays of violence and pornography, which are often accused of corrupting the minds of children and the young.
However, they fail to even clearly state the form in which the media corrupts the public. Some people feel that media’s corruption is more in the form of violence, killing and massacre. Others may see pornography as a greater form of corruption. Political party members may even claim corruption as the dissemination of information that do not adhere to their political aims, such as introducing communism in a democratic state or vice versa. With such a poor definition of the way in which media corrupts society, we can never be certain about what in the media is corrupting. What appears to be corrupting to one person may be seen as by another as a way to a way in educating the people of the harsh realities of life.
Furthermore, the media is not necessarily the one responsible for the corruption of society. Ironically, it is actually the changing of opinions and the creation of a more "open" society that has caused this "corruption". As more people in the world become more open to new trends and practices, the control over the media has also loosened. There is an increasing airing of shows and movies on violence, bloodshed and gore such as SAW and Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which actually enjoyed large viewership. The very fact that there is an increasing demand for such shows means that society is actually encouraging the airing of such shows. This brings about the controversial question: is it the society or the media that is corrupting?
The actual fact is that the decline of morality in the society has caused the decline of media morality and it is not the other way round. Furthermore, the statistics obtained from a survey entitled "Shooting the Messenger: Why Censorship Won't Stop Violence" have demonstrated that while research indicates numerous causes for violence, none of them link directly to media violence.

"When violent crimes hit the headlines, people want to lash out at something, anything, and assign blame," said David Horowitz, Executive Director of the Media Coalition. "The media is too often that something, even though, as our report found, there is no causal link between the violent content in the media and real violence."

While the accessibility to violence depicted in various forms of the media, such as books, magazines, movies, music, TV and video games have risen during the 1990s, violent crime has, instead, fallen to its lowest level in nearly 30 years.

The survey also notes that even research linking media with violent content to an increase in aggressive play, such as children's wrestling, as opposed to actual violence, is contradictory.

It should also be considered that television viewers are watching out of their own accord. They have a choice of whether or not to watch. If someone feels that a program has inappropriate content, he can simply change the channel or shut off the television. It is ridiculous to accuse the media of corrupting society when people can fix the problem by this simple act of discretion, assuming they themselves are not corrupt. If we were to ignore the fact that the media is not an entity independent of human control and treat it as another being with the ability to corrupt, then the situation can be seen as a willing speaker conveying ideas to a willing listener, the keyword in this case being "willing". Is the speaker at fault for speaking, even though the listener has a choice that can be easily exercised to not listen to the speaker? Or should be listener be blamed instead, for actively listening so that he may be corrupted by the ideals put forward by the speaker?

Furthermore, most people blame the mass media for the increasingly violent nature of the society, which contributes to the corruption of our children. We believe that the media are not the sole or even the primary cause of those problems. Blaming media for changes in childhood and social problems has shifted our public conversation away from addressing the real problems that impact child’s lives.

The main reason is that politicians are using the media rather than budgeting the money to address these problems. Lower-income people ‘have more experiences with the reality of problems like violence’; they know the media are not a big part of the equation in their struggles to keep their children safe in troubled communities

Media does not reach children in a vacuum. Children process the messages they receive in the context of their value systems. By giving children the tools they need to understand what they are seeing and hearing, parents can help their children absorb a wide range of media and messages consistent with the positive values taught by parents, teachers and peers.
In conclusion, we have to note that the very idea of "media” is formed by the society. Thus, how is it that the knife is blamed for the murderer’s deed?

the media is corrupting our society

II do not agree that the media is corrupting our society. Most people say that media nowadays often show violent and obscene scenes that are damaging to the people, especially the innocent children who are deem as immature citizens of the society who cannot differentiate good and bad and what to accept.


But in my opinion, I do not feel that the media is corrupting our society. Media in my opinion is only a tool for us to get our information, enjoy entertaining shows to pass time. Thus it is us that will decide what is right and what is wrong, as we are intelligent human beings. Of course that might be some group of people who are not able to do so, take for example children. In order to tackle this problem, the media itself has already done its part by having censorship. One way that media execute censorship is through movies. Movies are first audited by authorizes and they are classified into different categories – PG, N16, M18, R21. There is an age cap for those who are underage, which prevent them from watching movies, which contain scenes that they are unable to digest. This is one of the way that media has done its part. We should also exhibit moral values and make a valid judgment and not push the blame to the media, which is a very irresponsible action. Take for example, knife is used for many different purposes; it is used to cut our food into size able pieces, wood which benefit the users. However, the negative side of knife is that it can be used to stab people, inflict harm on others. So do we deem knife as something bad and banned from using it. Definitely not. This is a stupid mindset as we all know whether the knife is benefit the man or harm the man depend on the users; which is us. The media is same as . the knife. It really depend on us, the viewers which will react to the shows.

In conclusion, I feel that indeed the media is not corrupting our society.

censorship can never be justified? Do you agree

There are two words that need to be defined-- censorship and justified. Censorship is a barrier or restriction that are imposed to prevent undesirable information or ideas to be spread to the public. This is usually done by the government of the society or the higher authorites of the society. Justifed means whether is morally right and accepted by the majorities of the people in the communtiy. I feel that censorship is very important as without censorship, all sort of information and articles will reach the public. And some articles and information may be untrueful or racial. this might result in riots, being unfair to the targeted people as the fact reported might not be the truth, creating a chaos in the community. Thus the government come in use filter method to prevent such thing to occur in our life.

I agree that there is a need for censorship but it is not justifed. Firstly, the government are the one setting the limits and restriction of the censorship. But who will be the watchdog, taking care and checking on them to prevent the abuse of power? There is no one actually. With great power in hand, there is a chance that abuse of power will be present-- information showing the ineffectiveness and inefficiency of the governement will not have a chance to surface to the public.

And the most important thing is that the government is only a minority of the whole community. Whether the norm like the idea of censorship is at grey area. this is a open society with everyone are equal with no one more superior than others. Thus freedom of speech and freedom of flow of ideas should be allowed. But if the information is damaging to the community, then censorship will have to stand in to prevent chaos in the community.

http://www.quotegarden.com/censorship.html

Civil Servant Pay Rise

This topic has been a hot thing in Singapore. Everyone ranges from students to elderly are discussing whether it is good to give a pay rise to the civil servants. However, I feel that most of us, including the press and media are focusing more on the ministers and high ranking officers. Thus I will like to set my perimeter to the normal civil servant like teachers, policeman and service officer in various government departments. Indeed, civil servants are paid lesser compared to the private sector employees. In addition, private have more benefits in terms of paid leaves, medical benefits and non-wage benefits. Although some may say that civil servants' jobs are "iron bowls “. But I can assure you that it is a wrong idea as the ineffective and inefficient people will be asked to leave the jobs. And most of the high ranking officers will have to pass through a lot of tests and trials before they can assume the positions. And their actions must be honest and clear as they represent the government, which give no leeway to mistake and abuse of power. Thus the civil servants must uphold a higher order of conscious and attitude.

Civil Servant don’t enjoy the following:1) No concession bus rides2) No concession MRT rides3) Bus fare up = they are affected5) Cab fare up = they are affected6) GST up = they are affected7) They pay taxes just like every other Singaporean8) They have never-ending work to do9) On top of doing work, they are cursed by Singaporeans who think civil servants are not affected by all those above.10) Subjected and must comply with the Civil Servant Instruction Manual which has several hundred pages.

This give us a idea that civil servants do not have more benefits. Instead they have to suffer more than others. Moreover, I feel that civil servants are very noble as they are willing to serve the community and their aim are not the money but the chance to serve us. So, the least we could do is to give them a small pay rise to overcome their needs.

Nowadays, the mass media do not report the news; they make the news.

Media is defined as organisations of various newspapers or television channels. I truly agree that some time they are making inaccurate reports. In my opinion, they have forgotten the most fundamental value of a member of the media - to report the truth and fact and nothing more. Nowadays, due to globalisation and opening of the societies, reporters are losing their focus and concentrating too much on the audience. They face strong competition and they hope to sell their papers well. So they want to publish articles that people are interested in and the norm are more fonds of scandals and information of celebrities' work and love life. For example, Chinese celebrity Jolin Tsai was to have affair with one of the male celebrity at one of the hotel. Although the manager of d came out to clarify the matter and rebuttal what the mediam plus evidence was shown to the public that the affair was just made belief, even how to now, the public have a deep impression of the "affair".

But the good thing that most of the news reported are true as they are being checked by the government agency which would not even tolerate one untrue statment. But in my opinin, the reporters and editors of the mass media should understand a important point that they are the bridge that link the world together. Thus it is important to be stand on the fence and not be biased to any of the sides, and if they are interested only in earning money and gaining fame, they should never be the "bridge". These are noble jobs that require a group of justice and upright people to uphold.

These have been cases that untrue reports were made and it caused a uproar in the world that causes serious harm to people. One of it would be the racial descmination that occur during the 1960-1970 when mass media(Malaysia) broadcast Malays in Singapore getting bullied. Althogh this was fake and the singapore government came out to clarify. It was to late and there was bad blood between the chinese and the malays which caused the race riot in singapore. Many people were injured and some even died.

This show us that it is thus very important for the mass media to make truthful report as their actions will affect the communities greatly.

1. “YouTube has no ethics, it's been created for the sole purpose of entertainment and money.” Do you agree?

In my opinion, i do not feel that way as youtube is just a video hosting and video sharing website. It all depends on how to users treat the website. Although some may seen it as a place to watch animes, movies, and MV (music videos), i see it as a database website. All the wonderful and interesting videos are kept there and the purpose of uploading these videos are a form of sharing and learning. You can learn alot of things such as learning to cook a proper meal using very limited resources, lifestyle of other countries people and even learn a skill through demostration videos uploaded there.

youtube is definitly a form of entertainment as we can access interesting videos such as magic tricks and

Some may say that the host earn money from hosting youtube and their purpose of hosting youtube is only for profits. I have to agree that the web host of youtube earn money through advertisment and contract with other company. But this is what they do for a living. You cannot expect them to not earn money. Then who is there to feed them and support them financially.

Emo Teenagers

After reading the articles, I have to admit that indeed a considerable sum of teenagers nowadays seems to become emo and perform self-inflicting acts. To most people, they might think that they are just crazy and have nothing better to do. But to view this problem deeper, I feel that this is due to the ever-changing society. In Singapore, everyone is aiming to excel in academic results or to be outstanding in their own fields. We belong in a competitive global world which cannot condemn mistakes and too self-centered. Thus when teenagers nowadays encounter problems, they have no one to fall back on and they considered themselves to be outcasted. And the most crucial problem that now the teenagers are going through a transition period (puberty) where not just the emotional but physical growth of the teenagers. At this point, the teenagers are confused and stressed; they need someone to show them the path to adulthood. These emo people are those that have no form of support and they go astray. Without any form of help, these emo teenagers use self-mutilation to communicate with the "outside world". Though we find them nonsensical and nuts, we have to realize that is we who cause their weird behaviour,

In order to solve this problem, I feel that we should offer a helping hand to them and engage in social activities with them and try to interact with them and get their moral thoughts back to track.