The Idea of Transgression in Media - Essay Example

THE IDEA OF TRANSGRESSION IN MEDIA By The Idea of Transgression in Media Introduction Transgression is really a very significant idea in the current digital world. Most of our society is created with boundaries and constraints, but since our cultures are highly subject to flux and uncertainty, people are currently finding it more challenging to determine where the constraints and boundaries lie. Governments have formulated censorship rules that tell us what can be seen on the media and cannot be seen. These rules also determine what can be said on the media and what cannot be said. Censorship is an international phenomenon. We regularly hear news of things being banned in some parts of the world for reasons, which seem meaningless to some people and necessity according to others. While each culture and each country set censorship rules of their media in one way or in a different manner, the cutoff or censorship level that defines what the media should show or should not show to the public is very different (Pember & Calvert 2010, p. 354). Countries also have different censorship types. One of the commonly used criteria of transgression in the media is age limits that hinders a group of people to view different media. For instance, people who are under eighteen years are prohibited to watch pornographic materials (Reeves 2008, p. 89). Sometimes transgression can be banning of certain taboos in a certain country and definition of such taboos would be in accordance with the governing body of that country. Therefore, although theyre different levels of censorship, there is a group of people, which complains that the government should remove all types of censorships. On the contrary, there is a group of proponents who emphasize that the idea of transgression in the media creates a balance on what should be said and written in the media (Chan &Qiu 2002, p. 46). Again, the critics of censorship rules claim that implementation of censorship rules poses threat to people’s right of speech. People are highly influenced by the information they receive on media and other information sources and therefore, there is a need to regulate what should be seen on the media and what should not be seen. However, people tend to forget that, despite the bias brought by media, there are also significant and educative information that we receive from the media. However, the fact is that, the media highly influence the societies negatively by portraying things as they actually are in order to keep their shows moving or when following a certain convention (Flew 2005, p. 45). As a result, in most times, the media feeds people with information that is entirely misleading and sometimes true. Through the media, people are manipulated in several unseen ways and therefore, most people find it difficult to put their full trust in the information aired by the media. Driven by popularity, money, most outlets of media report what they feel like reporting and not what people should really hear (the truth). The idea of transgression should be implemented on media to censor what is being broadcasted because of children. Children have impressionable premature minds that cannot differentiate between fake and real things. For instance, most of media shows contain higher amounts of violence that negatively affects young children’s perception (Villani 2011, p. 76). Instead of the media showing such violence, it should be making emphasis to enlighten children understand that killing other people is immoral and illegal. The media should not be given freedom to influence our children think that it is good to be heartless and start killing those who upset you. The media’s vivid broadcasting of violence gives children a false understanding of what is right and what is wrong. In addition, the casual view towards sex topics and pornographic materials is broadly giving young children extremely wrong ideas. Since our current education system does not give children approach towards sex, most children are currently making use internet and media to gain information about sex since they offer open platform of information (Ang & Nadarajan 2006, p. 48). There is also need to curb the open advertisement of alcohol and smoking done on television on a daily basis. This is because children learn from what they see and hear and failure to use the idea of transgression of our media coverages, the future generation will be completely deteriorated. The government should employ age restriction and all grounds of open media such as newspapers and television stations must restrict broadcasting of such topics. News broadcasters should consider the general audience age when broadcasting such topics. Governments should also transgress spread of false and wrong information. People should understand that whether something is a mere belief or hard fact, it remains to be a secondary matter. Fortunately, the media has enabled people to know and learn many things that are not taught in schools or by society elders. However, the fact that news broadcasters are fighting for their freedom of speech, they are crossing boarders and spreading the wrong information to the audience like wildfire (Johannen, Gomez & Gan 2004, p. 56). It has currently reached to a point where people cannot believe what they read from newspapers or hear from news channels. Media is anymore not an impartial observer, instead it has turned out to be a weapon that the more powerful people can benefit from. It has reached to a point where there is a need to determine whether what is published on papers and broadcasted is not malicious, actually newsworthy, and accurate (Bamman, OConnor & Smith 2012, p. 98). Media has the mandate of broadcasting political agendas, but the information spread should not be meant to influence citizens negatively. The information given about current events should have a balance. The media should not spread derogatory comments and violent speeches of speeches about a certain religion or race. There is no need of broadcasting hate speeches that can influence violence among the involved parties. This is because such information only incites people against the individual being said or the organization the individual associates him/herself with. For instance, political parties are the leading when it comes to using such media tactics. They use such tactics for selfish matters without knowing that they are actually ignoring the good of the societies. Some political leaders try to spread meaningless propagandas through the media an act that must be completely banned. Transgression and censorship rules will prevent public disrespect of any community or individual thus promoting political correctness (Bartels 2003, p. 268). The following is an example of a transgressive film that has gone beyond the boundaries. Like the other transgressive films, Philosophy of a Knife is a Japanese film that deals with the atrocities that are committed against the medical unit 731 of Chinese. The film follows the camp’s birth right up till its demise in the year 1945. Those who have ever watched this film give their testimony against the horror that the film has. Part reconstruction, part documentary, the film portrays a young nurse and a Japanese officer who is in dilemma of carrying out his duties and the love he has for a young Russian girl whom he feels a lot of deep sympathy. The horror in the film increases as the Japanese officer is forced to carry out experiments upon inmates who are organized in unit 731. It is recommended that before one watches the film “Philosophy of a Knife”, the viewer should have a beforehand knowhow of what they are about to watch. The transgressive sadism and brutality of this film deeply shocks the viewers unless they are aware and know what they expect from the depths of misery and horror of this film. Nevertheless, even when a viewer is ‘prepared’ before watching Philosophy of a Knife, this does not completely set him or her from the severe cruelty and pain of this film. There are some horror like sections in the film like the caesarean sections carried out to rip a woman’s fetus from her womb, chemical experiments, sexually transmitted diseases, and radiation experiments (Druckman & Parkin 2005, p. 1036). More than affecting, the films that are horrible like Philosophy of a Knife are transgressive. In addition, such films are transgressive because they teach young children violence since young minds learn from what they see and hear. This film work productively to undermine the feelings and expectations of the viewer. Most people argue that transgressive films threaten the status quo and misleads the viewers by doing surprising things. Films like Philosophy of a Knife are beyond all boundaries that are prescribed or set of morality, taste, censorship rules, or any tradition value and as a result shackle the minds of the viewers. Nowadays, transgressive cinema is frequently discussed as one of the isolated historical movements, largely restricted by many contemporary artists. Films like ‘Baby Doll’ by Tessa Hughes-Freeland, which is about systemic misogyny destructing the go-go club in New York and ‘My Nightmare’ by Richard Kern which involves a lot of sex graphics, urine-drinking rituals, and masturbation are examples of the transgressive films that have gone beyond the set boundaries (Posavac, Posavac & Weigel 2001, p. 325). What does it exactly mean for a film in today’s world to be transgressive? Most movies are currently being sold as shocking and other misleading such as the pornographic materials. Most of the current films sold have a very huge negative impact on the society due to the increased level of violence and gore. Other films have many sex graphics, which are misleading a large group of the youth (Jenks 2003, p. 54). The influence that transgressive media has caused to the psychological development of children and minds of many people is profound. Therefore, it is of great significance for the government to impose strict rules on media and physicians discuss the parents about the exposure of their children to the children. Parents should give guidance to their children about age appropriate media usage, including, video games, music, television, internet, and radio (Dollimore 2006, p. 57). The main goal of this idea is to explore both harmful and beneficial effects of media on the society. Dirty music videos should be completely banned due to their transgressive. This is because most of today’s music videos have huge negative behavioral impact with most of them desensitizing the viewers to violence and influencing teenagers to involve themselves to premature sex. Most research states that more than 75% of modern videos show sexually explicit materials and violence, mostly committed against women (Agliata & Tantleff-Dunn 2004, p. 13). The media should not be allowed to show these transgressive materials to the society. For instance, women are broadly portrayed in a condescending way, thus affecting the attitudes of children about sex roles (Wilcox & Laird 2010, p. 67). In addition, some media information reinforces false stereotypes, which are beyond its boundaries and should be banned. For instance, a detailed research of music videos, which was carried out, recently raised many concerns about their negative impacts on adolescents’ expectations on race, female-male relationships, and conflict resolution. Music lyrics have increasingly become explicit, with reference to violence, sex, and drugs. The current potential negative effects of today’s music videos put parents off guard to give guidance to their teenagers. Although parents are increasingly taking an active responsibility of monitoring the type of music videos their children are listening and watching, it is the mandate of the government to set censorship rules to ban production of such explosive media. The media should aim at broadcasting and airing significant and educative information and avoid transgressive materials. Most countries rank media as the core source of destructive information such as sex scenes, violence, and drug abuse. Instead of promoting immorality in the society, the media should be the leading in trying to reshape the current generation. For instance, media should influence sexual responsibility through the promotion of birth control measures, such as the use of condom. The debates of such relevant measures to the society should be broadly broadcasted via the media. Conclusion To sum it up, people are highly influenced by the information they receive on media and other information sources and therefore, there is need to regulate what should be seen on the media and what should not be seen. Based on the idea of transgression, the media has gone beyond the boundaries in many cases that have been discussed in this paper. It is, therefore, the role of our governments to set censorship rules that will govern what the media should pass to the audience and what it should not. Bibliography Agliata, D, &Tantleff-Dunn, S 2004, The impact of media exposure on males body image, Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 23(1), 7-22. Ang, PH, &Nadarajan, B 2006, Censorship and the Internet: a Singapore perspective, Communications of the ACM, 39(6), 42-78. Bamman, D, OConnor, B, & Smith, N 2012, Censorship and deletion practices in Chinese social media, First Monday, 17(3). 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