Race and Television - Essay Example

TV promotes racism in disguise. Racism is tagged as humor to make it sound acceptable to the audience. Racial concepts are inculcated in our minds as a secondary outcome while the prime focus remains upon the comedy. On the other hand, real-life racial interactions are much more hostile and obviously offensive in nature. Real-life racial interactions include frequent use of abusive language and bullying, that is either physical or verbal or both. The fictional views projected on TV assume great tendency to influence our personal interactions.

“Just as people can develop their views about others through dialogue and interaction with others in society, the same types of outcomes can emerge based simply on watching television” (Mastro, Behm-Morawitz, and Kopacz, 2008). In my childhood, I tried to maintain distance from my blonde class fellows because they were stereotyped as fools in certain cartoon series. Nevertheless, over the time, I have become more critical in my analysis of the validity of the information provided about specific ethnicities and races on TV, which is why I am not as influenced now as I used to be before.