Television Culture and the Rise of Trump

April 3, 2016 - Grand Rapids, MI

I had an epiphany yesterday. Like many people around the world, I've been very curious about the cultural and political phenomenon that is Donald Trump in the primaries. I've wondered many times why people, including some good friends, see him so differently than I do.

A lot is being written about the Trump supporter demographic: that is not what I'm talking about here. The epiphany was about the similarity between Trump and his proposals for fixing what's "wrong" with America, and the way things get fixed or resolved in many video games, TV shows, and movies. Rarely do we see popular media advocating or modeling diplomacy or reflective reasoning for complex problem solving. Instead, what we see being used is violence or magically simplistic super-powers. Violence, in it's own twisted way, is "sexy," and it sells.

Trump's approach has an easily understandable "get 'er done" appeal. Isn't it amazing how many crimes or conflicts are resolved in the space of 1/2 to 2 hours? If only we could just send in the SEALS, eliminate the bad guys with nuclear bombing, use a gun or warship, or fists of fury, the world would be a safer and better place very quickly - right?  Is it surprising that the shows that depict this kind of conflict resolution are the ones that get the highest ratings and last as opposed to ones like "Manhattan," which very intelligently explores the complexity of developing and deploying atomic weapons, are cancelled after two seasons?

Understanding complex economic, political, social, geographic, and cultural realities requires "deep" reading and critical thinking. But this takes time and paying close attention to subtleties and nuance. Here is a prescient quote from the attached 2009 article, "The Importance of Deep Reading," by Maryanne Wolf and Mirit Barzillai.

"From a cognitive neuroscience perspective, the digital culture's reinforcement of rapid attentional shifts and multiple sources of distraction can short-circuit the development of the slower, more cognitively demanding comprehension processes that go into the formation of deep reading and deep thinking. If such a truncated development occurs, we may be spawning a culture so inured to sound bites and thought bites that it fosters neither critical analysis nor contemplative processes in its members. As technology visionary Edward Tenner (2006) remarked, it would be a shame if the very intellect that created this new technology was threatened by it."

Seeing the World through Words

This is a new blog. I enjoy writing and stimulating conversation so I plan to use it to make comments about current events, politics, religion, being in treatment for cancer, society, art, literature, philosophy, culture, and anything else of potential value that crosses my mind. I also enjoy making people laugh and encouraging critical thinking about issues and ideas. All of my adult life I have been fascinated with how ideas shape culture and vice versa so a lot of what I have to say will be informed by that.

I hope you enjoy this, find it stimulating, and throw in your own thoughts in the comments section or with a post on Facebook. My pledge to you is to try to keep the entries short and engaging so that you will want to read them and, if interested, dig deeper with your own research. I am of the strong opinion, thanks especially to my parents, that we have an obligation, first to ourselves and then to the communities to which we belong, to educate ourselves. This is part of my ongoing effort to do that by way of reflecting on and writing about things that are important and meaningful to all of us.

Oh, about the name. It's because my daughter Elsa once challenged me to summarize Thomas Cahill's book, "How the Irish Saved Civilization," in twenty-one words or less. Ever since then, it's been a standing requirement in our family that if I want to say something about anything I have to use that metric, if not literally, at least in spirit.