Emma's Blog

The cultivation theory is the way that TV is affecting the way we see our surroundings and live our lives. What we see on TV we end up seeing in the real world as normal. The theory was created by George Gerbner who was born in Hungary in 1919. He was born when fascism was taking over Europe. He was exposed to it at such a young age that he grew up wanting to learn more about it. The video of John Oliver was really showing the cultivation theory at work. For example, he explained how we see so much torture in action movies that we suddenly think it is okay to do to terrorists even though most of the time it doesn't provide reliable information.

There are many things that explain moral panic. Moral panic can be described as something that makes a mass amount of people scared about something. In popular culture, this includes all of the media and what they say about certain things. The Momo Challenge is just one of the examples. Parents thought that this thing was making kids kill themselves and parents started freaking out. The parents started showing their kids the picture of Momo to have them stay away from it, but it ended up doing more damage to the kids because it scared them so much.

There are many things that can be important throughout this whole video. One main point that stood out is that being famous is going to make you happier. People think that because celebrities have money, they are happy, when in reality that isn't true at all. Another main point that caught my attention is that most people that want to become famous are from all different lifestyles. They seek a higher lifestyle and so they use all of their money to go to the modeling shows in New York and go to agencies where they think that they are going to get famous. In reality, like Timothy Caulfield says, the chances are very very slim. The last thing that jumped out to me is that becoming famous is all chance. You do not have to be the best singer or the best dancer to become famous. It is more a chance of opportunity and what comes your way. In the reading, Inside the Star Machine , it states "A star can't land a major endorsement without the media creating his or her public profil...