Seiter vs Jenkins on Media Effects

The first thing I thought when watching Bowling for Columbine and Paradise Lost is the sympathy Professor Jenkins would have for the murderers, and how he would try to figure out the reasoning behind what happened, rather than blaming the reasoning on things that are irrelevant. For example, they show the camera footage from Bowling for Columbine while playing the frantic sounding phone calls in the background. This makes this situation more horrifying for the viewers, and it also plants phone calls that may have been placed at any time, not necessarily at the moment being shown. In Paradise Lost, hard rock music begins to play when the children accused of murder are being interviewed. While I don’t doubt that the accused suspects are guilty, these specific scenes demonstrate how the media twists the way these suspects are viewed. There is also a scene in Paradise Lost where a man is in the church singing a song entitled “Whatever It Takes.” While this song is being played in the background, they are showing how “happy” the neighborhood is, and how religious everyone is, implying these children that committed the crime were worshiping Satan. I believe Professor Jenkins would make more of an effort to understand the children, rather than be quick to make an assumption related to their religious beliefs.

Seiter believes that parents and teachers should worry “less about the debilitating effects of television on affluent children and more about improving access to education for children against whom the odds are already stacked.” (12) She believes that more access to popular culture would open the childrens eyes to more possibilities and give them a better idea of reality, rather than a blocked off ignorant idea.  It is hard to say what her opinion would be on the case regarding the child murders in Paradise Lost, it is almost too much information for a child to be absorbing at a young age yet it is important to know what is happening in the world. It is important to see the way that media twists these stories in order to pick up on the false images media displays to sway the viewers opinion in the future.