Kendal Holzman, 25, and Abby VonFeldt, 21, reach for each other’s hands and intertwine their fingers after Holzman pulls out a cigarette and lights it. The two girls are days away from their one-year anniversary and just finished their first Easter dinner with VonFeldt’s family. Holzman says that they met on a website called Ok Cupid. While Holzman was initially hesitant to use a dating website to find a girlfriend, she says that her relationship with VonFeldt would not have been possible by any other means because they would have been “too shy” to approach each other at a club or in any other social situation.
Among dating websites, many new forms of media have emerged during the digital era that society is currently in the midst of. Some of these media include, but are not limited to: social networking websites, new forms of advertising, interactive media such as the iPad, search engines such as Google, news websites and new kinds of television programming. Media is becoming so prominent and intertwined with society that some people seem to overlook it or misinterpret its effects. Others rely on it, for social lives and work.
The media has held a place in history since it began. However, until recently the media was viewed in specific forms. From the emergence of newspapers, radio, and television, people were either users of these media, or they weren’t, as simply as that. Today, the media is so prominent and diverse in form that there is very little that can be done to avoid it. This poses the question: does a person’s opinion about today’s media system or their media outlets of choice create a cultural division of opinion or lifestyle between those who differ in their media preferences?
Reasons for Resistance
Although Holzman and VonFeldt give the media credit for their loving relationship, they feel that, in general, the media today is a destructive force. Both women are minimalists, and use, let alone own, very few media technologies. However, they both find a need for it for schoolwork. Holzman is a student at Red Rocks Community College and VonFeldt is a student at Metropolitan State College of Denver.
While both women use the media minimally for required schoolwork and the occasional social networking, they both feel that they need to resist it, because media today serves more as a “status symbol” than a form of intellectual progression. Holzman compares technologies such as an iPad to other social status symbols such as luxury cars and clothing.
VonFeldt says, “Let’s go out on a limb and say we lost all technology today. Tomorrow, Mercedes Benz will be worth next to nothing. Maybe as scrap metal but not as a status symbol, because of media’s influence. I venture to say that the media equals social script. It’s become that. It didn’t used to be that way. But because media is everywhere, that’s all we see and therefore, it basically tells us what we have to wear, how we have to look, what we’re supposed to say, how we’re supposed to talk, how we walk, where we go to school, who we congregate with, who our friends are…”
Holzman agrees with VonFeldt. She feels that a life without a prominent media influence would result in a more genuine and individualized life. She believes that media also creates a more impersonal social experience. Holzman says, “I have, what, 420 Facebook friends? How many of those people do I actually see and actually hang out with? If I were to run into them on the street would I actually recognize them?”
Media is Meant for Consumption
Despite the impersonal view of social networking, some people believe that such media technologies are actually productive towards our advancement as a species. Colin Riebel, 22, says that logs onto his Twitter and Facebook accounts right when he wakes up every morning so that he can observe what has happened in the world while he was asleep. As a consumer of the media and a professional within the industry, he finds relevance and importance within all media outlets, no matter what the purpose for using it is.
“I'm a major consumer of media, both in the traditional sense that I enjoy media for entertainment, news, and the like. However, I'm also a major social media person,” says Riebel.
Riebel is a professional in the media industry. He works as a lighting and sound designer, master electrician, console programmer and editor for the stage performance industry. He says that this is the reason that he uses and appreciates the media so much. Modern media, he says, makes his job about five times faster than it did with the old technologies he learned to use in high school.
Digital media, Riebel says, is an overall benefit to society. “Access to the net has improved schools’ abilities to teach. Net access has ensured that important systems and information doesn’t live in one place, thus creating redundancy, and daily technological advancements keep solving issues that once plagued society. There may be some drawbacks, but they are far, far, far outweighed by the positives.”
Use It, But Question It
Another prominent professional in the media industry is Justin Herrman, 29. Herrman is a graphic artist, and an avid user of the Internet. He jokingly says that he makes media while simultaneously observing the media. However, Justin feels a certain sense of bitterness towards the media, because he feels like new technologies will be detrimental to the generations of people who grow up without any knowledge of a life without them.
Herrman believes that new media technologies are creating a generation of people that are just growing to be scared of the world around them, by providing instant gratification, a sense of detachment from the world and impersonal bonds with the people they connect with through social networking. Herrman says that people growing up with modern technology are “screwed,” because if you grow into technologies with knowledge of life without it, you appreciate it. But, if you grow up with these technologies, you’ll never appreciate the world without it.
Living Without the Media
Although some, like Herrman, use digital media but are somewhat skeptical, some people feel the need to resist it altogether. Among these people is Stephanie Gipson, 22. Gipson is a college student at CU Boulder. She acknowledges that she uses media for school on a daily basis. However, she feels strongly that the media is a generally negative entity, and resists its social pull for personal reasons.
Gipson says that she likes to live her life in isolation from the outside world. It gives her more time to focus on her own life, and not constantly worry about the “horrible ridiculous things that are going on on a daily basis.” However, she says that she does catch on to current events through word-of-mouth from her friends, and from her media-related guilty pleasure, Facebook. She claims that she doesn’t use Facebook as a way to seek out the news, but as a mindless distraction from homework.
Does Gipson feel that her detachment from the media separates her from those such as Riebel, who relies on the media for every aspect of his life? She says that the answer is no. “I don’t feel separated from people my age by any means, the problems going on in the world are not really a concern for a lot of college students because we haven’t really entered the ‘real world’ yet.”
Another major issue in the media, according to Gipson, is that the media “dumbs down society” by imposing entertainment such as reality television and sports as a distraction on human minds, so that they “don’t have time to think about how messed up society really is.”
Riebel surfs through various websites on his laptop, checking out the latest tweets on Twitter and verifying the facts through other, more credible sources. He believes that this is the best way to receive news as quickly as possible, so long as you have the resources to back the information up.
Riebel’s thoughts about credibility may put Gipson’s mind at ease. She expresses concern that the use of the Internet damages the credibility of the information that one learns, but Riebel has expressed useable methods towards overcoming this credibility issue.
The Many Meanings of "Media"
It seems that the structure of today’s media is so far-stretched that even mentioning the word “media” brings many different topics and feelings to surface from different people. Some feel that it is important and productive and others feel that it is harmful and detrimental to society. However, it seems that, in one way or another, the media is a dominating force in everyone’s life, regardless of each personal opinion about it.
Holzman and VonFeldt don’t fail to recognize the changes that have taken place in the media over the span of even the past 10 years. Holzman says that 10 years ago, the media held minimal influence over society, but “Now it can control us through every mean. I mean it’s not just the car you drive or the house that you own like it was ten years ago. Now it’s the TV, the computer, the phone, the car or the house, the cell phone, the shoes, the shirt, I mean it’s down to everything.”
“Every little aspect of what we used to call personal identity is now shaped by media,” says VonFeldt.
“And even though we don’t necessarily agree with it we all do it. I mean, I’m sitting here wearing a Volcom hoodie,” says Holzman.
Holzman puts out her cigarette and says that she and VonFeldt need to go inside and clean up the kitchen before VonFeldt’s mom wakes up from her nap. They walk inside, and instead of turning on the television, sounds of continued conversation emerge from the house, as if the two lovers are trying to personally make up for the impersonal way in which they met.
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