"Amusing Ourselves to Death"

(Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business)
-by neil postman
1985
In the first lincoln/douglas debate, abe had ninety minutes to respond to douglas's hour-long opening speech. Then stephen got to speak again. Any points they made were specific, contextualized, and comprehensive. By their standards, the event was short; an earlier debate had lasted seven hours. Any chance politics might return to that format?
Postman's book, about the degradation of public discourse in the television age, is not exactly what you might expect. Neil's point is not that cheesy sitcoms and mindless dramas are sucking our brains out, but rather that in an age when television has become the essential conduit of our interaction with the world, everything becomes entertainment. TV has to look good for ninety seconds, while leaving our minds clear for the next segment. It's not junk TV that's killing us, it's news programs, Sesame Street, and commercials. It's Jeopardy (and its moron cousin, Trivial Pursuit). It's religious programs - at least in the past, their leaders were people of deep study and earnest intent. Now, they're teflon talking heads angling for a guest spot on SNL. Have you heard of the Dunkers? Their one commandment, had they been immodest enough to declare it, would have been "Thou shalt not print thy principles, lest thee be entrapped by them". Gee, i wonder why they died out?
Postman analyzes the history of mass communication, to deconstruct how each revolution changed not only how we disseminate information, but how we think. The telegraph laid the foundation for our all-encompassing "what's next?" mindset.
Neil compares the dystopian visions of orwell and huxley, and argues that "Brave New World" was much more prescient for a species moving into the "information age" (a conclusion huxley himself came to in "Brave New World Revisited").
A point neil might make were he around today - is it possible that the much-lamented decline of America's schools is not simply about budgetary neglect or the world catching up, but also the inevitable fruits of America's charge into the television age? Are we first in dumbing ourselves down?
And what would neil make of the "golden" era of reality television? Oy.
I'm almost embarrassed it took me this long to get around to reading this book, even with roger waters' subtle exhortation. It's scathing, and deserving of a spot on any list of books every thinking humyn must read.