#neil postman

[entheognosis]

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." "In 1984", Huxley added, "people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure." In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

Neil Postman

Collage by Joe Webb

#neil postman #culture

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Art: Collage by Joe Webb

* * * *

“What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." "In 1984", Huxley added, "people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure." In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.”

~Neil Postman

Book: Amusing Ourselves to Death :: by Neil Postman

#Amusing Ourselves to Death #Neil Postman #Joe Webb #book banning #book burning #Brave New World

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Inquiry is not a method of producing answers, it is a way of learning the answer is worth.

- Neil Postman

#postman #neil postman #quote #inquiry #critical thinking #thought #logic #deduction #learning #sherlock holmes #jeremy brett #knowledge

[chasematt-journal]

In response to gig-app companies that have left workers precarious and impoverished; punishing, gamified productivity regimes put in place by corporate behemoths like Amazon; the conquering of public life by private tech platforms; and the new epidemic of AI plagiarism, a coalition of New Luddites aims to reclaim an old and misunderstood label.

For The Atlantic; art direction by Ben Kothe

#matt chase #illustration #editorial #conceptual #photo illustration #tech #luddite #neil postman #AI #the atlantic

[sinigami]

"Öğretmenler, okulların doğasına uygun olan ardışık nitelikte ders kitapları yazarak ve sınıfları takvim yaşına göre düzenleyerek çocukluğun devrelerini icat ettiler. Bir çocuğun hangi yaşlarda ne öğrenebileceğine ve öğrenmesi gerektiğine ilişkin düşüncelerimiz, büyük ölçüde ardışık müfredat anlayışından kaynaklanmaktadır.

(...)

Okul müfredatı, okuryazarlık taleplerinin koşullarına tümüyle uydurulmak için tasarımlanmasından dolayı eğitimcilerin 'çocukluk doğası' ile matbaanın eğilimleri ya da yan etkileri arasındaki ilişki üzerine geniş ölçüde yorum yapmamış olmaları şaşırtıcıdır."

Çocukluğun Yokoluşu, Neil Postman

#çocukluğun yokoluşu #neil postman #kitap

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

“We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn't, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares. But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell's dark vision, there was another - slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. 

Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think. 

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we desire will ruin us." 

- Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business (1985)

#neil postman #amusing ourselves to death #1984 #brave new world #dystopia #visions of future horror #social control #public discourse #capitalist press #george orwell #aldous huxley

[karmaalwayswins]

oliSUNvia “Drowning in Entertainment: The Age of Distraction” (2023)

Video essay about mass media, the transition from print culture to visual culture, and our current age of distraction. 

Quote: “Arguably the most dangerous type of disinformation is that which creates the illusion of being informed, when they’re really being led away from knowledge.”

#olisunvia #age of distraction #print culture #visual culture #mass media #metaphor #neil postman #aldous huxley #george orwell #disinformation #social commentary #philosophy #video essay #video #2023

[1five1two]

It is not necessary to conceal anything from a public insensible to contradiction and narcotized by technological diversions.

Neil Postman

#quotes #neil postman #the public

[abjectionporn-blog]

#technopoly #Paul Goodman #neil postman

[shakespearenews]

The state of affairs, which indeed is equaled nowhere else in the world, can properly be called mass culture; its promoters are neither the masses nor their entertainers, but are those who try to entertain the masses with what once was an authentic object of culture, or to persuade them that Hamlet can be as entertaining as My Fair Lady, and educational as well. The danger of mass education is precisely that it may become very entertaining indeed; there are many great authors of the past who have survived centuries of oblivion and neglect, but it is still an open question whether they will be able to survive an entertaining version of what they have to say.

Hannah Arendt, "Mass Culture and Mass Media"

#shakespeare #william shakespeare #Hannah Arendt #neil postman #amusing ourselves to death #culture #mass culture #hamlet #my fair lady #media #mass media

[entheognosis]

If parents wish to preserve childhood for their own children, they must conceive of parenting as an act of rebellion against culture.

Neil Postman

#neil postman

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Right wing fascists have officially killed satire so this fun-for-the-whole-family game I drew 3 years ago is basically like an AI campaign platform generator for Republicans now. ::: [The Daily Don]

* * * *

When a population becomes distracted by trivia, when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of baby-talk, when, in short, a people become an audience, and their public business a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture-death is a clear possibility.

~Neil Postman (Book: Amusing Ourselves to Death) [Philo Thoughts]

#conspiracy theories #The Daily Don #political #Vaudeville #Neil Postman #amusing ourselves to death #Philo Thoughts

[lqb2quotes]

Once you have learned to ask questions – relevant and appropriate and substantial questions – you have learned how to learn and no one can keep you from learning whatever you want or need to know.

Neil Postman

#Neil Postman #ask #questions #relevant #substantial #learning #knowledge #wisdom

[travelbackintime]

Marshall McLuhan was once asked why the news on television is always bad news. He replied that it wasn't: the commercials are the good news.

Neil Postman, The disappearance of childhood

#neil postman

[cupsofsilver]

“In America, everyone is entitled to an opinion, and it is certainly useful to have a few when a pollster shows up. But these are opinions of a quite different roder from eighteenth- or nineteenth-century opinions. It is probably more accurate to call them emotions rather than opinions, which would account for the fact that they change from week to week, as the pollsters tell us. What is happening here is that television is altering the meaning of 'being informed' by creating a species of information that might properly be called disinformation. I am using this world almost in the precise sense in which it is used by spies in the CIA or KGB. Disinformation does not mean false information. It means misleading information--misplace, irrelevant, fragmented or superficial information--information that creates the illusion of knowing something but which in fact leads one away from knowing. In saying this, I do not mean to imply that television news deliberately aims to deprive Americans of a coherent, contextual understanding of their world. I mean to say that when news is packaged as entertainment, that is the inevitable result. And in saying that the television news show entertains but does not inform, I am saying something far more serious than that we are being deprived of authentic information. I am saying we are losing our sense of what it means to be well informed. Ignorance is always correctable. But what shall we do if we take ignorance to be knowledge?”

Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business

#quotes #words #misinformation #unreality #neil postman #amusing ourselves to death #discourse

[postersbykeith]

#quotes #Neil Postman #when a population becomes distracted #entertainment #baby-talk #vaudeville #culture-death