Four Arguments for The Elimination of Television

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or fish...
or fish...
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By its nature, television conveys a narrow range of experience, according to Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television
By its nature, television conveys a narrow range of experience, according to Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television
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Representations of nature don't come across well on television. Not lobsters...
Representations of nature don't come across well on television. Not lobsters...
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Or warthogs...
Or warthogs...
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Or birds...
Or birds...
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Or monkeys...
Or monkeys...
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Humans are of potential interest to television, but not portrayals of pre-industrial human societies.
Humans are of potential interest to television, but not portrayals of pre-industrial human societies.
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Passivity and receptivity are the hallmarks of a mind adapted to watching television.
Passivity and receptivity are the hallmarks of a mind adapted to watching television.
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Some forms of culture come across well on television, while others do not.
Some forms of culture come across well on television, while others do not.
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A passive, receptive viewer ready for the messages beamed by television.
A passive, receptive viewer ready for the messages beamed by television.

If Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television has any basis in “authority,” it lies in the fifteen years I worked as a public relations and advertising executive. During that time, I learned that it is possible to speak through media directly into people’s heads and then, like some otherworldly magician, leave images inside that can cause people to do what they might otherwise never have thought to do.

At first I was amused by this power, then dazzled by it and fascinated with the minutiae of how it worked. Later, I tried to use mass media for what seemed worthwhile purposes, only to find it resistant and limited. I came to the conclusion that like other modern technologies which now surround our lives, advertising, television, and most mass media predetermine their own ultimate use and effect. In the end, I became horrified by them, as I observed the aberrations which they inevitably create in the world.

Adman Manque

In retrospect, I can see that an absurd little revolt against my family led me into advertising work. My parents wanted me to choose a profession or to take over my father’s business. They felt that while advertising was already a lucrative field by the time I was seeking a way into it in the late 1950s, it was still very chancy for Jewish boys. They were certainly right about that. Directly out of the Wharton School of Business and then Columbia Graduate Business School, I was denied a job in a Park Avenue ad agency because “your hair is a little kinky: you might want to try Seventh Avenue.” Seventh Avenue was what I was fleeing.

My parents carried the immigrants’ fears. Security was their primary value: all else was secondary. Both of them had escaped pogroms in Eastern Europe. My father’s career had followed the path familiar to so many New York immigrants. Lower East Side. Scant schooling. Street hustling. Hard work at anything to keep life together. Early marriage. Struggling out of poverty.

  • Published on Sep 1, 1978
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