Century of the Self

I've been a fan of Adam Curtis for a while now, ever since I saw the video he did for Newswipe on what he called 'Oh Dearism'. Criminally, I've not seen Century of the Self before, so this was a great screening to go to this week.

It seemed a lot of what he talked about in the episode was almost exactly what was said in last weeks lecture, but it's good as that helped to solidify my knowledge. It was interesting to watch what he talked about as I really wasn't sure what perspective I agreed with the most. I'm still somewhat in that stage where I can't abide the government, so I liked the attitudes of Reagan where small government was the order of business. On the other hand, I recognise that people have a wonderful ability to cock everything up and need someone to guide them.

To me it all seemed a bit too absolute. Hippies saying that their way was correct and that the only way to live was to release your inner you and with pent up Freudians saying that inside people are monsters that need to be contained. Add to that capitalism saying that everything's up to YOU, the individual it made it all a bit too...clean.

To me, it seems that the purpose of these beliefs and philosophies is to try and strike a balance. With such extremes on either side, they should in theory ending up with most people finding a middle ground. Having too much regulation (or repression if you prefer) will lead to rebellion and with too much freedom people will take advantage, as we've found out with the banking crisis of late.

I'll certainly be watchiung the rest of The Century of the Self on YouTube. It's certainly illuminating.

'Oh Dearism' - The role of News Theatre in shaping the World

Adam Curtis, the news documentary film maker behind 'The Power of Nightmares' and 'The Century of the Self', created this short documentary film for Newswipe. He makes an excellent point on how the news has become a way in which the audience isn't driven to help people, but is actually driven into a state of apathy due to over-exposure of terrible events.

At face value, this may seem odd, as the dour presentation of the news in the past also did little to make people get up and act over the injustices of the world. However, the modern news industry has become so pre-occupied with the notion of 'bad news is good news' that images of starving children in Africa no longer stir the feelings in the public that there was after the Michael Buerk documentary on the Ethiopian famine of 1984-85.

Yes, there are still massive amounts of aid being given through money sent to charities from the public, but not that sense of guilt or overwhelming melancholy. People see these things on the television and donate a few pounds, but only to feel as though they're doing something about it and for their own peace of mind.