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Add to FavoritesHollywood has changed the world ten times over. The World has been through many things. The human race has been through many things. Even America has been through many things. Hollywood has a heartbeat and a life of its own. It has affected life in so many ways that it is very difficult to explain exactly why Hollywood's impact has been both negative and positive. Simply, it's just like the old saying "Yin-Yang." However I would say that although the effects that Hollywood has had on the world have been both positive and negative, the affect it has had on society and social behavior as well as education and intelligence has been overwhelmingly negative. Hollywood has grown so powerful and enormous that it has become like a living organism that feeds and grows off of the people and moves as one.
Now before I explain the impact that Hollywood has had on the world and the human mind, I would like to say I am from Fort Lee NJ, and you may not know this but my home town is the original Hollywood. Before they moved their studios out west to California, the movie-making business was centralized right where I grew up. Pretty cool when you think about it.
Hollywood has made countless films and grossed billions of dollars since it began, but with every film the artists who acted, directors who shot the scene and writers who wrote the script all influenced the minds of the observer. When a person watches a film he has accepted these images and sounds into his or her mind as thoughts. All thoughts are connected through the usage of neural passageways in the brain. When a person sees a horrific or sexual or beautiful image or sound it registers and stores these experiences as thoughts. These thoughts in accordance with chance and what I would call destiny or fate can easily influence a persons actions or beliefs either consciously or unconsciously whether we want them to or not. However our lives are not movies and our experiences are nothing short of amazing, but they are real nontheless. The question then becomes "What is true reality?" If we do not know what reality truly is, we can not know what the true impact of our actions can be. The question then becomes "What are we? and What is life truly all about?" I'm not going to explain my thoughts on those topics and related topics of that nature because this article is about Hollywoods impact on the world, but to understand why Hollywoods impact is so huge, we must understand the human mind and the three dimensional reality that we accept as true reality is actually an illusion that is simply put a smaller perspective of a larger reality or truth.
People are constantly being desensitzed to violence, crime, sex and drug use. Meanwhile our children are failing out of school at higher and higher numbers. The movie industry has not been the only contributing factor however. The televion networks many of them based in New York and all over the world aslo contribute to some of the problem, as well as the media outlets like televised news stations and the majority of newspapers. The problem that I speak of is constantly subverting the human mind from its full capacity. Constantly subjecting it to entertainment that is usually kept at a sixth grade level. Constantly introducing false ideas and misleading suggestions that can lead to misinterpretation of the truth. Constantly advertising bad food, sex, unhealthy vices, then it flaunts extravigant lifestyles and reality shows based on someone being humiliated.
I have seen some very inspirational people and ideas that have come out of Hollywood and the Television Industry but the positives are far outweighed by the negatives. The Movie and Television Industry has been one the best tools for mass mind manipulation. The fact that some people will go to unbelievable lengths to take pictures of movie stars because magazines will pay unthinkable prices for these photos shows that we have a problem with our perception of what is right and wrong, and what is true and what is just not important. Why do magazines want these pictures so bad? Because they know the masses are so brainwashed that they have to know what is happening in these celebrities life at all times. Teenage girls are looking up to these young Hollywood starlets and idolizing them in such a way that it stops them from thinking for themselves. They feel that they should imitate these girls because they are famous and rich. Mostly they are simply conforming. However besides the effect it has on the simple mind of a teenage girl, Hollywood also does a great job at pushing one-sided agendas. There are people out there who don't know anything other than what the T.V. tells them. People who are so uneducated they don't know anything about history, freedom or possibility. They don't know themselves, others, the world and just the way of life. Some people don't understand how action leads to reaction leads to consiquence, they don't understand cause leads to effect, and if you don't understand these things you can not see how Hollywood truly affects the world.
Learn more about this author, Joseph Marrero.
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Yes
Hollywood has a huge impact and unfortunately, I believe it to be negative. This is not only due to their enormous social responsibility, but also in political and economic issues by the simple nature of their presence. Their greatest audience is in young, impressionable persons who will look to characters on a screen or the people who play them for guidance. This not only leads to risky social interactions but irresponsible voting and work habits. Although I applaud the great work that many Hollywood icons perform for charitable causes, I feel it falls short in balancing the negative impact they produce through their own lifestyle and scripts based on sensational and immoral characters.
For many, the path they take in life is influenced by what they see on TV or in the movies. I have recently been a little alarmed at what I hear in Prime Time Sitcoms. Is it acceptable to discuss masturbation and frivolous sex on a TV show billed in the sitcom venue? Drunkenness is presented as "funny", not risky. The words carried in many Rap and Hip Hop rhythmic poetry (I cannot use the word song) is demeaning and vulgar as well as violent.
The most recent elections is an excellent example of how Hollywood can make a negative impact on our society. Working with the media, they influenced young people to vote for an individual with little or no experience. How many Hollywood personalities have college degrees at all or more particularly ones in Political Science or Economics? They have no right to take such public stands and influence impressionable people. Their own financial status, based on a glamour factor rather than work ethic, makes them ineligible because their lifestyle is so unlike the greatest portion of the population. Just because an actor plays a president on TV, doesn't mean he could be one or even has a great knowledge or how to be one.
Who has the most time to watch TV or go the movies? Adult working people with experience and responsibility who own their own opinions? No, it is the young and impressionable who are still seeking their own selves who are the greatest target of movies and television. In other words, they are more likely to vote base on the influence of an actor or the characters they play than on. They are going to dress like the people they see on popular magazine article and behave like celebrities. We are left with a person who will dress like Brittany Spears, vote like Susan Sarandon and behave like Joaquin Phoenix. This is not to say that these celebrities are always wrong but it most often their negative moments that the media tends to present.
This leads to the entire point of this article; that the influence of Hollywood is going to be inherently negative because trash sells. The media isn't interested in how hard these people work, how many sacrifices they make or whether or not their opinions have credibility. It is the bizarre and ridiculous that sells and that is what becomes and influence.
Free speech must remain but it would be of great benefit if it were free speech with consideration; consideration toward the values and goals of a positive society.
Learn more about this author, Carole Cox.
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