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Truth About Lies: The Tube Is Reality

A Video by Nicholas Fraser & Michael Jones


American television is primarily an entertainment medium which shouldn't peddle politics or morals to its huge audience. But network programming is created to sell advertisers' products. In turn, the companies providing the advertising revenues want the networks to create conflict-free, optimistic, and bland "realities" that won't raise anxieties or doubts about American life or values.

Does such covert and pervasive control represent the genuine "American Dream," or is it a fantasy of lies? During prime time, the television viewer's world is freed of religious, political, and ethnic differences. Emotions and personalities leave no room for ideals or politics. Even shows like The Simpsons which attempt some social satire, work within boundaries that call for conflict resolutions by each episode's end.

THE TUBE IS REALITY questions broadcast utopia's influence on viewers as it examines a world which has little to do with reality and perhaps much more to do with the dispensation of comforting ideological lies - a tactic often employed in totalitarian societies.

"Quickly shifting clips of product commercials, popular programming, and political campaigning illustrate points made by scholars, advertisers, and network executives on the role of TV in this thought provoking production... an eye-opening look at the power of television to reflect and shape American culture... [a] surefire discussion starter." - Booklist

52 minutes / color / 1991
Sale/video: $390
Rental/video: $75

 


Subject areas: Advertising & Marketing, American Studies, Communications, Human Rights, Journalism, Media Studies, North America, Sociology

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The Tube: Have the physiological effects of watching TV been kept secret for decades? A journalist penetrates the heart of the TV and advertising industries in Europe, Japan, and the U.S. to find out.


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Last updated 09/01/2006