It is Halloween. Dust blankets the sky as families across the nation settle around their radios to hear the night’s broadcast. The orchestral music of the Mercury Theatre is suddenly interrupted; a news flash. A meteor is reported to have made an impact somewhere in New Jersey. The music returns. Again, there is an interruption. Over the next hour a series of news reports imparts on an unsuspecting audience the horrible details of the monumentally disastrous events unfolding in their own backyards. Strange beings, believed to originate from Mars, have descended with an armada of ships. The Martians have begun a campaign of complete destruction in the states of New York and New Jersey. They clearly are intent on conquering the planet. Their motives are unfathomable.
”The War of the Worlds”, presented by Orsen Wells in 1938, incited a wave of mass hysteria which blazed through the United States. Listeners, apparently, had either ignored or never heard the announcements declaring the broadcast’s fictional nature. People fled into the streets. Their faces wrapped in damp towels to protect against poisonous gasses. Police stations and news bureaus were swamped with calls from those anxiously awaiting verification of the “report”. They pleaded for instructions on how to evacuate the major cities to save as many lives as possible from these exotic invaders.
Perhaps this event is an example of media influence in the extreme. Nevertheless, it is a clear indication that, consciously or subconsciously, the media has an affect on audiences and plays a role in the public’s decision-making.
The media has a tendency not to reflect public opinion, but rather to project a quasi version of public life, perverted to benefit the producer. Just such an opinion was once expressed by Theodore Adorno, a German philosopher, in his book Minima Moralia (1974). “The culture industry not so much adapts to the reactions of his customers as counterfeits them.” Herein lays the basis of the advertising industry. Agencies attempt to sell their products to the public by convincing them that it is the quintessential item, that this brilliant invention has already improved the lives of many. Every time a name-brand product is chosen because of the brand, the media has succeeded in affecting that person’s opinions and decisions.
Media influence is now an integral part of day to day life and modern culture. The effects of the industry are not always as apparent as riots sparked by fantastic radio broadcasts. They are more often seen in more subdued and subtle ways, caught in the mundane choices of everyday life. The media is a gateway of ideas, a thoroughfare of human thought and opinion. As this wave of ideas is received it is absolutely no wonder that a viewer would be moved, his opinions changed, beliefs challenged, and his decisions affected.
