In the final chunk of The Culture of Fear, Barry Glassner continues to express how the media pays little or no attention to research, statistics, and analysis conducted by scientists to prove that certain fears created by the media are false. Through the use of logical appeals, rhetorical questions, statistics, and anecdotes, Glassner further explains why people fear metaphoric diseases like Gulf War Syndrome, Multiple Chemical Sensitivity, and breast implants. Instead of using the research done by researchers and scientist on certain metaphoric diseases the media focuses and favors the anecdotes given by the victims since their story is more interesting and eye-opening. Glassner then explains how the media has placed the fear of plane crashes into people. Even though the likelihood of a plane crash is one in four million, the media connects together random, scattered events to provide false information which leads to decrease in certain businesses. In his final remarks, Glassner elucidates how the fear mongers are successfully able to promote fear among the American people. Glassner states that "Statements of alarm by newscasters and glorification of wannabe experts are two telltale tricks of the fear mongers' trade" along with "the use of poignant anecdotes in places of scientific evidence, the christening of isolated incidents as trends, and depictions of entire categories of people as innately dangerous." Glassner lastly urges Americans to redirect the funds that are given “largely [to] mythical hazards like…on prison cells occupied by people who pose little or no danger to others, on programs designed to protect young people from dangers that few of them ever face, on compensation for victims of metaphoric illnesses, and on technology to make airline travel safer” then it already is and give the funds to combat serious dangers that threaten numerous Americans. He also suggests that during elections they could “choose candidates that proffer programs rather than scares.”
Question
1. What are some other things that people fear that was not mentioned in the book and could be caused by fear mongers?
2.Can the media be the reason why some parents in America are afraid to get their children vaccinated?
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I think one thing he failed to mention was the fear of immigrants taking over the vast majority of jobs in the united states creating more unemployment which makes them an easy target to blame because immigrants come to the united states in in search of a better life and leave their home country because there are no jobs available and in some cases need money to feed the family and children. And ironically enough, the united states was founded on a mixture of cultures seeking the same thing immigrants nowadays are too.
ReplyDeleteI can't really remember if the Anti-Christ was mentioned or not but I think Americans are so afraid of the end of the world that they tend to point fingers at different people in office. Take Obama for example, i've heard that some people believe he is the Anti-Christ just because he is widely excepted amongst many different people.
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