Dear Mr. President...

Dear President Barrack Obama,

I would like to start of by saying, "Thank You!" for taking the time to read this letter. It has come to my attention, through a media literacy class I attended at the University of Vermont, that the media is strongly affecting our culture, and not in a positive way. Millions of people are consumed by media through television, billboards, internet, and a variety of other advertising mechanisms every day. People are wasting away years of their life surfing the internet and watching TV, and who is to benefit from all of this? The answer is a minute percentage of the population.; people who control big corporations such as Disney and NBC. Although this may lead to an economic gain within our country, the truth is we are seriously harming our own people, culture, and environment.
In a book I recently read, titled, "Culture Jam", (I highly recommend it) the author states, "The moment you fail to understand why the natural world might have relevance in the day-to-day lives of human beings, you become, to quote my physics teacher, 'a lost ball in high weeds.' Abandon nature and you abandon your sense of the divine. More than that, you lose track of who you are." While I applaud you for your efforts concerning the environment we need to understand that we also need to take into consideration the reason for why we are consuming so much and creating such massive environmental destruction to the Earth. We are bombarded by media everyday telling us what we should wear, who we should be, and what we need to buy to be that way. It's the media that has created the consumption habits and unless we put a control on the media we are going to continue to see environmental catastrophe no matter how much of a cap we put on green house emissions and driving hybrid cars.
Education also plays a role in stopping this. Several countries in Europe and Australia have incorporated Media Literacy classes into their public education system because they have seen the detrimental affects it has had on American society. Did you know, 9 out of 10 girls thinks their is something wrong with the way they look? It's not because they are female, it's because the media tells them their is something wrong with their body. If they don't look like a Barbie doll then they will never match up to societies standards, therefore, in their minds, fail at life. Rates of eating disorders like anorexia and bulimia have sky-rocketed since the creation of advertising and mass media. Before mass media there was no one telling girls how they should look other than their peers and family.
While one may say, "well that is just a product of technology and there is nothing we can do about it", the truth is is that we can. We can put bans on ads promoting violence, sex, and drugs. Why do you think our country is plagued by rapists and pedofiles and why porn is one of the number one industries? We have raised human beings that are addicted to sex. Even potato chips ads use sex to sell and their is no reason why you need sex to sell a potato chip, especially since children and teens see these ads and eat these potato chips.
I guess the bottom line is that we need to fix what we have created. We know that the environment is being harmed because of our consumption habits but it has harmed us as well. We are not the same people we used to be. Our culture is changing. We need to stand up for our own country and for ourselves as human beings. Our country was founded on activism so why not take a step in the name of our ancestors. I am sure they would be pretty disappointed if they saw us now. In order to do this we need your help. We need governmental pressure to create massive awareness. We need to hit every home in America. There needs to be laws on the media and education in the schools. If we lose this battle, we will lose ourselves. As Kalle Lasn, the author of "Culture Jam" puts it, " The loss of a language, tradition, or heritage- or the forgetting of one good idea-is as a big loss to future generations as a biological species going extinct." Do you want this to happen?

Sincerely, a deeply concerned citizen,

Amber Imm

Corporate Culture

Five Important Ideas from "Culture Jam"

1. Half of all exotic dancers were once beauty-pageant contestants. I find the crazy and believable all at the same time. It reminds me the show on TLC entitled, "Toddlers and Tiaras", where parents thrive in their childrens beauty making them look and act as if they are 16-25 years old when in reality they range from ages 3-16. Its sickening to watch, but then reading the statistic makes me realize how scary this show actually is.
   
2. I didn't know that products I buy at the store such as brussel sprouts (which I love) contain almost no trace of vitamins. I knew this was true of some products but not BRUSSEL SPROUTS!!!!
   
3. Flight attendants sometimes use Coke to unclog drains...I don't even want to know what that is doing to my intestines. Fortunately for me I don't drink soda very often
4. I think that if people actually believed that our environment and existence really is in danger, we would make drastic changes, but most humans fail to believe this, therefore, it will remain almost impossible for us a society to change. We need to change individually in order to change as a whole. This is something I struggle with from day to day as I do what I think is right but at the end of the day I feel hopeless due to all the other people that regret to realize the trouble we are in.
5. I realize that I am not abnormal and there are a lot of people just like me but we are an exception to the norm. We are the "uncool" of what most people think as cool and we are infact offsetting the media, which in my mind makes me feel pretty good!

The film, "Corporation", was very depressing to me. I couldn't believe that people don't actually understand the implications they are having on the environment. To see the tremendous amount of c0mpanies that have been fined for not complying with the law in order to make an even larger profit is astounding. There were companies there that you would not even think would do such a think to their customers. It gives me hope that their are people out there that do really care and that over time, each and every company can make an impact on another company. What this country really needs is stricter laws and better enforcement to make sure these laws are being followed. The fines also need to out-way the financial gain of breaking the law in the first place, which I don't always think is the case.

1. 
   

Consuming Culture

When i first started reading the book I felt it was a little extreme, however, as I kept reading I realized that the reason I thought it was so extreme is that, perhaps, I was afraid of the truth. I have grown up in this culture and have had not other to choice to unknowingly conform to this way of life. As I have grown up I have realized what the media has affected me and who I am, and while I may be conscious of this I am no different from anyone else. I have the same desires of wanting more than I really need. I want to wear nice clothes, I want to eat good food (probably too much of it) and I want to drive a nice car(which i don't but wish i did).
I agree with what Lasn concepts of how recognizing the environment may aid in helping alleviate some aspects of this. He writes, " Abandon nature and you abandon your sense of the divine. More than that, you lose track of who you are." I think that the main reason why I enjoy nature so much is that I can escape from the crazyness of real life and slow down. I don't feel rushed and I feel like I can actually breathe. I think understanding nature aids in understanding life and by that I mean what life is supposed to be like. Enjoyable.
I also really connected with what he said about our loss of language and culture. As mentioned in my memoir, I grew up in a very strong Inuit culture. Native cultures are being lost entirely as massive corporations are taking over their land and livelihood. Many of these people are forced to work for these corporations in order to make money. In one of my favorite quotes he writes, "The loss of a language, tradition or heritage- or the forgetting of one good idea-is a big loss to future generations as a biological species going extinct." Our culture has already been lost, but we are killing ourselves as a species. We are killing who we are. I feel like we have become strangers in our own bodies. It saddens me to think about where we will be in fifty years and how much more things can change. It makes me scared to have children because who knows what their childhood will be like. It has already changed so much since I was a child which was only twenty years ago.