Writing Feedback / Media essay - GRE (Issue Topic) [2]

"The media (books, film, music, television, for example) tend to create rather than reflect the values of a society."

Media is a forth power in our society. A person who posses the information posses the world. Different types of media is created and owned by a small group of people who can decide what type of information will be transmitted to the general audience. Media gives us a possibility to perceive the world around us. People who own different kinds of media, like our parents, can choose what amount of information will be given to us at particular time. However, this arguments mainly concern television, newspapers, magazines and more deep discussion is needed for the function of books, music and films in our society

The opponents of this argument can say that the media mainly concern the values that exist in our society, like freedom, love, fairness, respect. Such values are definitely the central notion of many books, songs, movies. Here we can mention the Brave Heart movie with Mel Gibson," War and Peace" by Lev Tolstoy, the reflection of black people mental conditions in the jazz music when they were slaves in America, the Beatles' songs that reflected the ideals of a new young population. However, in our dynamic information society even this types of the media are becoming to serve the function of manipulating the people's thoughts and values. For example, the books about Harry Potter, the Twilight movies, Lord of the Rings that are extremely popular nowadays do not reflect the existing values, they create a new ones on the examples that are totally new for our society. The same things can be said about the modern trends in music. The appearance of rap, hard rock influences the beginning of special types of culture. It is hard to state that in Ramstein songs we can find the values of our society. But we should admit that some part of modern music, books, films are concerned with the existing values of the society but their are less popular. Twilight movie which is about the relationship between young innocent girl and bad but good vampire is well-known in the world then the movies Shindler list.

All what said above is in some extend can be extrapolated on the other types of media like newspaper, internet, television. But here the function of creation the value is even more obvious. Owners of TV channels in Ukraine can manipulate the information shown on their channels and in this way chahge the perception of Ukrainian politicians in peoples' minds.

So, it is incorrect to say that nowadays the main function of the media is the value creation, but with the development of information this is becoming tdominative

Graduate / "Choice is an illusion" [2]

1. "Choice is an illusion. In reality, our lives are controlled by the society in which we live." 18.56
Choice is not an illusion, in real life we always have at least two possible alternatives: perform an action or do not do anything.
The problem of choice was and continues to be urgent for all generations during our history. Every day we make a choice what to wear, what to eat, where to go, how to have a rest. These problems mainly concern our daily life, but sometimes we could face a real hard problem which can be characterized by popular Hamlet's words" Be or not to be". In such situation, the solution is always too complicated, and the decision process depends on many existing external and internal constraints. For example, a young woman who just has born a child is thinking to refuse the right to be his mother. On the one hand she understand that due to the bad financial conditions or law level of maturity , or personal fear she will not be able to became a good mother, but on the other hand she was born in strict society where the refusal of women to grow up her child considered as inappropriate. What constraints will play the main role in her decision is highly subjective, because nowadays, even in the most conservative society we have examples of mothers who decided to leave her newborn child. For sure, the percentages of such choice will be lower than is society that is more liberal, but still it exist.

Without doubt, the society plays a very big and important role on our final choice, even when we are taking a decision what to wear in the morning before the job. The special rules accepted at our work plays influence on our decision. However, if I do not like it, I can always change my work place, where the rules will be more suitable for me. Of course, it cannot be the final factor in changing my job, but this example shows that we always have an alternative. We should not complain, that there is no alternative, we should look for it.

The problem of choice can be a little complicated for children because they do not have such freedom like adults. Children are always under the influence of people and conditions that surrounds them. Very often, their parents instead of them make the choice, because parents think that they know what will be better for their child. In some situation, it can be true, but there is nothing ideal in our world, and even our parents can mistake what is better for us. My friend father always wanted to see her son to become a football player. From four ages, he go to football school every Saturday, but deep in his hard he was dreaming about the ballet. Mike was wasting time playing football while dreaming about ballet and his father continued to be stubborn and did not allow mike to make his dream come true. However, another friend Katya was allowed to attend the classes in skating despite the fact that her mother and father was a well-known physics, and wanted Katya to follow their path.

We always have a choice, no matter how hard is the situation. The consequences could be different, they moral value can vary, but it does not mean that we are not free in our choice. When Eva ate the forbidden apple, she made her choice. Children whose parents are alcohol addicted, do not necessary will follow them. To follow them means to take the easiest path, but not to do that is a hard decision that requires a lot of efforts.

I absolutely disagree with the statement that we should blame the society in all our misfortunes. We create the society, and we create the rules, because the society consists of individuals who can choose what society they want.