My sympathetic look at Angus - the man.

Gosh. I post this thing and it's a monster. Don't be overwhelmed. I just rambled through most of this...

In the assignment, it says that we had to look at this article by Ian Angus in a sympathetic way, understanding where the author is standing and what view he's taking. I read through the article a couple times, as I have to with every article I read in this class to be able to somewhat comprehend what in the world these guys are trying to get at...

Anyway, Angus looks at democracy today and is unhappy with what it has become, looking at the election signs, media domination, and millions of dollars used. This isn't all democracy is, it's not just the elections and the mass media representation of it. A democracy calls for full attention from the citizens that make up that democracy. In order to be an active citizen, you need to have the access to relevant information and you have to have informed decisions about political topics. Public discussion and debate are the inner workings of the fully-functional democracy. In order to be politically aware in a democracy, you need a form of communication that will get ideas out there to the public to look upon and debate. Since the birth of our nation, and the beginnings of many other nations, the forms of communication have grown from just public debates and printed material to tv and internet. These later forms of communication became important because it was becoming impossible for all citizens to meet together. Angus then brings up his argument that in order for democratic rule to continue in a nation, public discussion and debate is a nesessity, but the way citizens go about meeting changes as time goes on. Social participation and public participation require a meeting place and a one-on-one discussion/debate where citizens can exchange their views on certain topics. Contemporary media hands you already formed questions and don't allow the public to debate the political issues face-to-face. Tv does not allow the viewer to question the material presented. The news is selected, and could be leaving potentially important debatable topics out and throwing in fluff that doesn't have any meaning. Marketing, advertising and entertainment also take up so much time on these new contemporary media units.

Well, I've pretty much spit out what I read in the same exact terms. That's what sympathetic reading is, right? Understanding what the writer is saying and being able to pick out what the writer is telling you without all the big words. I might not have done this right... I'm definately looking forward to a group discussion on this one.

There were a couple quotes I wanted to pull from the text that I found interesting:

"Democracy requires a way of life in which the enemy is transformed into an adversary so that differences can be dealt with peaceably and argument can replace violence."

- In politics today, I don't think that parties can come together and debate one-on-one enough to understand eachother, thus the radical seperation between parties that seems to be widening as time goes on. People of a certain party seem to look upon someone from another party as 'the enemy'. (I'm sick of that...) The only debates I've seen between parties is on tv, mostly on Fox News or CNN, where one guy is in the studio, and the person they are talking to is on a split screen, talking to them from across the country. This is what Angus is talking about, I think, that the ways citizens used to communicate are gradually breaking apart due to new innovations in media, enabling people to discuss and debate from across the world. You can't discuss on a more personal level. But I also see it this way: some people have views and they stick to them, not even listening to what the other person has to say. That is not part of a democracy either, in my opinion.

"It depends on a common determination to maintain the bounds of mutual respect in social life."

- I had this underlined in my printed copy of the text, and I don't remember why at the moment... my eyes hurt and I'm tired, hopefully I'll remember why I thought this was interesting tomorrow for class.