And yeah, I think we are probably in agreement as well (I worried about my muddled way of communicating my thoughts on this matter too).
And, to be honest, my original response was half-way inspired by a comment elsewhere that implied that these shows would desensitize americans to torture and make it that much easier to do it. Part of me thinks that it might make it more acceptable to reveal that we do it by having it depicted on tv, but I don't think it will result in people being actually any more or less likely to perform torture.
This makes a lot of sense. A characteristic of our society is that we like to pretend that we aren't ever the agents of evil, so whenever wrongdoing by the "good guys" is exposed there's often a "shoot the messenger" type of reaction. Shows like BSG, which allow the viewer to see the heroes in an ambiguous light, can help make a less black and white and more truthful view of the world acceptable. Now that's probably still muddled. *g* In short, I see what you are saying and I agree.
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Date: 2005-03-03 02:54 am (UTC)And yeah, I think we are probably in agreement as well (I worried about my muddled way of communicating my thoughts on this matter too).
And, to be honest, my original response was half-way inspired by a comment elsewhere that implied that these shows would desensitize americans to torture and make it that much easier to do it. Part of me thinks that it might make it more acceptable to reveal that we do it by having it depicted on tv, but I don't think it will result in people being actually any more or less likely to perform torture.
This makes a lot of sense. A characteristic of our society is that we like to pretend that we aren't ever the agents of evil, so whenever wrongdoing by the "good guys" is exposed there's often a "shoot the messenger" type of reaction. Shows like BSG, which allow the viewer to see the heroes in an ambiguous light, can help make a less black and white and more truthful view of the world acceptable. Now that's probably still muddled. *g* In short, I see what you are saying and I agree.