Via the Merrian-Webster Online Dictionary:
Rudder
1 : an underwater blade that is positioned at the stern of a boat or ship and controlled by its helm and that when turned causes the vessel’s head to turn in the same direction
The same can be said about words. Influential figures in history have used their words to steer a whole country in one direction or another. Hitler stirred up German nationalism and uprising for World War II while simultaneously Winston Churchill inspired a whole country of Englishmen to stand up and fight for their beloved England. These are just two examples of when words were extremely important and influential to the world’s history. Their tongues, like rudders, steered countries in a new direction, War. The media works exactly the same way.
Rupert Brooke wrote poems to inspire people in the same way. His eloquent words telling of the heroism of his fellow countrymen can make even some of the most anti-war citizens feel a strong sense of pride and nationalism. This is accomplished with poems of vivid imagery that set your mind to see glorified death for the righteous cause of keeping your country safe. Never is this more prominent than in Brooke’s poem, “The Soldier”.
I don’t know about you, but that poem makes me even proud to be English… and I’m not. The way the words are presented so carefully and the poem is constructed to make death less frightening makes it all too easy to buy in to the product. It is the same way Billy Mays made me believe Mighty Putty could seal someone up after heart surgery! Obviously I’m joking, but I think you get the point.
That is just how important the media is in influencing people, or even a country. Everyday the news reports from what we can only hope is an unbiased fashion, but let’s face it, this isn’t a perfect world, unicorns don’t exist, and Elvis has (probably) left the building. It’s unfortunate that we should have to be skeptical of the news we’re reported or the information we are fed, but we do.
The metaphor of a tongue being a rudder is quite an original idea. You bring up a very valid argument. In the way that a rudder steers a boat a tongue, being the media, directs everything that the general public feels, thinks and is informed of. It is strange to imagine that we are all in this boat simply drifting along… in some ways you could even say that it is going down. Your post really alludes to the fact that in many ways we are all helpless to barrage of information that we are left to sort through. In this kind of arena it is so hard to know the truth of things. Being misinformed often leads to many having feelings that don’t truly represent how they feel. i just wonder what needs to be done so that we can finally get the whole truth. We need that whole truth to understand our world better and right now we are, as you allude to, drifting.
Comment by brenbernard — October 29, 2009 @ 3:14 am |