Keaton Davis H1, Midterm Post (1/4)

PHILOSOPHY, THEN AND NOW

Keaton Davis

H1 Group 4

Midterm 

INTRODUCTION:

For decades, television has provided America's population with mind-numbing entertainment, wallet-lightening advertising, and depression-heightening news that leave viewers discussing, pontificating, and sleeping for hours after the tube is turned off.

Thanks to TV, elections are won and lost; careers are made and broken; trends are set and banished; and the list goes on.  

However, television's role is not only to influence the outside world, but also to provide a glimpse of the prevailing thoughts of the day.  If living our lives is not enough, we love to watch our lives play out on the TV screen just so we can say, "Haha, that's how our family acts!" or "Psh, totes just like my teacher at school, yo."  Where else does television get its material but from the world in which it was created?  

This series of four blog posts is going to take a general look at television and its relationship with the social philosophical trends of the day, from the 1950s up to now.  Each episode will focus on a particular subject, using TV shows from different decades to see how the views of said subject have changed over the years.  While I realize not every show matches up with the social norms of its respective era, one must look at the overall context of the day and go from there.  I hope this series will shed light on the ever-changing philosophical ideals of America, AS SEEN ON TV.  

SEASON 1, EPISODE 1: "WHAT MINORITIES?"

Back in the day, one would not normally find a show that had white, black, Asian, and Hispanic people as its minor characters, let alone its lead roles.  No, you basically had white people, with the occasional black person thrown in.  Shows were not trying to make a statement by excluding different nationalities from their cast, they were just sticking to the status quo.  

Take good ole The Andy Griffith Show, for example, which was set in 1960s North Carolina and featured an all-white cast.  The growing influence of the civil rights movement did not break through the TV screen into the town of Mayberry, which was almost virtually free of any race but white people.  Looking back, Andy Griffith said he regretted not casting a black person as part of the regular cast.  However, that time in America's history was not necessarily conducive to having a successful black counterpart in a show set in the South. 

Most racially equivalent part of 

The Andy Griffith Show: 

filmed in "black and white" in its 

early seasons. D'ya get it?

Another show set around this period was Happy Days.  The show was set in the 50s and 60s even though it was made in the 70s and 80s.  Dealing with the everyday challenges of college-bound high school students, this show typically avoided the racial issues that dominated the day.  So, does this mean the show was just trying to do a good job at accurately depicting the atmosphere of that era in American history, one without strong black people?  Or, was it just following suit with the previous decades and choosing to exclude black people in the cast?  Well, the title of the show implies "the good ole days," a time when blacks were suppressed and other racial horrors were commonplace.  This leads me to think it was a combination of both.  The civil rights movement was still going on until around 1980, so Happy Days may have been one of the last shows to keep the White man in power while ignoring other races.  

Hmm, there's a white guy, a white girl, 

another white guy...

is there a pattern here?

Not until the 70s, 80s, and 90s did we see more black people taking lead roles in TV shows.  However, some shows took their black cast as seriously as their white-heavy predecessors.  

Ever heard of Bill Cosby?  Yeah, me neither....

This wildly successful comedian and actor starred in many shows, but the most popular one was his sitcom, The Cosby Show, which follows an upper middle class black family as they live their hectic yet comfortable lives in the 1980s.  This show dominated in the ratings, and is said to be one of the last shows to be watched by such a wide audience — today's shows cater to more specific audiences than in the past.  While this show was great in that it showed how black people were more accepted in America, it almost did too good a job.  According to Jump Cut, an online journal on film and television, shows like The Cosby Show added to the already growing belief that nothing more really needed to be done to provide greater equality to the black population.  "Clearly, they are doing well for themselves," one would say as they observed Dr. Huxtable (Cosby) interact with his well-dressed family in his nice townhouse.  Even though the show had an all black main cast (and only a few white supporting characters), Cosby made a point not to bring up the issue of racism, because he did not want to alienate the white viewers.  Would it have made a difference if one of the characters made a remark about whites vs. blacks or if there was an episode devoted to racial equality? Who knows?  

Where'd all the white people go?

CONCLUSION

TV back in the day definitely showed a picture of the racial inequality that plagued the nation.  However, it depicted a cleaned-up, watered-down version.  The only real noticeable connection was the color (or lack thereof) of the cast.  As the nation began to adopt a more multiculturalist flavor, political and social changes out-of-doors eventually found themselves inside the little glowing boxes placed in the center of most living rooms in the country.  Whether every show was as effective as it wanted to be is not certain, but both the real world and the TV world helped push changes along that would lead us to where we are today in racial equality.

TUNE IN TOMORROW FOR SEASON 1, EPISODE 2: 

"OH! THOSE MINORITIES..."

Join me as I explore another example of a one-race main cast, along with other shows that introduce different minorities!  Will these new shows live up to their expectations?  Find out tomorrow on AS SEEN ON TV!