For my first artifact I decided to watch an hour of television. I chose to watch the 16th episode in the fourth season of Gossip Girl. Gossip girl is a dramatized show that revolves all around life in the Upper East Side of New York. It focuses on many stories of multiple people - young and old alike. Through many schemes and large amounts of drama we come to learn, as viewers, how all of these characters are connected by events that have happened in their past.
This episode reveals how broken life is in the empire where we allow society to run our lives. Many characters exemplify this throughout the episode. The character of Blair earns a prestigious spot for a new internship. Her boss tells her that she needs to dedicate her life to everything fashion and society constantly tells her what she is doing isn't good enough. Through the struggle to try and please not only her boss, but society as well, Blair disappoints her mom, gets in arguments with her best friends, loses many hours of sleep and eventually ends up getting fired. Like Blair, we get caught up in what society tells us is important. For our best interest we cannot allow the empire to run our lives in this manner. We need to learn to discern what actions help us to promote the Kingdom of God and what actions do not. If we do not learn this skill we are the ones who end up suffering in the long run. Another character that shows the affect the empire has on the world is the character of Lily. To protect her daughter, Serena, Lily tells an extravagant lie that sends an innocent man to prison. She goes years without addressing this issue with her children and acts like it doesn't exist. Society has taught us that being selfish and fighting for all of our own best interests at the sake of others is perfectly okay. It has taught us that if we don’t think about our mistakes then those mistakes aren't really affecting us or the people around us. When we let the empire get control of our actions and our thoughts we become more selfish and ignorant.
Considering we are already so deeply rooted in the empire and what society demands of us, how can we work on getting ourselves out of this rut? These cases represented by Gossip Girl are a little bit dramatic, what are ways we allow the empire and society to run our lives on a much smaller scale?
The struggle against the empire is often a common theme in television shows such as the one you viewed. I myself am a fan of several shows in which the characters are presented with an obstacle of empire life. We are so deeply drawn into life of the empire it seems almost erratic to not give into its demands.It is true that in this show the situations have been exaggerated but we can still relate the struggles to our own lives.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing about Gossip Girl, Kassie. I haven't seen Gossip Girl, but I'm curious whether Lily experiences any negative consequences as a result of her lie. If not, the show would seem to affirm lying to protect our self-interests. If so, the truth might be telling the truth about the consequences of selfishness and deception. Also, were there ads shown during the show? If so, I'm curious what the ads during Gossip Girl assume about their audience. What is the target market?
ReplyDeleteLily never really got in trouble for her lie. There were moments where she had scares, but overall she was protected. The only real consequence was the anger of her children after they found out but even that subsided. To be honest I watched the show online by a host site. Therefore I had no ads during the show. On the side bar there were some ads about dating sites and what not which I guess can show that Gossip Girl is trying to target younger adults.
Delete