Youngsters will benefit if media is constructive in its content

19 February, 2011

Media in any democratic country is influential. With influence comes power and responsibility. The Indian media has power but lacks responsibility, and needs to be positive and sensitive as it is consumed daily by young people of the country.

MEDIA HAS a greater impact on the younger generation than the school or family. Different mediums of media influence the young generation including television, radio, internet, newspapers, magazines, books, broadcasting and text publishers.

All these manipulate youngsters when it comes to culture, politics, social life, religion, fashion, education, sports, and other interests. The media plays a substantial role in the building of attitudes, behaviour and physical aspects of youth today.

Almost each teenager has a TV in cities and even in less developed areas, and he may watch it for hours together to watch a show, a movie or to find out any interesting information in the discovery channel.

But they are not realizing that the TV them what they want to see and not what they are supposed to see. Nowadays, TV focuses more on entertainment (we cannot deny that) although the three pillars of media are: information, education and entertainment.

Here, the TRP ratings come into the scene, which compell channels to show only what the audience wants to see. Then, the internet has become much more important than TV because it offers a variety of facts on different areas of interest. Now teenagers download a movie from the Internet and watch it at home instead of going to cinema halls. Moreover they can communicate with friends and relatives no matter how far they are.

Most of the youngsters spend maximum time on the internet in chatting or orkuting or tweeting or using facebook,etc. They prefer not to buy newspapers and magazines as they can read them from the internet. Advertisements play a special role as they can influence young people to buy different things or to follow certain behaviours.

Media strongly affects youth culture. It is one of the important means to reach out to the masses and mould their thinking and decision making. A more positive media cannot attract the attention of the masses and gain viewership.