The popular American culture is a versatile thing that is able to change every now and then. People in America create the main motives for culture and the beginning was outlined by the emergence of scientific-technological progress and by means of different amenities for people of today’s society. Popular American culture comprises many things which are dedicated, first of all, to the role of mass media and the production of different items and services which are associated with the American way of life. It is also felt in the manners which contemporary American people have and demonstrate worldwide. Dressing, talking, behaving are those parts of the American popular culture that stimulate the flow of today’s transformations of thoughts, priorities, and visions which the American people have at the moment.
The role of mass media can be maintained throughout one of its functions, namely: communicative. It is felt when people realize that after having time watching a favorite talk show or reality show they start to behave the same way as the characters in these shows. It is a pure fact which undoubtedly provides a truth of today’s decline of cultures, not only American. Restrained themes of pornography and violence are greatly emphasized in present society. Moreover, these products are sold everywhere due to the conveyor of the movie-making industry, TV screens, and the Internet which made the process of sharing that content which was not taken for granted before time. One can point out that democratization of the society brought a sort of freedom so needful for the people of America. It can be true because of the morale shift which was provided by the events that happened in the late 1950s and 1960s, in particular when the Sexual Revolution encompassed Europe and its effects were immediately spread in the USA. The absurd of the situation which is happening today Martha Bayles comments in the following way: “Even many creators of popular culture who are not on the cutting edge assume that “pushing the envelope” of sex and violence is the very definition of “creativity” (Bayles, 2001, p. 40).
People stopped looking at their appearance due to the national brands of fast food and soft drinks which made people unconscious about the theme of health. Values of a clean and healthy society are almost trite. It is powered by the industrial needs of the government. Those sayings and lessons which were presented earlier by classic writers, such as Jack London, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Walt Whitman, John Steinbeck, or J. D. Salinger, at last, are forgotten in the society, and slogans coming from various logos are dominant for new generations. It is prescribed in a feature of “coolness” when people use such modern terms and behave in such a suchlike manner. The point is that arts have the function of teaching how to feel and evaluate reality. Culture contradictory points for improvements can presuppose plebiscite. Bayleys points out in this case: “Yet a plebiscite could also be bad news because as the grim history of the last century shows, the worst kind of culture war is between artists who hate morality and moralists who hate art” (Bayles, 2001, p. 43).
To sum up, the reality shows a predominant impact of mass media on people in the US with more points on violence, sex, and obscenity, on the whole. People strive to be trendy due to the hooray words which are seen and heard everywhere. Another thing contemplates that going by the way to a total decline of culture people can lose the entire values for life.
Reference
Bayles, M. (2001, Summer). The Perverse in the Popular. The Wilson Quarterly, 25, 40.