Mass media is an important part of our life. People from different walks of life have become nowadays listeners, readers, viewers. Reading newspapers and magazines, watching TV, listening to the news on the radio is our main means of getting information in all its variety. Newspapers with their enormous circulation report different kinds of news. They carry articles which cover the latest international and national events. There are special newspapers which gave a full coverage of commercial, financial and publish affairs. There are newspapers and magazines for young people. They give a wide coverage of news, events and reports on education, sports, cultural life, entertainment and fashion. Radio broadcasts are valued mainly for their music news. TV is the most popular kind of mass media now. Viewers are fond of watching different kinds of shows, films, sports, plays and games, educational and cultural programmes. Although there are many interesting and exciting TV shows, but some of them encourages indecency, foul language, drug and alcohol abuse.
There are a wide variety of opinions how television affects young people. It is believed that violent behaviour in later life could be linked to teenage viewing habits. US researchers say that adolescents who watch more than one hour of television a day are more likely to become violent adults. Effects of media may be particularly sensitive in early adolescence, because it is a time for the development of socials skills and personalities. Other researchers claim that television can’t be a reason for a violent behaviour. The behaviour also depends on living conditions, relationship with family members and other factors.
With reference to all theses facts, we could give a question: “Might television be brainwashing today’s youth?”. Youth are becoming the offspring of the television. Usually they turn into reality whatever they see on TV. Kids like to become the people they see on television. So, we could say that television is brainwashing today’s youth into little soldiers preparing for war. Many children are paying a lot of attention to different kinds of TV programmes and they don’t do this at school. After the invention of television, the problem had become inevitable. Spending numerous hours in front of this “boob tube”, children are not being able to express their feelings. When people watch TV they stick to it and don’t see anything around them. On one hand television gives us a lot of information, but on the other hand it might be called as the “brainwasher of today’s youth”.