Television: The plug-in Drug

Much literature has been written centered around the role of the television on family life, ever since its inception. Marie Winn's article about the appliance provides a thorough and direct analysis of how, from the beginning, television was marketed toward families with newspapers, people of influence and other related appreciations. The style of writing, throughout the article, seems straight forward in stringing together literary artifacts from several prominent newspapers, such as The New York Times, as well as being dry over the use of television as an addiction by the whole family. In the whole article, the emphasis has been on the effect that television has garnered on family life, and the ramifications of this through the years. While television was at first marketed as a tool to “bring together the whole family”, Marie Winn notices how the trends changed over the years as television sets became cheaper to acquire, and people's preferences became more defined.

Initially, the article starts off with allowing the target audience to see the initial marketing gimmicks used in the promotion of the television. A brief look is allowed into what the television's unique selling point was meant to be. The “family life” aspect is then explored fully, as a direct result of the marketing techniques. Winn keeps her vocabulary simple, so as to reach a wider audience, for them to see how television directly affects their lives just as much as anyone else's. It is clear at first that the author wants to ensure that there has been a drastic change from what the first reactions had been to the device, as now it is named several derogatory terms which demean not just the television, but the people watching it. Not undeservedly, the television is called the idiot box, and so on, ...