Work of art vs Big biz

by | May 11, 2019 | art and architecture

The world of mass media is filled with artists, many who work their craft as a labor of love. Mass media is also filled with big corporations, which don’t stay in business unless they are profitable and return dividends to shareholders. In the United States, many of these major corporations (such as television and radio stations) are actually required by law to be “good citizens.” Consequently, we see and hear Public Service Announcements broadcast in the middle of the night. We see these stations involved with charities, ranging from 10Ks to auctions. Many of these big businesses create works of art and act like a good citizen because it is good for business. A great film is good for the box office and DVD sales, while readers will buy a newspaper to learn how to save on their taxes or win a college scholarship.
Sometimes these roles — art, big business and good citizen — create tension in mass media. Other times they work together beautifully. Please write a thoughtful, thorough essay about the dilemma that deals with the four questions/issues outlined below. Please be sure to make your essay of adequate depth and detail to warrant the 50-point maximum of a final project.

  1. Find an example of a mass media being a -Good Citizen.” Do you think this particular example helps the company be profitable?
  2. Find an example of an artist complaining that his work was comprised by the business side of mass media. Share you thoughts. Are his complaints justified? Did the compromise really hamper the quality of the final result? How would you handle a similar situation if you become a professional in the mass media (journalist, musician, actor, etc)?
  3. Many people complain that the drive of mass media corporations to be profitable is taking our society in the wrong direction. Our media does indeed belong to the masses — the lowest common denomination. Our media has become sensational and exploitive. Give five examples where a critic would say that the mass media has crossed the line past art and good citizenship to make money. These can be specific examples (the billboard for a strip joint on LBJ Freeway) or a trend (throwing in a few gratuitous cuss words in a PG-13 movie to attract teenagers).
  4. Mass media going overboard in hopes of boosting profits — do you personally see this as a problem? Why or why not? Will this change in the future — why and how? Could this change? How would you advice critics of mass media to affect a change?

Sample Solution

Sample solution

Dante Alighieri played a critical role in the literature world through his poem Divine Comedy that was written in the 14th century. The poem contains Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. The Inferno is a description of the nine circles of torment that are found on the earth. It depicts the realms of the people that have gone against the spiritual values and who, instead, have chosen bestial appetite, violence, or fraud and malice. The nine circles of hell are limbo, lust, gluttony, greed and wrath. Others are heresy, violence, fraud, and treachery. The purpose of this paper is to examine the Dante’s Inferno in the perspective of its portrayal of God’s image and the justification of hell. 

In this epic poem, God is portrayed as a super being guilty of multiple weaknesses including being egotistic, unjust, and hypocritical. Dante, in this poem, depicts God as being more human than divine by challenging God’s omnipotence. Additionally, the manner in which Dante describes Hell is in full contradiction to the morals of God as written in the Bible. When god arranges Hell to flatter Himself, He commits egotism, a sin that is common among human beings (Cheney, 2016). The weakness is depicted in Limbo and on the Gate of Hell where, for instance, God sends those who do not worship Him to Hell. This implies that failure to worship Him is a sin.


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God is also depicted as lacking justice in His actions thus removing the godly image. The injustice is portrayed by the manner in which the sodomites and opportunists are treated. The opportunists are subjected to banner chasing in their lives after death followed by being stung by insects and maggots. They are known to having done neither good nor bad during their lifetimes and, therefore, justice could have demanded that they be granted a neutral punishment having lived a neutral life. The sodomites are also punished unfairly by God when Brunetto Lattini is condemned to hell despite being a good leader (Babor, T. F., McGovern, T., & Robaina, K. (2017). While he commited sodomy, God chooses to ignore all the other good deeds that Brunetto did.

Finally, God is also portrayed as being hypocritical in His actions, a sin that further diminishes His godliness and makes Him more human. A case in point is when God condemns the sin of egotism and goes ahead to commit it repeatedly. Proverbs 29:23 states that “arrogance will bring your downfall, but if you are humble, you will be respected.” When Slattery condemns Dante’s human state as being weak, doubtful, and limited, he is proving God’s hypocrisy because He is also human (Verdicchio, 2015). The actions of God in Hell as portrayed by Dante are inconsistent with the Biblical literature. Both Dante and God are prone to making mistakes, something common among human beings thus making God more human.

To wrap it up, Dante portrays God is more human since He commits the same sins that humans commit: egotism, hypocrisy, and injustice. Hell is justified as being a destination for victims of the mistakes committed by God. The Hell is presented as being a totally different place as compared to what is written about it in the Bible. As a result, reading through the text gives an image of God who is prone to the very mistakes common to humans thus ripping Him off His lofty status of divine and, instead, making Him a mere human. Whether or not Dante did it intentionally is subject to debate but one thing is clear in the poem: the misconstrued notion of God is revealed to future generations.

 

References

Babor, T. F., McGovern, T., & Robaina, K. (2017). Dante’s inferno: Seven deadly sins in scientific publishing and how to avoid them. Addiction Science: A Guide for the Perplexed, 267.

Cheney, L. D. G. (2016). Illustrations for Dante’s Inferno: A Comparative Study of Sandro Botticelli, Giovanni Stradano, and Federico Zuccaro. Cultural and Religious Studies, 4(8), 487.

Verdicchio, M. (2015). Irony and Desire in Dante’s” Inferno” 27. Italica, 285-297.

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