Richard T Schaefer Role Taking Analysis

Socialization happens every day. Determining if you are aware of how it is affecting you would take a well-educated and trained sociologist from a third-party viewpoint. However, I think that looking for affects of socialization of mass media you will start to change your perspectives. This happens due to the break down and examination of the mass media message you are studying. Defined by Richard T Schaefer Role taking is the process of mentally assuming the perspective of another and responding from that imagined viewpoint. As I write my response assuming the role of a sociologist I know I will have certain bias due to my time spent in a total institution that instilled core values and beliefs into my life.
During my observation of my use
of mass media I found that I watch a lot of Facebook videos during my free time between classes and during my free time throughout the day. When I started to record what some of the videos stood for and the messages they were trying to get out I feel as if you could break them down in different categories, single sided and multi-sided. Single sided for me is where the mass media video shows the opinion or view point from one side of the message they are trying to put out for the world to see. What I mean by this if I made a short video of different cats biting or scratching people and say that all cats are evil because of this video. It has just my view and now everyone who watches it has images that provide facts to go with the words. just because it is one sided does not make it right. However, there is no authentication or fact check on Facebook, so mass media messages like this do get through. Multi-sided is when the media message gives both sides to the argument of their opinion or view they are trying to present. That does not mean that both sides will be represented fairly and equally by any means.
As I started to see the breakdown in the videos of single and multi-sided views I notice it all came down to how does the current message you are watching influence you the most. As I was scrolling through Facebook I watched this video of an interview on Fox News. The news anchor asked Congressman Brian Mast how he felt about the new term that people are using as an excuse why they are upset about President Trump winning the election. The term they came up with is PESD (Post Election Stress Disorder), in this short video Brian Mast talked about his military career. More specifically how he served in Iraq and lost both his legs when he found one to many bombs. He then goes on to make some small jokes about the disorder they came up with, along with the understanding that some people are going through a hard time as understood with every loss you have. However, his belief was that it is not a disorder nor should it be.
I think that the PESD is more of an impression management on a large scale. If everything in this mass media message was accurate, then I believe that this message was functional and dysfunctional at the same time. It was functional for calling attention out to a group of people who are taking a loss of the election to far as to making a disorder to cope with it. I think that the Congressman did a good job at noting that some people do have problems and need help but there is a line to be draw on what the problem is for the help needed.
For being dysfunctional I think that the people that are altering their self to make the impression and appearance to give a certain impression to the audience being covered by the news is only covering the extreme cases. By doing this they are creating serotypes that could affect the people that really do have some of the problems that the congress man was talking about. They gave no one with this disorder to come forth in this mass media message and share their point of view. By doing this the news anchor is influencing people to be bias against people who are upset and could possibly have real problems that might or might not be connected to Trump winning the Presidential election. Many veterans have a different sense of humor over the average person.
This is due to being in a life style for several years, which regulates everything you do by a single person. I feel as it is a tendency for people who have been part of a total institution such as veterans. Join groups on Facebook and other social media sites that have certain ideals and views that relate to them by using videos and other mass media messages. While watching some of these videos and analyzing it as a sociologist on how it influenced my perspective. It made me think twice what the norm was for a veteran in my eyes. One of the most dysfunctional videos that I have watched was from VetTV. The video makes jokes about PTSD(Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) by showing a commercial video of a neck brace that would allow for a person to choke another person during the night without harming the individual that was getting choked. The whole video commercial was a simple joke, but the norm that was installed in the message is that all veterans that have PTSD are violent. At first I just brushed this off as I thought it was stupid and a little humorous, and went on watching videos, until realizing the serotype and perspective that this kind of video was installing in myself. This kind of Problem is not okay to make jokes. Yet I have been so socialized by other videos like this one that the seriousness does not stick
out.
All messages from these sites are not like the one previous stated. Grunt Works is another online Facebook page that shows mass media messages to get information to its followers. One of their post that I read during my time of observing what I watched was a story about James Mattis who is the current Sectary of Defense. One of his interviews was posted to this site for all the followers to read. During his interview James Mattis talks about the misperception of veterans and how they are perceived as damaged goods. By ascribing status to veterans such as damaged goods. Without regards for their personal skill and traits they are being outcaste of the norm, into a social group that does not represent them fairly.
Some may have a hard time discarding former behaviors and transition into a new life style, it is not impossible for resocialization.
However during that transition if we utilize Charles Cooley’s concept that the self is an outcome of impression of how others perceive us. And the impression is that veterans are all have PTSD and need medical help can they truly transition without thinking different of themselves. James Mattis says in his interview and I quote “If we tell our veterans enough that this is what is wrong with them they may actually start believing it.” Without the control of material along with the verification of truth in mass media messages that go in to the world we are creating opportunities for problems to occur. While victimhood and disorders in America is exalted, too much of the wrong information could pose the threat of narcotizing dysfunction. With different mass media messages having the same topic but different views on what the facts are about the information giving to the audiences. It will lead to massive amounts of information that the audience will not act on regardless of how compelling the arguments
are.
Means of wide spread messages from Facebook to the newspaper are part of our everyday life. We all like to think that we have set cultural beliefs and practices that help us stay true to who we are, and how we perceive our self. The information we get from these mass media messages change our self and personality on a daily bases. The changes may be small, but in the end they are still a change and mass media plays a large roll in that change. I think we start to see it more now since mass media can be viewed around the world in mere seconds rather than taking days to send letters and telegrams. With that increase we will see more functions of enforcing social norms, socializing individuals, and promoting good or bad ideals.