You Need To Become Media Literate

I talk about Media Literacy often and I have rarely met a person that actually knows what it is. There are many who have preferred connotations when it comes to what they think things mean and what they want them to mean or – a phrase I absolutely HATE to hear – “how they understand things to mean” … but they don’t actually care what media literacy is and that explains why they have none – or don’t think they need any.

The truth is really just about people lacking in HOT skills.

In my Media Therapy classes I talk about media AND literacy as two separate things and when I combine them together it’s meant to be an word that specifically references the material from my class.

In the CONTEXT of my class, media literacy refers to being able to understand media on multiple levels and having the critical and higher order thinking skills to analyze it and synthesize your findings into a coherent understanding of what you have watched and how it pertains to you.

The definition from my class is only a SMALL PORTION of what media literacy is and it’s a simplistic version of a much larger concept that is very misunderstood by people who really just don’t want to think or can’t think well.

First we have to define what thinking actually is. And again, this is one of those words that people think they know but don’t.

𝙏𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙠𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙞𝙨 𝙖 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙨𝙘𝙞𝙤𝙪𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙥𝙧𝙤𝙘𝙚𝙨𝙨. It is not something that just happens in the background … it is a FULLY COGNITIVE process.

What is cognition? It is the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses.

So thinking is 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙨𝙘𝙞𝙤𝙪𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙥𝙧𝙤𝙘𝙚𝙨𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙖𝙘𝙦𝙪𝙞𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙬𝙡𝙚𝙙𝙜𝙚 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙪𝙣𝙙𝙚𝙧𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙣𝙙𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙩𝙝𝙧𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙤𝙪𝙜𝙝𝙩, 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙚𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙣𝙘𝙚, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙚𝙣𝙨𝙚𝙨.

It is not a background process.

It is not something you do in an idle sense.

It is not something that is done without conscious effort and awareness on your part.

The problem comes often when people don’t realize that the actions they are performing are not what they think they are …

Thinking is more complicated than people realize it is. Kind of like communication is not remotely the same as “talking”.

𝙏𝙤 “𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙠” 𝙖𝙣𝙙 “𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙢𝙪𝙣𝙞𝙘𝙖𝙩𝙚” 𝙖𝙧𝙚 𝙗𝙤𝙩𝙝 𝙫𝙚𝙧𝙮 𝙨𝙩𝙧𝙪𝙘𝙩𝙪𝙧𝙚𝙙, 𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙫𝙚, 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙨𝙘𝙞𝙤𝙪𝙨, 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙥𝙡𝙞𝙘𝙖𝙩𝙚𝙙 𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣𝙨 𝙬𝙞𝙩𝙝 𝙖 𝙙𝙞𝙧𝙚𝙘𝙩𝙚𝙙 𝙤𝙪𝙩𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚.

Now that I’ve explained the definitions of the words I’m using, I’ll continue with what I was saying about media literacy.

Media literacy is NOT just talking about a movie and analyzing what it means.

Media literacy is NOT just watching a TV show and realizing it’s maybe about more than one thing.

Media literacy is NOT just attacking media or judging media or writing reviews about media.

That is all surface.

It begins with the 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙨𝙘𝙞𝙤𝙪𝙨 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙖𝙘𝙩𝙞𝙫𝙚 𝙥𝙧𝙤𝙘𝙚𝙨𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙖𝙘𝙦𝙪𝙞𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙠𝙣𝙤𝙬𝙡𝙚𝙙𝙜𝙚 and moves into critical and higher order skillsets.

Anyone can have an opinion, very few can analyze on multiple levels.

Full media literacy requires “thinking”, “communication”, and HOT (higher order thinking skills) including:

1. Critical thinking
2. Inference
3. Analysis
4. Synthesis
5. Metacognition (𝘈𝘸𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘰𝘧 𝘰𝘯𝘦’𝘴 𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩𝘵 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦𝘴.)
6. Transference (𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘣𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘭𝘺 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘭𝘦𝘥𝘨𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘬𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘯𝘦𝘸 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘹𝘵𝘴)

99% of people AREN’T doing ANY of this on a conscious, deliberate, or active level AT ALL times.
And if you think you are, you’re probably deluding yourself.

Those 6 things are just the BEGINNING of a higher order thinking skillset and the majority of people on social media are NOT using any HOT skills when they communicate or absorb media all day long.

They are highly emotionally dysregulated, illogical, delusional, easily manipulated and controlled and extremely gullible.

Thinking (as previously defined) generally doesn’t figure into how they use the Internet.

Media Literacy is one of the rarest things to find online.

The majority of people are not THINKING remotely about anything they consume. They are only REACTING to it. They are only having EMOTIONS regarding it.

They are only caught up in illogical and unreasonable PASSIONS regarding what they read, who they interact with, how they interact with things, and how they allow other people to have power over them.

NONE of that is critical, none of that is on a higher order of thought.

The bottom line is you are probably not remotely media literate and you probably only know a couple of people who are and you probably don’t like them very much.

You might find them too serious, too “woke”, or too aware of things that you don’t pay much attention to or spend much time thinking about, if you do much real thinking at all.

Media Literacy requires a higher order thinking skillset. It’s the foundation for the kind of comprehension, analysis, and action necessary.

“Media” in media literacy refers to anything you consume created via broadcasting, publishing, and the internet which obviously includes everything you read and react to on social MEDIA.

Given how people treat each other online, given how much power people give to strangers online, given how much people rely heavily on social media to get their news about the world and how completely delusional the world is … I’d say 99% of the world is not media literate and doesn’t use HOT skills.

If you look at the state of the world ESPECIALLY in how it has been changed, manipulated, and devolved due to the infestation of social media and the lack of global higher order thinking, emotional regulation, and media literacy, I don’t think it would be very difficult for anyone to realize how NECESSARY media literacy is, how vital the teaching of critical thinking is, and how despite what many may think, they are NOT actively and consciously THINKING daily on any real level that counts.

Invest in yourself for you, but even more so for OTHERS.

Your ignorance, your lack of empathy, your disregard of your own strengths and weaknesses, your inability to hold your own power, it all impacts others.

It is important to strive to be our best selves for others because we are all a part of the same world. Not the same REALITY, but the same WORLD.

Our existence, and how we move through the world, has a reciprocal effect on other people. You’re not the center but a part of a whole.

The one GOOD thing about the Internet is that there are quality and legitimate resources available where you can LEARN about #MediaLiteracy.

You can learn about critical thinking, you can take free courses on self development, higher order thinking, and many different subjects that can aid in how you process information from the world around you in better, more informed, more logical ways.

Literacy goes beyond “reading and writing” … far beyond that.

Update your definitions and yourself.

Some of the most important lines from Rachel Burton’s video are:

ACCURACY TAKES EFFORT.
Is this accurate or just loud? (i.e. clickbait).

WHO BENEFITS FROM ME BELIEVING THIS? <– that’s the thing that EVERYONE seems to miss or completely ignore.

Get media literate.

Learn to develop your higher order thinking skills and stop merely reacting to everything you see.

Stop giving strangers so much control over you. Stop being manipulated.

Think DEEPER. Think HIGHER.

Make better choices.

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