Prompt #14 The television has a greater effect on people’s lives than the telephone has. Do you agree or disagree?

I personally agree that televisions have a greater effect on people’s lives than the telephone.  Although the telephone has affected people’s lives greatly, I think the television has a much more bigger affect on people’s lives.  Although, when the telephone was first invented, it had a very big impact on the way people communicated.  It was much easier to communicate with other people from a distance and allowed people to communicate overseas.  The telephone helped people communicate much easier and faster than sending letters that could take weeks or months to receive.

The television has a greater effect on people’s lives because not only can you hear people, but also you can see people.  Telephones only able you to hear the other person on the other end of the line and usually, you know the person who you are talking to.  On the television, you see and hear people that you don’t know who might be from different places, cities, and even countries.  A telephone can connect you to other people around the world, but you can’t see them, only hear them.  With a television, you can see people from different countries with different languages and cultures.  Seeing those things might interest you to want to travel to those places and experience those places yourself.  A television helps you visualize places where you might want to go and visit.

Not only does a television make people visualize other places, it can also be educational.  There are many channels and shows that are educational and intellectual, that actually teaches you things.  Channels like Dora the Explorer or Ni Hao Kai Lan help teach you how to speak Spanish or Chinese.  Those kinds of shows are meant to engage people, mainly children, to learn to speak another language.  Other channels like the history and discovery channel are also very intellectual and educational.  They teach you about history and other intellectual things, the topics that are shown in the channels always vary and will always be educational for the viewers. 

The television is also influential to people’s lives.  Channels such as the cooking channel may influence people to want to become a chef.  Watching people cook things on television might influence viewers to want to become chefs or cooks too.  They would be inspired to learn how to cook by just watching others cooking on television.  People might also be influenced to become an actor or actress.  Watching movies and seeing their favorite actors and actresses might make them want to become just like them too.  Many people on television are seen as role models to the people who watch them on television.

 

Television may also have its negative effects on people’s lives too.  Some people might be addicted to watching the television or playing video games on the television.  They might become lazy and unmotivated to move away from the television.  Some people might be influenced to do the dangerous stunts that they see on television.  Dangerous and violent shows can influence curious and thrill seeking viewers to try to mimic and relive the stunts they saw on television. 

The telephone may have been around longer than the television, but I personally think that the television has a greater effect on people than the telephone.