Television

Television is one of the most powerful inventions of all of the 20th century. It has changed the way we look at the world. Through satellites ['sætƏlaıts] pictures are sent from one part of the earth to another within seconds. "News travels fast" goes an old saying, but it has never been more true than it is now.

Television has increased our knowledge and opened our horizons. We have never before known as much about other parts of the world as we do now, thanks to television. Through our television set, other countries, cultures and events are on the screen in our own living rooms. Documentaries about different countries as well as about people in our own society have widened our knowledge of the world and surely this must result in greater tolerance and understanding.

Television has many positive uses. In most countries of the world television has been directly used for educational purposes. There are amusing children's television programmes, university courses and programmes on health service.

Television is a powerful medium of influence in this modern world as the pictures you see reach into your life. We can understand for ourselves what is happening in the world and this often leads to strong reactions to the injustices we see. If it had not been for the horrifying pictures on television in the mid-eighties, would an event like Band Aid have happened, where musicians of many countries came together with television companies to produce a spectacular musical event to raise money for starving people?

However, television has another side to it. It is a big business in most countries and different companies compete with each other to have the highest ratings. For example, the news channels try to get the "hottest" piece of news and this often means the most horrifying pictures we have to look at. Pictures of dying soldiers, earthquake victims and so on, would definitely be prime issues for the News at Nine. What does this do to us, the viewers, especially younger viewers?

We are sitting in front of the television set in our favourite chair watching people dying of starvation or killing each other in wars. One result has been that we become indifferent to all the violence and terrible things we see and turn off the television and switch over onto our favourite game-show. We no longer really see or hear what is happening and the danger seems to be that we come to accept violence as a part of our world. We become harder and harder to shock. What happens to our sense of injustice if we constantly see heart-breaking scenes on television?

What we see on television must also be selected in one way or another. Someone has to choose what pictures to show and which to leave out.

Television should be used for good purposes. However, since television has become such a big business, particularly with the growth in commercial stations, we must all develop a healthy attitude to what we see and hear. We must all realize that whatever we see on television has either positive or negative effects on people, specially, on children. There are many other arguments for and against television. But we must realize that television in itself is neither good nor bad.

I.   Translate the phrases with prepositions.

1.    through satellites

2.    through television

3.    result in greater tolerance

4.    the pictures you see reach into our life

5.    understand for ourselves

6.    reactions to the injustice

7.    has another side to it

8.    happens to our sense of injustice

9.    do to us

10. in one way or another

11. indifferent to all the violence

12. arguments for and against

II. Find in the text the derivatives of the words below. Say which of them are nouns and which are adjectives.

Example: power - powerful

invent	just
know	horror
tolerate	music
understand	view
education	starve
serve	violent
argue	grow