On Media Literacy

 Lately, I feel like we’ve all heard a refrain repeated over and over about digital spaces: “media literacy is dead”. We have the information of the world at our fingertips, yet we struggle so much to find the basic takeaways from the media we consume. Do I think media literacy is totally dead? No, of course not. But it’s dying, and we’ll lose all of our common sense in discussions of our media if we don’t lock in QUICK. I’d like to discuss/rant about how the rise of social media reactions to current media has rotted our brains. The spaces we occupy online are full of misinformation, demonization, and reactionary responses to minor inconveniences and challenges.

To start, I’d like to argue that we no longer have to think for ourselves. Critical thinking and common sense is at an all time fucking low; this much is clear. I do believe that this decline is due to the rise of social media. These platforms, while providing a means to connect over and share infinite information, the consumerist structure of these sites allow us to completely shut our brains off. This is most exemplified on TikTok, where you don’t even have to think about what you want to watch- it’s presented to you without any effort. As such, the level of mindless content consumption we see across society is mind-boggling. The more you spend time on these platforms, the more refined your algorithm becomes, and the deeper you fall into your own biases. The issue is that when you don’t have to think about what you’re consuming, you fall into a follower mindset, and you’ll believe practically anything that is shown to you. As such, TikTok has become a breeding ground for misinformation and propaganda. The best way to get views on this app isn’t to be truthful and grounded- it’s to be funny, entertaining, sensationalist, and shocking. Therefore, people who make content want to be offended; they want things to get angry about, so they can whip up their followers to gain more clout for themselves. This is why there always seems to be a controversy on this app; it’s a way for us to follow the crowd. We love to band together with others to get mad at things, even if it’s not fulfilling to do so. Misery loves company, right? And so extremism is rampant not only in political spaces, for example, but in fan spaces for various media.

This leads me to the reason I talk about this today. A certain adult animated show has recently gotten a TON of flack for the portrayal of SA of a certain character. In the 2024 show Hazbin Hotel, Angel Dust is repeatedly abused and sexually assaulted by Valentino, his primary abuser. Angel Dust works in the sex work industry, and he signed a contract with Valentino to work in porn films; unfortunately, Angel was literally selling his soul to Valentino, and now remains fully under his watch and control. There was a music video in the show called “Poison”; in this song, Angel is shown dealing with extreme sexual assault and physical violence at the hand of Valentino. Although this show is animated, it’s very graphic; it shows shots from porn productions that Angel is forced into making.

The response to this song and Valentino’s character has been heated, to say the least. People accuse the creator of the show, Vizziepop, of fetishizing this abuse for the wide audience of the show. Some have even accused her of being PRO-SA. These talking points were promoted by reaction content creators online, then parroted by their viewers. This is complete brain rot. I truly wonder if these assholes even watched the music video. The abuse Angel suffers is HORRIFIC. It’s graphic, uncensored, and gut-wrenching. It’s very, very clear from the video that Angel is not complicit in these acts; he is not happy with this situation. That’s literally the whole point of the song - Angel is saying that Valentino is poisoning him with his abuse, and he feels like he can’t escape the shit he’s facing. I thought, before hearing the discourse, that this message was clear. However, I’ve learned that people truly believe that if something negative merely APPEARS on screen, then the creator of the show thinks those things are good. People have even begun verbally harassing the voice actor of Valentino, calling him an abuser. I’m losing my mind. JOEL PEREZ IS NOT VALENTINO: HE WAS PLAYING A CHARACTER. This should be a testament to how good of a voice actor Perez is, not a reason to bully him! Morally policing creators of flawed characters is pointless, straight up. The creators are not their characters, and the voice actors are not their character.

These types of extreme and wildly idiotic reactions have caused a shift in the media we see nowadays, where shows seem to need to clarify that the villains are evil. Villains in movies now are bafflingly shallow. They lack any nuance, since people would be outraged if they had any redeeming qualities. One example of this is Chameleon in Kung Fu Panda 4. Compared to the other villains in the Kung Fu Panda franchise, she’s paper thin. Tai Lung was a discarded former child prodigy, who fell from grace at the hand of Shi-fu. He became evil to avenge his own potential, fueled by his hatred of his former master. Shen was the child of the emperors of China. His methods of violence disgusted his parents, who cast him out of the family. Shen then became so bitter of this disgrace that he resolved to destroy his parents’ entire kingdom, even after they’d died. Kai was deeply connected to Oogway, sticking by his side for years. They stumbled upon the power and chi control of the pandas, which Kai became extremely jealous of. Kai quickly became selfish and possessive, as he wanted the power all for himself. He decided to take chi from others rather than give it, causing the fight between him and Oogway. He was killed in battle, and in the film he literally rises up from the spirit realm to finish his work. And Chameleon? Uhhh…we have no motives for her actions. She steals people’s kung fu, but never uses it. She wants to take over China…for some reason? But hey, she’s super evil, and that’s apparently enough nowadays.

Even in protagonists, we see this too. In the live action Netflix Avatar, Sokka has been stripped of his misogyny completely. In the early episodes of the original animated show, Sokka was an asshole to women. He verbally demeaned his sister Katara and his love interest, Suki, to the point that it was viscerally uncomfortable to the listener. He acted this way early on so we can see his character development. Over time, he matures and learns to respect women deeply, which is a powerful message that ego is never a signifier of true strength. In the live action, though, Sokka is purely good. He never says anything negative to women; he is a picture perfect, funny sidekick to Aang. If he was misogynistic in this show, people would whine that the show promotes misogyny. This is present in the other characters too: Katara is no longer bossy and controlling, and Aang no longer acts like a child. These characters are adults in children’s bodies, simply because they no longer have room to show character flaws. Aang can’t have the normal complaints of a child; he is forced to be a perfect protagonist for the comfort of the viewers.

These misunderstandings could be fixed if we simply thought about these depictions for more than one second. I believe that the lack of critical thinking across the generations is due to lack of education and digital extremism. It seems nobody has been taught how to make distinctions about what is promoted and what is simply being shown, so we all lack the skills to critically evaluate information and media. So many people are shockingly ill-equipped to navigate our media, and they remain vulnerable to manipulation by those who just want personal clout. This has caused the constant moral policing of media creators to the point of flattening previous deep and well-developed characters.

We don’t need to feel personally attacked by depictions of negative qualities in shows and movies. This leads into my next point about critical thinking at large; the idea of “the bean soup phenomenon”. What is this? There was a post on TikTok recently outlining a recipe for bean soup. It was completely innocuous in nature; it was just a lady showing how she likes to make bean soup, measuring the ingredients, etc. The comments to this video were laughable, the most stupid of which were along the lines of “What if I don’t like beans? Can I still make the soup?” This represents a concept by and large we see online, also known as “What-about-me-isms”. People so desperately want to make everything about them that they search for hidden reasons to be triggered. By being mad, they can associate with anything and everything they see. Asking “what if I don’t like beans” is a truly braindead reaction to a bean soup recipe. If you don’t like bean soup, don’t make the fucking soup. If you don’t want to view a certain type of trigger, such as the SA scene in Hazbin Hotel, you don’t have to watch it! It’s so simple! There is so much content at our fingertips; you can find things to watch that are up your alley. Again, this is simply due to the fact that people want to be angry. They want to feel that their opinions are important, and that their experience is the only one that matters. For all the possibilities of connection online, there is rampant loneliness. We consume so much content, yet we don’t have to interact with people in the same manner as in real life. We can be the worst fucking versions of ourselves, get angry about everything, bully innocent creatives, and get away with it. Despite this feeling of being the center of everything, we don’t create anything for ourselves; we watch what others say, and form our own echo chamber. There is an entitlement to say whatever the fuck we want, even if we don’t have any prior knowledge on what we’re yelling about.

So, if we are truly living through the death of media literacy and a renewed moral policing of fictional stories, how can we trust people to think critically? I still hold out hope that we can learn to think for ourselves again. Schools need to start teaching media literacy. Creators need to preface their media critiques by saying that what they say is their opinion, not fact. Social media could be a wonderful way to connect with others, if we use it correctly. As corny as this sounds, we need to spread positivity, focus on what we like about the thing we watch, and present our gripes thoughtfully and with better understanding.

More to watch:

queer villains and the death of media literacy

Fandom Policing, Purity Culture and the Death of Media Literacy

Hazbin Hotel vs The Death of Media Literacy

We Are Losing the Media Literacy War // Avatar, Scott Pilgrim, Hazbin Hotel

"learned helplessness" & the tech literacy crisis | Internet Analysis