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Plato and Media

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Submitted By nmackie
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In Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave”, prisoners have spent their entire lives chained inside a cave. They are chained so that they cannot see behind themselves while solely staring at the cave wall in front of them. There is a fire burning behind them and between the prisoners and the fire are objects that create shadows on the wall. A prisoner is released and has to adjust to the blinding light. After learning that there are object which create the shadows and not just the shadows themselves the prisoner goes back to the cave to tell the others. The other prisoners are unable to understand what he is speaking of because the shadows on the wall are the only thing they know to be “real”. Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” can be compared to a number of different contemporary mediums at various levels. Exploring how an ancient text can be compared to modern media helps us to connect the similarities while there is a growth in technology. In this paper I am going to be analyzing Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” and advertisement to see how they compare and contrast. In advertising, we are tricked into believing what we see in the advertisement which may not be entirely real. This connects to Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave” in that the shadows that the prisoners see on the wall are all they are supposed to know but are not what is “real”. With advertisements, consumers can explore the product being advertised and find out the truth about the product and whether it can be beneficial for them. The wall of shadows are what would be treated like the advertisements and maybe if the prisoners questioned what they saw on the wall or were released like the one prisoner then they would come to understand that there is more to the shadows themselves. The prisoner leaving the cave learns that there are real life objects which create the shadows. If you always believe in advertisements then you will live in a cave all of your life or you can go and explore through other modern day technologies and enlighten yourself by deliberating what should be deemed truthful. For those who do not leave the cave it will become very difficult for them to understand other things and to be optimistic when all they have done their whole life is be trusting of their own eyes. Those who create the advertisements are just like the puppeteers inside the cave. They are the ones in between you and what is real. Even with advertisements that are on television, there can be special effects added to the advertisement in order to convince the consumer that the product does a certain thing, for example makeup is always misrepresented to make the woman look more “beautiful” in societies eyes to make them believe what they see on the television screen. Not everything that we see is real and we must always question ourselves in order to find what may be the most truthful and to grow as individuals.

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