"Hell is not the future - but what we live in."

(Walter Benjamin 592)

The view that electronic mass media, such as TV, is value-neutral technology has to be revised because TV's impact on society and the individual has shifted. The viewer, first condemned to passivity by technological restraints, has been transformed by technological progress into an active, choosing participant. This study will argue that the shift in responsibility, from the journalist and the viewer to the mediating technology itself, is problematic. It will also show how a critical concept of responsibility can be developed. Responsible decisions presuppose the freedom of the agent, and the capacity on the part of that agent to foresee the consequences of his/her actions. Essential preconditions of responsible action, then, are the agent's capacity to reflect and to plan ahead. From the perspective of the TV viewer, choices have been expanded in quantity, while the capacity to comprehend the consequences of these choices has grown out of control. Without reflection, there can be no moral use of technology. The "old" reading of TV distinguished it from texts. Part of the assumption which led to the distinction between written texts, spoken dialogue and TV was that supposedly only a living dialogue represented an exchange in communication, whereas both print and TV supposedly lacked the reader's response.' Further, it was put forward by hermeneutic philosophers, such as Hans Georg Gadamer, that the sole aim of reading should be to revitalize a 'frozen' dialogue, thus reenacting the text in dialogue. Since the modern mass media, with their capacity to broadcast live, did not fit into this distinction between fixed "dead" vs vivid life expressions, they were not recognized as either dialogue or text. The inherent, implied reproach was that the undifferentiated audience of TV did not read the text, did not "understand" any message and did not engage in a living dialogue. Instead they merely passively consumed a ready product beyond its control. Whereas the text offered at least a reader-response (which led to a theory by this name), the viewer seemed to be passive and unselective.

Due to the recent developments of interactive technologies, this image of TV must be reconsidered. In anticipation of a technically unlimited access to numerous channels, the "new" viewer seems to have more choices than in the past, but the mere number of choices has left him helpless. He is confronted with the difficulty of determining what he should choose. It would be a tempting solution today to assume that technology itself freed the viewer and that technology replaced man in the decision process. If this were the case, then TV would be transformed from a mediator of reality to a creator of reality. To speak about responsibility in such a context would be futile.

The differences between TV and other forms of mass media needs to be discussed before analyzing the way in which responsibilities have been modified. Beginning with the analysis of films, the recognition that modern electronic and photographic media are texts grew. Cinema studies, as well as prominent film critics, helped to decode films as textual structures. Publications such as Cahiers du Cinema became respectable guides for viewers just as book reviews did for readers. Film critics used the written word successfully. Critics of the cinema like Roger Ebert became notorious - about cinema, but on TV. The question remains: why is there a continual deficit of competent critics of TV in TV? Even written publications which focus on TV, such as Television: The Critical View (Newcomb), use the critical distance for criticism of TV as a medium, and not in order to "rectify" its content. One of the reasons for this difference is the capacity of TV to not only describe reality but to create it in a form different from cinema. It is not so much the information, or the plot, which count as specifically TV-like - but its capacity to create events. These events are not perceived as a break from reality into fiction, but as virtual reality.
A majority of columnists, who have been condemned to write in "serious" journals about not- so-serious TV, have denounced this medium, and found it unnecessary from the point of view of serious scholarship and criticism to take its content seriously (Gronbeck 334-347, Vande Berg 14, 20). Both the European and the American TV critics use a relatively simple vocabulary, and the length of the articles in non-specialized publications is under proportion. Most TV criticism is found at the margins of newspapers and might even become a casualty of current events. The essence of TV events seems to lie beyond the limits of criticism in the classical sense. Even attempts at upgrading the guild of TV critics, for example, through special conferences, fall short of the expectations. Whereas the viewing time per head is growing worldwide, TV criticism seem to lose more and more importance.' Gossiping about stars takes the place of serious analysis, previews of up to five hundred channels become too complex to read, and opinion essays are built on the assumption that people share similar experiences - which is no longer the case. The improved technology has shifted the emphasis from "broadcasting" for wide, undifferentiated audiences to a specialized "narrow-casting." Thus, broad criticism of the content of ever more diversified programs in mass-media becomes obsolete. Only two aspects of TV gain regularly respectful attention by the broad public and the community of scholars. One is the golden new age promised by new technology, the so-called "information super highway," feared by some and cherished by others. The other is the impact of TV on morality. Normally it is seen as bad, and technology is blamed for a decline in morals as such. In both fields, government regulation - or deregulation - is seen as the sole salvation. This demand for control suggests that, on the one hand, TV is still widely recognized as a dominant force, capable of changing the morality in our society. On the other hand, it demonstrates what Henry W. Johnstone described as TV's unique capacity to put a person "on hold" (50 f). Viewers are seen as objects of the mediating technology, and not as its masters.

Neither review nor preview have a chance. Technical or industrial innovations, like the "information super highway", govern press and discussion. Instead of its content, the mediating technology becomes the focus of interest. Debates about deregulation, regulation, ethics and lack of ethics govern criticism. From Variety to TVGuide, the information about the carrier has taken the place of the information about the message that is carried. In this sense, the image of the media has replaced the old ideal of journalism - the truthful representation of reality by images. This reflects one characteristic of TV which differentiates it from other media. The capacity of the individual to regain control of this impact seem to be very limited, and, strangely, the viewer's emancipation from passivity to activity and choice via remote control seem to have even deepened this structural dependency. With further perfection of the technology, TV's impact on life seems to grow - parallel to the resistance of our critical capacities. If this were the last word on a new, brave, and virtual reality, the notion of the autonomy of the moral individual would be endangered.

The suspicion remains that TV pessimism is just a resurrection of the technology-fear which followed every invention. We might be tempted to hope that a new generation will become as familiar with the remote control as past generations became with the automobile. The only problem is that it is structurally impossible to gain control over TV viewing.

Unlike written texts, the illusion of TV is immediate and even "tele-literate" viewers who grasp the meaning of a viewed situation in seconds lack one element all reading and understanding presupposes - the distance between the reader and the text. The closer TV gets to achieving the goal of perfect illusion, the more technology allows the immediacy of (live) broadcast, and the more TV has lost its philological innocence. In the era of literacy, in which enlightenment was a corresponding ideal, the objectivity and distance of the commentator could exist without structural complications. TV coverage has lost this impartiality. Due to its dominant role in the perception of reality, TV has outgrown the old role of mere mediator and has become the creator and judge of reality at a time. It is a moral medium, imbibed with values not only mediated, but formed. The ideal of objectivity and truthfulness has been replaced by the illusion of immediacy. Immediacy, the sense of existing in the picture, leaves the viewer feeling like an independent judge of 'real life"; whereas, he is in actuality guided by the choice of focus and the viewpoint of the camera. At the same time, the viewed reality is perceived as objective (in news broadcasts). However, the structural barrier that hinders the viewer from achieving a real objective standpoint remains. The viewer cannot choose his own point of view because he lacks the necessary temporal and spatial distance to judge objectively. Furthermore, the viewer has even less control over his judgment than in real life since he is structurally unable to gain further knowledge of the context, to direct his thoughts, or to focus himself.

TV is seen as direct, seemingly not falsified by any interpreting inter-mediator, and thus what it depicts is taken for reality. In this confusing situation, in which mediated and mediator seem to conflate, one could try to regain the distance necessary for a critical judgment by the distinction between reality and interpretation as proposed by Benjamin (N 2, 1; 574)

Sich immer wieder klarmachen, wie der Kommentar zu einer Wirklichkeit

(denn hier handelt es sich um don Kommentar, Ausdeutung in den

Einzelheiten) eine ganz andere Methode verlangt als der zu einem Text.

Im einen Fall ist Theologie, im anderen Philologie die Grundwissenschaft.

The common belief in the truth value of TV has thus to be compared not with standards of objectivity, but with "belief.w Belief in the quasi-theological credibility of the commentator, or, in the case of his absence, in the images themselves, has transformed the image of TV. From mediators of reality, images have risen to the level of active players and have paradoxically even gained the reputation of objectivity aside. The misunderstanding of the function of modern mass media is here to be found in a vulgar naturalism - images are mistaken for facts.

This situation, as such, is not new, but as old as the use of signs. It can be seen in the inherent criticism of unreliable signs in Plato's allegory of the cave or, in order to take a more recent example, the use of wtromp Neil" in art. The basic difference between wfake realities," invented to deceive the viewer, and "real" perception could be unmasked. The recognition that the viewer is deceived depends on his/her capacity to unveil this illusion and compare it with reality. If the viewer mistakenly believes he/she sees an object, and not a photograph, e.g., then his personal experience can teach him otherwise (Allen 27). Technological changes in other reproductive, representative technologies, except TV, did not change this basic structure. Illusions could be unveiled: virtual reality and life could be distinguished. In photography, the fixed life expressions could not be mistaken for reality, because reality is represented, as it is in script. The distance between the represented object and the representation leaves the viewer enough space for reflection. Of course, errors may occur in the process of decoding. However, even for the sworn enemy of the notion of objectivity in interpretation, Roland Barthes, "the photograph is never experienced as an illusion, is in no way a presence; ... its reality (is) that of the "having been there." (Barthes 44) Photography differs from TV technology in the different representation of time. The TV viewer seemingly participates in the action, while the viewer of a photograph reflects. The second dissimilarity stems from the first. The TV viewer lacks distance to judge for himself, whereas the observer of photography can construct his own judgment at his leisure. He can, if he so desires, inquire about the truth behind the photography, an option structurally ruled out by TV technology. In the new "rhetoric of the image," images are not compared with reality: they Ars reality, disillusion is impossible.

What endows images with such credibility while stripping them of reliability? It is the character of TV to give the viewer the illusion of immediacy, the illusion of being a direct witness, who takes part in the events that are happening. One cannot after events nor direct the magic eye. Without a context, one lacks the ability to make conscious judgments. The hope for immediacy explains why TV criticism can never achieve the heights of literature or film criticism. In TV, the possibility of control and criticism is to be found in technology itself and is to be sacrificed to the illusion of presence and immediacy. It is even incorrect to describe such a situation as an illusion, because illusions are built on the inherent possibility of deception, upon the possibility of unveiling "the truth" behind the images. The average TV viewer is, however, not deceived because there is no way to convince him of an alternative truth. Any decision taken by the viewer is limited to a change of channel, not perspective, and is restricted by technology. He can neither change the broadcast situations, events, or entertainment, nor the use of broadcasting technology itself. In a live broadcast situation, the boundary between fiction and facts is not perceivable by an independent, critical audience, because the means for controlling the technology of mediation are beyond human control. Neither the viewer, nor the various professionals on the production side can be held fully responsible. Neither can oversee the broadcast situation, given the lack of leisure and expertise as well as the pressure of time. Responsibility has not shifted from producers to viewers, as assumed by those who hope for a better, interactive TV age, but from producers to the producing technology. It has to be asked, however, weather technology itself, understood as a moral factor, can be held responsible?

The image of TV as a virtual reality omits the loss of distance and gives us the illusion of having gained immediate insight, be it into the private life of stars, criminals, or victims. This illusion is not new and could be compared to the symbolism of archaic times. Symbols were considered as real as TV characters. Modern technology and its uncritical admiration are archaic elements in modern life. They bring back the days of childhood with its seemingly "innocent" experiments in search of the Onew" for its own sake. Still, now as then, we should not forget that in most cases, the fly did not survive the "innocent" childish curiosity. Our experiments might effect our common future more than pulling out the leg of a fly.

Jede Kindheit bindet in ihrem Interesse fuer die technischen Phaenomene,
ihre Neugier fuer alle Art von Erfindungen .... die technischen
Errungenschaften an die aften Symbolwelten. Nur bildet sie sich nicht
in der Aura der Neuheit sondern in der der Gew6hnung. (Benjamin N 2
a 1; 576)
This habituation, which can be observed in the different viewing attitudes of children as compared to their parents is normal, but it should not be forgotten that it is beyond the control of reason.

This is the point where the changed image of the media, the new media as producers and factors of the mediated material, touches the ethical question: Are we allowed to let the technological means control the contents of our habits, which form the foundation of society?, and, are thoese habits as value neutral as the images suggest?

If we do not want to accept the conception of TV as a value-neutral technology, the claims of moral responsibility have to de defended. The image of a value-free TV has to be replaced. Where could such a replacement be found since TV does not leave the time to reflect? Then TV would then be a parable for a general loss of responsibility - a loss of responsibility to machines. Images, perceived as powerful visual experiences, would dominate the capacity to reflect independently. Technology could be seen as the real moral actor, as the invisible ghostwriter who dominates our perceptions, our wishes and our capacity to choose.

Man has established a world of technological reflection which he made work for itself. Through the technology of TV, the distance of the viewer from the selfelaborated world grows, whereas the distance to virtual reality shrinks. Post-modern theories, which underline the textual character of all experience and which even deny the existence of a "real" world beyond virtual experiences, could be seen as adequate expressions of the technological stage of experience gained through TV. Through decontextualization, the referential surroundings of a TV event are not at our disposal. Similar to the Augustinian conception of "God's eye," the view of the camera has to become our own. We do not have the choice to focus on what we want. Instead, the represented reality becomes the reality from which to choose. The distance from t he self-elaborated world is growing to the degree that the virtual experience becomes so real that our judgments depend more on the mediator than the mediated. For example, our standards of beauty are based on its representation in TV. In the past, they would have been oriented according to ideals in art, sculpture, or print. The only difference is that today's ideals are perceived as real and that the distance between the "real reality' and the world of illusion is no more perceivable .3 If the images produced by, through, and for technology are perceived as real, then it becomes impossible for the audience to regain the distance from the media that is necessary for an independent, morally responsible behavior. If TV is transformed from the mediator into the mediated, then it alters morality fundamentally. By divorcing the viewer from organic history or personal experience, TV becomes the dominant moral factor, which determines both the experience of reality and the moral judgments built on it. Since in modern TV, the broadcaster and journalist seem to have lost control as well, it could be assumed that either ethics becomes incompatible with the cognitive style of media world or that the new ethics are presented by a technology gone wild. The isolation of the viewers from their fellow spectators by technology sets new standards. These standards are similar to games. As in both games and drama, the spectators are required to suspend their disbelief and to accept for the moment of viewing the world of the screen as real, as the world itself. The only difference between drama and its technologically modern version, the movies, is that one never leaves the stage again. Since the TV spectator feels present on stage, he cannot regain the necessary distance for a critical judgement.

One modern solution, whose aim is to overcome the loss of human responsibility is the development of a code of ethics, applied to professional groups like journalists. This concept alone has to fail because it still supposes that the journalist has control over the broadcast material, which is no longer the case. The viewer makes his own choices, guided not by reason, but by the medium of TV. Genre-ethics are divorced from the original principle of responsibility, focusing on proper dramatic casting and intrinsically consistent gamesmanship. A well-trained viewer 'masters' the kaleidoscope of material by adaptation to the rules of a game not mastered by anybody but technology itself.

Ideals and long-range goals are meaningless in such a setting. Genre-bound ethics, like "media-ethics," give the viewer the illusion of morality. They do not provide prospective goals, but only methods of avoiding immediate trouble within a pres"t market, dominated by technology itself. Today, TV technology confronts us with a mirror that does not reflect real life. Rather, images taken for real reflect back what is believed to be the moral choice of a fragmented majority of viewers; the "ideal" case would give each viewer the morality he recognizes. If we accept this automatism, we will see still more of the same, updated versions of the mediated own image. In order to regain control over the media, ethics specialized in and restricted to the images of the media cannot solve the problems.

The morality to be derived from such images is self-referential and beyond the control of the individual technology supposedly freed. Such a genre-related morality *provides no defense against the relapse into barbarism," defined by Arnold Gehlen as result of the loss of the capacity to judge independently (Gehlen 158).' The loss of control that normal in the process of "facilitation' has the implicit purpose to "bind habits, to lay down routines' (118). This behavior is normal in the process of appropriation of any technique, like the process of walking, which would be hindered if I were to think about each step. However, unlike walking, viewing the given images of TV does not enable me to step back and to regain control of the direction of my acts. Self-estrangement of the viewer goes hand in hand with a semi-instinctively gained adaptation to the viewed standards.

Unlike the tools of workmanship, which .... remain the servants of the

hand, the machines demand that the laborer serve them, that he adjust

the natural rhythm of his body to their mechanical movement. (Arendt

147)
If TV becomes THE lone vision of the world and if technology is thus taken not as a tool but as a mechanism transforming people beyond their control, then the moral standards set by the media are beyond control.

In order to recover control, help from classical ethical concepts is limited. They presuppose a control over our actions which, through modern technology, we seem to be on the verge of losing. "Old" morals only extend as far as knowledge does. Today, that is no longer enough. TV technology has multiplied the capacities to act - and thus endangered the assumption, inherited from Max Weber, that the objectives of ethics are the foreseeable results of actions. For Hans Jonas, responsibility in this now context cannot be built on reciprocity any more. If we loose control, we loose it not only for us, but for future generations as well. This explains why our responsibility in the use of technology has to be defined in terms of nonreciprocal relations (Jonas 94). Applied to TV, this concept asks us to provide standards of morality which go beyond the reach of genre-ethics, because they are universal. Even in this sense ethics cannot provide eternal values, forged in an unchangeable canon of ethical principles. In technology, the prevention of a catastrophe is the sole aim. For morals in TV, such a catastrophe would be the loss of distance, equivalent to a loss of control of the agent over his actions and leading to a loss of morality to technology.

Self-restriction has to become the leading ideal of the ethics of technology. This does not imply an outer restriction of the freedom of expression or of information. As demonstrated above, the changed image of TV from a producer dominated medium to a technologically guided demand dominated viewer implies that responsibility can only be regained if it is shared by all those involved in the use of technology. Due to the fragmentation of the audiences and the grown number of programs, genre-ethics have lost their impact. When common values are deficient, virtue-ethics, based on the assumption of a common interest or standard, are not very promising. Since the common, reliable ground of shared norms is not to be found, and since the effects of our technologically altered actions are all but foreseeable, new concept of ethics cannot establish 'positive" norms. Since the more humble, "new ethics" cannot determine now what to do forever, they have to determine what not to do. For this sake, Jonas proposes a negative form of imperative for responsible actions: "Act so that the effects of your action are not destructive of the future possibility of (the permanence of genuine human) life" (Jonas 11).

Thus, it is out of a wheuristic of fear" born from the uncertainty of the effects of TV that we will have to develop the new principles for the responsible use of the media. Since we cannot count on any reliable predictive science of the long-range effects of technologically amplified actions, we will have to adopt a much more careful attitude. If we are aware of the fact that TV images change our world, we can guide those changes. If we are aware of the possible corrosion of moral values by virtual values, we can save the latter by a self-restriction, that should not be mistaken for censorship.' Everybody concerned with a future loss of control over technology will agree that there is "too much.' However, the fear of unknown consequences must not lead to a paralyzing dread either (Sassower). Fear of the consequences of a loss of responsibility should lead us to the recognition that we have to regain control, step by step. Dread, as barrier for all action, is no solution.

Instead, new "tabooso (Jonas 1988) could be reinstalled in areas in which the dangers are obvious, for example in the over proportional and graphic amount of violence in TV. Less obvious, but even more important, are the dangers derived from the image of technology as such. In order to prevent a further loss of perspective, the distance to and from the broadcast event should be reinstalled. The responsibility of the journalist to not just broadcast but also present and understand information will have to be preserved. Last, but not least, the viewer will have to reevaluate his freedom of choice and reduce the risk of becoming an instrument of technology by regaining control. The urge to reduce viewing time, or to reduce the amount of crime representation in TV, cannot come from the authorities. In order to be effective, each viewer will have to make this decision individually, in order to rescue his/her and the children's consciousness freedom to decide in the future. A moral consensus on such taboos could be the first step in the right direction.

We may not minimize the responsibility both a viewer and a broadcaster bear for the risked state of affairs of morality in TV. The moral impact of TV is not minimized if it is simply denied or if the agent takes the 'modest" risk unconsciously. In summary, a relatively modest, but responsible approach to ethics, as represented by Hans Jonas, appears to be an attractive alternative between 'strong' but inoperable classical concepts of ethics on the one hand and the absolute belief in technology on the other. It is a view which enables one to maintain that an agent in the realm of TV, be he/she on the viewer's or the producer's side, can still act responsibly.

1. This dispute dates as far back as Plato's Phaedrus, the myth of Theuth (274), and continues in modern Hermeneutics"as the debate about the unwritten Plato and thel. "Reader Response Theorya in literary criticism.

2. The yearly "Mainzer Tage der Fernsehkritik," organized for TV criticism by the major German broadcaster, ZDF, could serve as an example. The decline of quality of most contributions is only a mirror of the decline in both quantity and quality of publications.

3. The average model's weight differed six percent from the standard population weight in the sixties. Today's model is ca. 20 percent below the average; and this model is perceived as real. A continuous dissatisfaction of the individual with his
'false,' because real, body is the result. Gratitude for remarks by Steven J. Gilbert. For the productive discussion of the entire manuscript I wish to thank Michael Green.

4. Compare also the classic The Revolt of the Masses (Gasset 97) about the disastrous consequences if "the personality becomes absorbed by the different sets of machinery." Only today, the consequences for each individual seem to be worse than predicted for the masses.

5. This view of "total" care, as proposed by Jonas (Jonas 101), is often misinterpreted as totalitarian, whereas it appeals to a parent-child-like type of relationship. Of course, it is undemocratic in the sense that the choice not to realize all technical possibilities does deprive future generations of some choices - but only with the purpose of providing them with others. Also the fact that future voters are not taken into consideration in a democracy is one of its inherent defaults (Huber 147).