Media influence and the core and periphery

I may have stumbled upon something I think I was born to do, an enlightened me in the past couple of weeks has been contemplating why I am here on this earth.

I have no clue what so ever about zoology, but I see animals as more clearly defined with their role on earth compared to a human being like myself, living in a world where time waits for no one, thinking is a waste of time if it amounts to just imagination and what if’s, it’s a few minutes or hours you can’t take back, most often the thought it self of thinking is wasted effort.

A series of questions pop up, why seems to start off the questions, answers need to be given to those that ask why?

Sometimes you need not look further with the role of mass media in society clearly driving the popular culture, a scroll through facebook or twitter and you get a glimpse of what the world has driven itself into.

A world of opportunity with so much promise, a world torn by war under the guise of counter insurgency and differences in political and religious opinion.

I am not a dissident to start with but a Papua New Guinean with some understanding of how countries relate with each other.

Back in university I was fascinated with the theory of Hegemony, one of my favorite Authors is Noam Chomsky, I even used his knowledge of Hegemony for my final year research on Mass Media and Patriotism.

Definition of Hegemony

Hegemony is a Marxist theory by Antonio Gramsci in simple definition it is when a ruling class promotes its ideals and values to become the world view; one of this is promoting world view through mass media.

Some of you may clearly see this in your everyday life yet regard this as normal, let me say it in my own understanding after trying my utter best to understand it and put into a real world context.

Okay America is seen as a super power, we most haven’t been to America I myself dream of being a tourist to the stars and stripes, but alas I be just a simple journalist with a meager income a pennyworth in the eyes of some of you reading.

Yes sad but true, but back to the point, America’s dominance is broadcast through mass media, magazines, internet, newspapers, movies.

Let me take one off the cuff just by my own understanding of America’s hegemonic influence through mass media.

Every time you watch a movie and when Aliens from out of space invade the Earth who defends it, America of course, with their technology and weapons “the super power”, even certain super heroes are from America I need not touch on this.

We come in peace that’s what America would say to the Alien race as representatives from Earth, portraying that they are the protector of Earth and its people.

hopefully it is all science fiction and no real pending invasion is being planned at the moment by some new beings outside the orbiting third planet in the milky way.

back to my simple understanding, from what I have gathered American hegemony started in World War II when all its allies were torn down after war, America stood tall with its country intact, after the war it became the home of the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

American Hegemony illustration 

It had a strong military and dominant economy; it was a political and technological power.

All this is portrayed through media in news and Hollywood, entertainment where America’s ideals are ever present, we all know America through mass media, and you can learn everything through internet about the country.

okay we have established US as a super power a country that has set most of the world view, on what terrorism is what counter insurgency is and what home land security should look like for countries.

but Papua New Guinea is just another small nation where do we fit into this world?

Let me throw another theory into the works The Theory of Core and Periphery, in the world countries can be divided into two major world regions: the "core" and the "periphery."

The core includes major world powers and the countries that contain much of the wealth of the planet. 

The periphery has those countries that are not reaping the benefits of global wealth and globalization.

I know it’s hard to believe this but it’s true my country is nowhere near the core.

Core Periphery relations illustration 

Here is another fun fact People in positions of power and influence around the world are often brought up or educated in the core (nearly 90 percent of world leaders have a degree from a Western university).

Another fun fact is that the periphery is just like Papua New Guinea where Many people living in rural areas perceive opportunities in cities and take action to migrate there, even though there are not enough jobs or housing to support them.

But where did all this classification start well during colonization European Countries established colonial governments and introduced everyone to what the core countries were doing.

Sad but true we were all hunters and gathers forced to learn the Whiteman’s way of life, because we had to be tamed for our resources.

Core nations had to have some sort of suppression on the periphery, because of the raw materials present and the abundance of resources; we supply the core nations with raw materials if we all become core nations who would become periphery.

Not all countries have advantages to progress into a core nation the world maintains a rough and limiting geography for the majority in the periphery.

So for your information and knowledge please do look up the theories I mentioned, I will write more about them in future.

Education System needs to be fixed by everyone

For you that think you are better than everyone else, it’s time you took the mirror and have a good look at yourself, ask yourself, why have all my dreams just remain as that and my reality does not fit what I imagined.

Your imagination is perfect but circumstances can’t make an exact copy of what you picture in your mind to every detail.

A quote by Albert Einstein on Imagination

Simple because you are one part of a complex system of the human race, human beings evolved through trial and error and ingenuity through each other’s adaptation of their ever changing environment.

 You can conjure up things but you can’t bring others into your mind to be in sync  with your perceived reality, people have their own demons to fight.

This has led me to realize that there is no such thing as perfection, what you create will be shined by some other person who betters your creation, by finding your flaws and improving on them.

Possibilities are endless when imagining things but it takes a lifetime to try and perfect something, like the saying goes if it’s not broken don’t fix it, just improve it and things keep progressing.

I am not a “dissident” nor am I here to please or create enemies but to offer some satirical insight into some issues blazing through PNG.

I think too much for my age I am just 30 years old and I thought why not I start a satire blog?

 I am not perfect rather a statistic of some study of human kind, no one is perfect, how can you be a perfect human, when being human is being alive.

Humans have a timeline and no one can accomplish everything in a time frame, you still leave something undone once you’re done in this lifetime.

Despite being the same species, everyone has an opinion and no one’s opinion matter because you feel what others say is not right in some way.

 Everyone desires some form of standard but what you see as perfect is just an imagined concept.

That brings me to a point.

There is so much that people want to say on social media, but sometimes it’s not written well, it’s joyous to laugh at these spelling errors and wrong tenses and misconception of words, on Facebook, the screen shots of peoples poor English is funny but fun and laughter aside it’s at   the cost of proud Papua New Guineas failed by the Government Education System and their society.

Notice two things mentioned, education system and society.

The education system in Papua New Guinea is somewhat flawed, some people who themselves could not master the GPA to warrant a tertiary education, yet self-sponsored themselves to a diploma in education.

Now that has got to be a crime, they had limited choices but institutions need the finance to survive and end up undermining the level of quality they should be setting to the growing population.

Schools have limited resources to provide for students, and lack innovation to provide even extra-curricular activities to support their budding pupils, reading clubs, adventure clubs something to get the students acquainted to the real world, to be thematic in their approach to issues at their level.

And then the bottle neck system of a huge number of primary schools, less number of secondary schools and limited spaces in tertiary institutions, why so competitive when all you get in the government education system is winners and losers, winners advance and losers get the “F” laterally.

But who introduced us to western education?

Let’s take a History lesson, the Three G’s God, Gold and Glory, short cut colonization, when we were colonized it was for the glory of the expansion of ideals, ideals like Christianity and the search of wealth.

The Three Gs

Expansion and exploration was for the superior nations, for the empire the claiming of “Terra nullius”, the uncivilized bought into civilization through Christianity and with it indoctrination.

Plantations popped up as the ancestors worked for the empire.

Let’s get this straight we were colonized by empires, established nations with intellectuals who formed policies and ideals who had a common interest to grow the empire.

Some were in search of new land as theirs crumbled into chaos; some also had personal malicious intent.

The systems put in place were to protect their national interest and their world view.

The PNG education system is career driven and a “caste system”, you get A’s and you get to be a Doctor, Lawyer, engineer, and so on and so forth.

Some information on the education system in Papua New Guinea

Those that don’t make it through the system are left with limited opportunities.

Only a few will achieve their dreams where the path they charted is right before them, otherwise you will settle for something else.

The other point comes in society, PNG is said to be built on a system of leadership, and close community survival.

Society has not survived without any form of leadership, teamwork and innovation.

They say family is the foundation, but simple jealousy and pride, because of unequal distribution of wealth among families, is a deterrent.

Put differences aside and focus on the benefits of family, you only live once why not share your knowledge; everyone has some piece of advice to offer.

Let me put it this way, if we are able to learn from mistakes and see improvement in our lives than our children and younger siblings should not be lagging behind in the education system.

If teachers are not up to standard than those in the family system should be working together to innovate ways to improve the teaching and learning aspects of children.

The education system is too far gone to fix, but households and extended families can improve the system by making it their business to teach the fundamentals of reading and writing and correct grammar as foundation to more pressing issues in the ever changing world.

Children are at an age where they have so much potential and if the society they grow up in is intelligent but lack empathy for the breakdown in simple fundamentals in education than we have a problem.

Teachers need to be more innovative and committed, an educated nation is a smart nation, and teachers need to be prioritized.

With the internet streaming everything in multiple windows and tabs so much information, rewarding humorous, filth and all sorts are being digested in seconds of each scroll and tap by the pointer or the thumb.

If things don’t get fixed than we will continue on with the current trend,

We will have individuals who have no real guidance at home from their immediate and extended family, coupled with poor performing teachers who are struggling with their socio economic problems.

Resulting in individual’s writing things on facebook with their imagination thinking that it is perfect, but instead it creates a lot of ridicule for this nation and its citizens.

 The Government must see this as priority improving the whole system of education how teachers are recruited, and how they are trained, and how they can instill more than just basic education, while for  parents and the extended do not  blame the system but help improve their children’s understanding by correcting and guiding where teachers have failed.