We Interrupt This Carnival For a Very Special Announcement

Sorry all, the Carnival is coming. I just need to do one last proofread and shoot off warning e-mails to people whose inclusion came about through some means other than self-submission.

But before I do that, I need to get something off my chest. I have a looooooong post hidden somewhere in the drafts about this, but it's just come up far too many times lately for me to not give the short version (which is probably better anyway) and yet still be able to concentrate on the proof-reading.

So here goes:

Television and movies suck because no one knows how to make them. And by no one, I mean us, not the people actually making them.

Better writers make better readers. Better readers make better writers. And an audience consisting of good readers who know how to write always demands higher quality material than an audience consisting of bad readers that don't know how to write.*

The problem with TV and movies are that they are read-only. Don't believe me? Read Amusing Ourselves to Death. Count how many times Neil Postman rants about how the written word is inherently better than moving pictures. Count (on one hand) how many times his argument doesn't include examples of readers also being writers. Ask yourself if moving pictures really need to be read-only. Start yelling at the book. Then start caring about media literacy. And by media literacy, I don't mean "TV bad, books good."

The end.

* pretend there's a detailed caveat here about why this doesn't mean what it seems to mean when it comes to kids books.