Are We Really “Amusing Ourselves to Death?”

At this meeting, we'll discuss the 1985 book Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman. In this book, the Postman evaluates the state of society in 1985 and finds that most aspects of society are becoming more and more like entertainment. His main philosophical point is that the medium of information affects the content itself and he provides several historical examples of this (spoken word, writing, radio, television, etc. all present information in different ways and contexts). And he argues that through the use of technology, especially the television, society is turning education, news, religion, and politics into just more ways to amuse ourselves. He isn’t against entertainment per se, but he’s critical of entertainment creeping into arenas which, in his opinion, they should be kept distinctly separate from.

During this meetup, we’ll take a critical look at his views from our 2025 perspective. How has television affected political debates? Is news obtained through doom scrolling or television inferior to the newspaper? Can religion thrive on social media? Can and should learning be fun? Now that television is being replaced by the internet, Youtube, and TikTok, do his arguments no longer hold (if they ever did)? Or is he more relevant than ever before?

The book is not long - only 163 pages. But if you don’t have time to read, I’ll be providing a short set of notes that summarize his basic points.

Hope to see you there, and happy thinking!