Broadcast mass media turn audiences into passive listeners with no means of reply.

Evidence

The step from the telephone to the radio has clearly distinguished the roles. The former still allowed the subscriber to play the role of subject, and was liberal. The latter is democratic: it turns all participants into listeners and authoritatively subjects them to broadcast programs which are all exactly the same. No machinery of rejoinder has been devised, and private broadcasters are denied any freedom. They are confined to the apocryphal field of the “amateur,” and also have to accept organization from above. But any trace of spontaneity from the public in official broadcasting is controlled and absorbed by talent scouts, studio competitions and official programs of every kind selected by professionals. — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 94

Categorization

• DEFINE: The famous telephone/radio contrast defines liberal (subject-role) versus democratic (passive-listener) media forms.
• XREF: Resonates with the reader’s established passion for silence and sound: radio’s one-way broadcast structure is a central force in the modern lo-fi soundscape Mc Luhan and Schafer analyze. — connects to: Broadcast communication between elites and audiences is systematically distorted by structure — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 783; Structural differences between broadcasters and audiences cause systematic communication distortion; Cultural invasion can be broadcast through technology to render people passive spectators — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 580 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Structural differences between broadcasters and audiences cause systematic communication distortion #corroborates (0.90)
• Broadcast communication between elites and audiences is systematically distorted by structure #corroborates (0.85) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 783
• Communication distortion stems from asymmetric positions between producers and audiences. #corroborates (0.85)
• Cultural invasion can be broadcast through technology to render people passive spectators #corroborates (0.80) — Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, 580
• Audiences bring their own cultures to consumption, so media effects are never automatic #complicates (0.80) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 122
• Unchallenged assertions gain credibility with passive audiences #expands (0.78) — Holm Gero Hümmler, Ulrike Schiesser, Fact and Prejudice, 263