Summary
This mediation of community through television is related to seismic sociological shifts that have been occurring for more than two centuries. In these and many other ways, television mediates community.
In the twentieth century, the capacity for relationships to spread across vast tracts of time and space increased exponentially. TV, the worldwide web, and other forms of social media have accelerated this process.
This means that many of our relationships are mediated rather than direct. We are more grieved when Michael Jackson dies, someone who has never set eyes on us, than when our neighbor passes away.
We interact emotionally with characters like Jack Bauer (24), John Locke (Lost), and Don Draper (Mad Men) We anticipate and participate in the weekly unfolding of their lives, setting aside regular time for them as if they were good friends.
Social psychologists call these relationships “parasocial relations.” They are one-sided bonds of intimacy between TV viewers and TV celebrities and fictitious characters. They fall far short of Martin Buber’s I-Thou relationality or Karl Barth’S cohumanity.
Will and Grace, the first and most successful sitcom with a principal gay character, is frequently cited as an example of this dynamic. TV may help us see past our prejudices to recognize the common humanity of those whom we may have judged and rejected.
Can TV’s function as mediator of community point us toward the Mediator of Communion? TV forms a community bound by neither time nor space. The communion of saints is not bound to time and space. Our very being is knit together with persons we will never see, hear, or touch.
This may turn our attention to Jesus, who mediates our communion with each other. So that we see one another as Christ sees us, so that we listen to each other as Christ listens to us.
