Media literacy focus of events

Mike Beegle wants more people to start asking “Why?”

Specifically, he wants people to question what they watch on television, read in the paper and see on billboards as they drive across town.

“If people sit back and watch and don’t question, democracy goes down the drain,” said Beegle, a 2001 graduate of Lewis and Clark High School who is attending Loyola Marymount’s film school.

As founder of Effection Media, which he describes as a “socially responsible production group,” Beegle wants to spread the word about the importance of media literacy, or questioning the content and images that are part of people’s daily media diet. He has returned to Spokane for the summer to kick off a series of coffee-shop discussions on that topic.

Part of Beegle’s motivation comes from the Practicum in Community Involvement class he took with John Hagney at LC. In that class, students choose an area of interest, then intern at a community nonprofit organization dedicated to that issue or cause.

“In that class, I learned the importance of giving back,” he said. “I don’t want to be a taker.”

Beegle, a Chase Youth Award winner, hopes people will respond to the information he shares with them and agree that learning more about media literacy is worthy of their time.

“Through education you can empower people. But it’s not overnight,” he said. “You have to have faith.”

In his view, ads are needed for the economy to work and the media are needed to provide information about the world.

But the real danger comes when people experience everything in isolation, passively soaking up whatever the media pours out.

Beegle cites statistics such as this: Researchers estimate Americans experience about 2,000 media messages each day, all of which promote a certain product, lifestyle or cultural norm. And according to the Washington State Department of Health, some researchers link “troublesome eating patterns to increased pressures on women by the mass media, fashion and diet industries to pursue thinness.”

To get people motivated to act, Beegle said, there has to be dialogue.

“It’s not about telling people what to do or what not to do,” he added.

So, to get things started, he will hold three free forums: Tuesday from 7-9 p.m. at the Spike, 122 S. Monroe; Wednesday from 7-9 p.m. at the Rocket Market, 726 E. 43rd; and Thursday from 3:30-5:30 p.m. at The Shop, 924 S. Perry. He will also talk about the film he’s working on and his development of a K-12 media literacy curriculum.

“I don’t want to be the guy who just sits around and talks about how messed up the world is,” he said.