Hypocrisy Revealed in Canterbury Tales

Theodor Adorno believes that humans are no longer

free. This is partly because media on the whole is

dictating what an individual should be instead of

individuals deciding for themselves. The entertainment

industry has humanity under its grasp, but most normal

people have yet to realize. The only roles in life are

dictated by movies. When coming to understand culture

today, it is often necessary to consider the free

lawfulness of the imagination. The idea that the

imagination “must be considered in its freedom.”

Immanuel Kant’s idea that imagination has its own laws

has been overlooked by what Adorno calls the “Mass

Deception” of Enlightenment.

This “Mass Deception” is embodied in the film The

Matrix. In this film, people are so intent in living

in a dream that real life has yet to be discovered.

The film’s theme revolves around the need for

redemption from this trap, as does Adorno. As

Morpehus declares, The world is being pulled over our

eyes. Television and the movies project an image of

the ideal hero that is “uniform as a whole and in

every part” (1223). That image takes away true

individuality.

People on the whole no longer learn the

art of free thinking. Instead, we have become a

society dedicated to what Adorno calls “resignation.”

Most people’s financial resources are spent on

mindless pleasure. This “pleasure promotes the

resignation which it ought to help to forget” (1232).

Our time, money, emotion, and other resources are

wasted as a result of this system.

What comes to mind is societyґs dependence on

entertainment. It gives us an identity. It establishes

a personality and relationship that fills the void in

our lives. Relationships are for people in the movies,

and they are more real than the real relationships.

Even happily married