Smarter, better, faster, kinder? The problems with claiming that media and popular culture has positive effects

For much of its history, popular culture has been seen as a threat to audiences. This paper identifies a parallel but powerful discourse that runs counter to these narratives: that popular culture is beneficial and makes us ‘smarter’, ‘better’, ‘faster’ or ‘kinder’. While media and cultural studies have robustly criticized ‘negative’ media effects, they’ve been slower to address ‘positive’ effects. This paper corrects that oversight by examining the politics of these discourses in the online press. Through a thematic analysis of 111 articles, the paper suggests positive effects can be critiqued using the criteria of simplicity, morality and ideology. ‘Positive’ claims about popular cultural consumption may seem appealing, but they oversimplify complex scientific research and social phenomena, moralize cultural consumption, and uphold ideological norms. Such discourses perpetuate troubling common senses about ‘good’ and ‘bad’ audiences that align with existing systems of power.