How Electronic Media has impacted my life

With advancements in electronic media, communication between people around the globe has become instantaneous, and things that could have been considered nonsensical have become commonplace. However, advances in electronic media is not the subject of this essay, and for a detailed history, on could find that information on their phones in this day and age.

The subject of this essay however, is the effect that electronic media has had on my life. I am a sixteen year old middle class male, I’ve lived in California my whole life, and most of the time I listen to heavy metal music, play violent video games, and watch My Little Pony.

Yes, that’s right, I watch My Little Pony. At first glance, you may find this a bit of an inconsistency with the rest of my hobbies, but I assure you I will explain. To begin my explanation of this curious hobby, and how it relates to my use of electronic media, I’ll start the story in the spring of last year, in the depths of the internet. While browsing an internet forum I frequent, I began to see subtle references to My Little Pony pop up from time to time. I chalked this up to random internet randomness, and didn’t think much of it. However, as time went on, I began to see more and more of these references, too many for them to be coincidental. I sought more information from popular internet culture resource, Know Your Meme.

Know Your Meme was (and still is) a collection of internet inside jokes, culture, and references that some people use to get data about the start of a fad or a meme. When I went to get information about My Little Pony, I found a wealth of information all leading to the conclusion that there are people in the 14-30 male demographic who both watch and enjoy My Little Pony. More, specifically, My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic, the fourth incarnation in the series.

At first, I was confused. I remembered when I was 12, my sister watched My Little Pony, and I, with nothing else to do in the lazy summer days of my youth, I sat back and ridiculed it. It was a terrible show, of course. As a young boy, it was pretty much my job to make fun of such childish shows as Barney the Dinosaur and My Little Pony. Mainly, I suppose, it was to proclaim my machismo to my peers. Partially, it was also to throw out the notion that I was still a child. As we all know, the main goal of a pre-teen child is to remove all traces of his youth from his personality, and to be viewed as manly as possible. But in reality, the generation 3 My Little Pony was no where near as good as the current generation 4.

The incentive of most people to like the new manifestation of My Little Pony is a bit of a combination of several reasons. The first reason is that the show’s executive producer, Lauren Faust, was also the director of some other cartoons that the shows newfound fan base loved as kids. Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends and The Powerpuff Girls were some of the other shows that she worked on, and a pretty big chunk of the fans of My Little Pony are fans of her other work.

Another reason that people like the show is the fact that, contrary to the older generations of My Little Pony, the show’s plot is actually pretty decent. The characters are well developed, and the storylines are not nonsensical girly gibberish. I myself, find myself engrossed in the story of an episode, and after discussing the plot on internet forums, debating the implications of plot twists on future episodes, and seeing hilarious photoshops, fan art, fan made cartoons, the moments where I stop myself and think “Why am I watching a show for little girls?” have become fewer and farther between.

Going back to my discovery of the show, after reading some of the people’s testimonies on the alleged awesomeness that the show contained, I decided that I might as well watch the darn show. I navigated my browser to YouTube, looked up the first episode of the first season, and pressed play.

The back story of the show was simple, but not trite. In a magical land called Equestria, there were two sister princesses, Celestia and Luna, who each ruled over the night and day, respectfully. The younger sister, Luna, became angry that ponies frolicked in the daytime, yet slept through her beautiful night. One night, she decided not to lower the moon to make way for the sun, and kept all the land in an eternal night. She had become Nightmare Moon, an evil manifestation of her former self. Her sister Celestia had no choice but to use the Elements of Harmony imprison her in the moon for a thousand years, and she was forgotten.

Upon watching this introduction, I was a bit torn. It was a good plot hook, and I was definitely interested. However, this was My Little Pony we were talking about. Why would I watch a show for little girls? This is stupid! Obviously I had to watch it a little more, just to see how stupid it was.

The main plot of the show focuses on Twilight Sparkle, the main character. She is a unicorn who focuses the majority of her time with her nose in a book, studying magic. She lives in Canterlot, the political center and capital of Equestria, and is a close friend and student of Princess Celestia. Basically, she is sent to Ponyville to make friends due to her introversion. In Ponyville, she meets the rest of the main cast, who each represent one of the other Elements of Harmony (Which are magical artifacts that represent different aspects of the ponies’ personalities, and are physically manifested as magical jewelry.)

The first character that the viewers officially meet is Applejack, an apple farmer pony who is honest, hardworking, and down to earth. She lives on her families’ farm, and spends most of the year planting and harvesting crops (mainly apples). She has a large extended family, and represents the element of Honesty.

The next main character is Rarity, a fashonista pony who owns a dress shop. However, despite her talent with clothing and fashion, her character is quite well developed and, surprisingly, rather likable. She is a unicorn, which allows her to do some limited telekinesis that is generally used to write away her need to have hands to operate complex sewing equipment. Her Element of Harmony is Generosity.

The next pony met is Fluttershy, a pony whose shyness exceeds any measurable level. When she first meets Twilight, she is so shy that she cannot even say her own name. However, she later opens up and makes friends with the rest of the main cast. She is a Pegasus, and although she has the gift of flight, she prefers to remain on the ground to look after her animal friends. She is a friend of all natural things, and cards for many animals, including her pet rabbit, Angel. The Element of Harmony she represents is Kindness.

Rainbow Dash is also a Pegasus, however, she is the complete opposite of Fluttershy. She is a tomboy at heart, and loves to fly and compete. She is the most daring of the main six characters, and is very headstrong in everything she does. She is widely regarded as the best flyer in Cloudsdale (her hometown) and is the only pony to ever perform a “sonic rainboom”, a flying maneuver in which a rainbow and a sonic boom happens at the same time. She represents Loyalty.

The last pony who is introduced in the first episode is Pinkie Pie. She is the oddball of the group, and usually takes things the least seriously. She is completely obsessed with parties, and hosts them at every occasion. She can sometimes get on other’s nerves, and sometimes just weird them out. She is known to break the fourth wall and exhibit the most cartoon physics out of all the main characters.

After watching the first episode (and the second, because it’s a two-parter) I was fairly convinced that this phenomenon was completely justified. I was in love with the show, and it showed. I mentally assigned personality traits to ponies that fit them, I browsed the web constantly for more pony image macros and fan fiction, and I was completely open and honest about my love of My Little Pony with my friends.

In fact, upon talking to some of my friends about the show, I was surprised that some of the people I talked to were fans of the show too! At this point, I had stopped even realizing the differences between what I normally watched and My Little Pony. As far as I was concerned, it was just as normal as watching any other t.v. show. Although I will admit, some people may think that I, for one, have gotten a tad too fanatical about it. Recently, I’ve been waking up at 5:30 am on Saturdays to watch new episodes, and I’ve been actually reading and enjoying fanfiction that I read on the internet.