The Black Mirror episode titled "White Bear" was a strange piece to say the least. But after reading these a few responses to it, one gains a better understanding of it and is more confident on how they originally felt about the episode. One response was written by Emily Yoshida from the Hollywood Prospectus and the other was written by David Sims of the A.V. Club. Up until the very last ten minutes of the episode, the audience is clueless to why this woman is being recorded and tortured. The viewer sees this young girl looking for her family throughout the entire episode and no one is helping her. They all just want to record. The woman goes all over town running from the people in the masks and everyone with a camera. Technology in this episode is prevalent throughout. From the phones always recording to the television having the white symbol on it when she comes downstairs, its always present. The current era of the world we live in is shaped by technology. People cannot go a day without looking at their phone or watching television. Technology, because of the way that we look at it today, has culturally changed the way that we view and interpret certain texts because of its transformation of the mind viewing it.

The main point from the response by Emily Yoshida of Hollywood Prospectus was that basically, when the main character was told what happened towards the end of the episode, there was a sense of "Did that really happen because of that?" Yoshida reinforced one the viewer's thoughts of how absurd the punishment was for the crime that the main character committed (Yoshida). One cannot simply think it is humane for her to punished this hard every single day of her life, even if she cannot remember it. She made a good point also concerning the punishment of murderers and other people who have committed worse crimes (Yoshida). This girl videotaped a murder occurring. That's really sick to a lot of people. But people who do more than that. People who go out and just kill people for no reason. One cannot imagine what their punishment must be like. 

Another response was written by David Sims of the A.V. Club. This response was a little more in depth and insightful when reading it. It gave background information of where the episode's idea originated and informed the viewer of a couple who performed the same exercises with children in the 60s (Sims). The husband would kill the child and the wife would record it. This is an example of how technology transformed people to use it for the wrong reasons. Technology, being the cultural era of our time is blown out of proportion by the media. Sims informed on how the media and technology can play a role in punishment if she is publicly shamed for committing that crime. That's exactly what happened in "White Bear." The main character was taken into custody, her memory was wiped, tortured, and put through the exact same type of punishment every day for the rest of her life. Technology formed the audiences view for them. Whether what she did was bad or not, technology told them how they should feel, and the audience bought into it. The audience was not allowed to form their own opinion because of the way that the producers incorporated technology into this episode. Sims informs the reader that while watching this young girl go through all of this torture for something we had no idea about, we cannot help but sympathize for the girl (Sims). At the same time, however, the sympathy for both Sims and the viewer away because we agree that what she did by recording that girl's death was wrong. 

The era of technology in our time is very advanced. Social media is a very big part of our lives now. One cannot go anywhere without seeing an advertisement about an app or tweeting away about their lives. Technology in this episode of "Black Mirror" was used to create a sense of urgency and distress. Generally, when a scary scene is being recorded and turned into a movie or television episode it constitutes a scary or emotional sense to it. "Black Mirror" is symbolic in the way that people today are constantly staring into their phones, tablets, computers, and televisions. In a way, they are staring back at us. Phones, tablets, and other technological pieces are visually appealing to the viewer. They give us so many options to choose from that satisfies our needs. Technology transforms our minds to examine the surface of it. So when we examine other texts visually through a movie or an episode, we never get passed the surface meaning that the text is trying to convey.

Technology in literary and visual texts has social repercussions. The Librarian Network argues that technology is just a surface of meaning when it said "our devices may have filled our hours with apps and social networking sites, but this does not necessarily mean that they have left us more fulfilled," (Librarian). This means that technology of the world today is just scratching the surface when we view things, no matter literary texts or movies. Everything that we do technologically touches the basic meaning of a text. This can leave people without a good understanding of any sort of text. In "White Bear," technology was used to give the audience a base line for what this woman did with the marking of a symbol on a television screen. They followed that claim when they stated "We have been supplied with all manner of answers, but this does not necessarily mean we had first asked any questions," (Librarian). This means that the reader did not think deep at all about the subject at hand, but was still supplied a number of answers to un-asked questions concerning the text. The interpretation of the text was given to them without any thought at all.

Historically, technology has not been a large part of our lives. It wasn't until about 50 years ago that advanced technology began to develop and change the face of our generation. Everything that includes computers, televisions, smart phones, and tablets have all changed how we live our everyday lives. It has also changed the way that the reader can interpret a text. Technology shows the reader the easy way out of a better, in depth understanding of literary texts. Technology draws the reader in and gets them distracted away from the piece itself. The New York Daily News reiterated this when it discussed the episodes in the "Black Mirror" series as a whole; "All of the episodes in "Black Mirror" focus not only on the way technology is used, but also how it creates a sense of paranoia for its users," (Smith). The creators of "White Bear" used technology to transform the viewer's mind to think that even with the crime committed by the main character, technology touched the surface of why the we felt the way we did because of the cameras throughout the episode and the way it ended.

Overall, "White Bear" used technology throughout the entire episode to grab the viewer and pull he or she a certain way just so they would form the opinion they wanted he or she to form only to turn it around at the end and make the viewer if not change it but second guess their opinion. It makes the viewer form a new interpretation of the episode. Throughout the entire thing, the viewer continues to question the reason why no one is helping this girl find her family. Everyone is recording her suffering as it is happening. And this goes on every single day for the rest of her life. But when it is revealed at the end why she is being tortured, the viewer is forced to re-think their opinion about the woman. The use of technology changed their opinion and made them decide if they sympathize for the woman being recorded or if it brutally correct to torture someone to this extreme. 

