Based on a 20-month ethnographic study of television and audiences in class-divided Philippines, this is the first book to take a bottom-up approach in considering how people respond to images and narratives of suffering and poverty on television. The book aims to contribute to the broader project of de-Westernizing media studies and explore the tension between ethical prescription and anthropological description in the social sciences and humanities. Winner of the 2016 Philippine Social Science Council Excellence in Research Award.Table of Contents: Acknowledgements; Introduction: The Poverty of Television; 1. The Moral Turn: From First Principles to Lay Moralities; 2. Theorizing Mediated Suffering: Ethics of Media Texts, Audiences and Ecologies; 3. Audience Ethics: Mediating Suffering in Everyday Life; 4. Entertainment: Playing with Pity; 5. News: Recognizing Calls to Action; Conclusions: Mediating Suffering, Dividing Class; Appendix; Notes; References; Index