Kimberly remarked about a story about a co-worker who will remain nameless where he came up to her cubicle at work and asked her if she knew that Heath Ledger died. She responded by asking him where he was when Benazir Bhutto was when she was assassinated.
Apparently, Montel has done something very similar in an unexpected move on the news channel we all love to mock and criticize, Fox News. The mainstream media, and especially the cable news network Fox News, have disgusted me the past few months particularily, and it's nice when someone associated with the media brings up those questions and refuses to take weak, throw away answers to a real and pressing subject and admits that something is very, very wrong here.
The rebuttals by the media are so hollow, so futile, so insincere and even almost condescending that it made me laugh out loud.
Girl: "But why do we do that as a society?"
Montel: "It's our voracious appetite to bring in ratings. We know it. We know it as a fact."
You just got punked by Montel!
On the other hand, the local Fox News in Seattle seems to be practicing some very responsible attempts towards a fair and balanced approach to Ron Paul, the candidate who has received, as they put it, "a snub by the media." Instead of treating him like a circus side show, smirking the entire way or sarcastic, constant questioning of his "electability," they actually take the time to ask him some serious, thoughtful questions. Amazing.
An interesting and startling fact that the Center for Public Integrity accuses the Bush Administration for a whopping 935 lies leading up to the Iraq War. Disputable, no doubt, but a serious accusation, nonetheless.
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3 comments:
My favorite part about the Montel clip was the pre-edited Heath Ledger clips that continued to play over the commentary.
To me the most annoying part about.. television, is when interviewers and interviewees spend the entire time talking over top of each other, trying to direct the conversation. It really gets on my nerves, but here it's doubly annoying when he's bringing up a drastic topic change that deserves to be discussed and admitted to, rather than defended and interrupted. And many props to Montel for being forceful enough to talk over all of them. He's not a talk-show host for nothing (and he's one of the few who really lets his guests speak up as well [not that I'm especially schooled in daytime talk shows for any particular reason <.< >.>]).
But is it being all about ratings actually bad? There's a market economy working in media field. If you are interested in soldier's name, you go to the media that serves specific market niche. I bet he didn't look hard enough for the name. There. Top site. Took a whopping two google searches to find that.
If you are watching mainstream channel be ready to eat mainstream news.
Our media system is pretty functional and for that it deserves a thumbs up. But I would have to say that a ratings/commercial based system DOES have several shortcomings and in general IS bad. When the media picks and chooses what stories to cover based on what sells well, we get sex scandals and celebrity news while important diplomats are being assassinated or making major policy changes around the globe.
And it's not just about being willing to seek out the "real" news. A ratings based system tends to target the baser instincts and desires of the public. It perpetuates an indulgent lifestyle for the audiences. Viewers are fed saucy and sugar-coated news with brief mentions of top stories, the same way McDonalds offers an enormous bucket of tasty fries and a tiny, wilted salad. Most people desire the junk, and when it's so readily available it's all we eat. And when the emphasis in the media is skewed, the viewer perceives the importance in a skewed way as well. You could argue about which causes which but in either case both spiral downward till Brittany Spears going to the hospital this week is more important that Israel/Palestinian policy or what the economic situation will mean in the next few years.
I'm not saying news on Brittany or Heath or Tom Cruise or whoever are bad, but they are blown out of proportion. That kind of thing really deserves a small side-line on page 6, not the front page. Bhutto's death *deserves* more press coverage the Heath Ledger, no matter how many more publications his face will sell.
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