Tuesday, November 3, 2009

I'm infected by awareness.

Do you ever feel like what you might really feel like doing is too unsophisticated to cop to? I am so distraught by Fox News and so much of what's in the "news" that shouldn't be news and even more distraught at what the real news, reported or not, appears to be. I'm angry that people like Glenn Beck have a cable network at their disposal, like a cockroach with a megaphone. I like Rachel Maddow because she fights back, but lately that's all she's able to do. The bullshit-storm, by design, is so strong that the sensible people have to waste their time defending themselves against assaults from the idiots who destroy and don't create. There's rarely a chance to do anything else. You can't have a civil conversation in the middle of a locust invasion without going blind and swallowing big gulps of exoskeleton. Is it wrong to want to just turn it off and live in a bubble of my immediate reality more often? I'm infected by global awareness, and probably only scraping the surface of the truth at that. My innate optimism feels feisty but naive and either dependent on oblivion or subject to serious and emotionally expensive re-evaluation and compromise.

5 comments:

Llama said...

It is NOT wrong to want to just turn it off and live in a bubble of your immediate reality more often.

Anonymous said...

Mmmmmm...exoskeleton.

But really, no one forces you to pay attention to Glen Beck or Rachel Maddow or anyone/anything else. Serene detachment is still an option.

David Kutcher said...

When did the nightly news become a series of op-ed commentaries that try to score political points at the expense of the opposing viewpoint?

I know everyone around here loves Rachel, but she's no different except for the fact that everyone around here agrees with her.

Pardon me for being old-fashioned, but I thought the news was supposed to just be the news, not opinion pieces crafted to sound like the news? I don't know why there needs to be yelling or shouting in the news if it's just reporting the facts, but that's what every interview seems to turn into.

Rachel was supposed to be the left's answer to the Glen Becks of the world, but, seriously, why do we need an answer? Just don't listen!

Where is someone who doesn't care for EITHER side of the same angry establishment supposed to go for real, fair and balanced news?

Jim Neill said...

I guess that's what I'm saying. Many don't remember that there was such a time....sort of. Murrow. Cronkite. When new departments were loss leaders and not profit centers. Weren't PBS and NPR supposed to be the neutral voice? And I don't mean centrist, I mean neutral, as implausible as that may be for humans. No sarcasm here, I just doubt there is such a thing as an "unbiased voice as we all report from the context of our broader situations." So much broadcast power in the hands of s few has always been spooky but never moreso than now.

David Kutcher said...

How can we expect bipartisanship from our elected representatives when we can't even get it from our media?

We have media at play that, in the name of ratings and advertising dollars, caters to the food fight that is modern politics. Instead of reporting on things that the government is actually doing, they're too caught up in reporting on things that the other political party is posturing about doing, and making that the target of their "reporting". Who cares about Sarah Palin? Ignore the lunatic fringes on both sides and talk to us about what the government is actually doing, like putting us into perpetual debt while companies like Goldman walk away with billions. Or how about how reps barely, if ever, read the full text of the bills and laws that they are passing? Waste and fraud persist while the "free and open media" is too busy name-calling to do their jobs.