Roger Clemens testifies in front of Congress and the entire world stops...
ESPN, CNN, MSNBC, and FOX are all there, streaming live.
No wonder we had a high school student who completely fabricated a signing day decision to attend school and play football for a University who had never even heard of him.
Our society's priorities are whack! Who sets those priorities? Policymakers? Media?
Is the United States still not heavily involved in a War? Has genocide in Sudan ceased? Has the Bush Administration been cleared of all accusations pertaining to torture? Isn't there something more important for supposed honorable members of Congress to be investigating?
Clearly Congress has a stake in steroid use in Baseball because, wait what is the reason?
The "news" media in the United States is a joke and more and more the mantra, "make a buck, make a buck" clearly has them under a trance.
I attended Chelsea Clinton's appearance at the Memorial Union on the campus of the University of Wisconsin. I also was witness to Barack Obama last night at the Kohl Center in Madison, Wisconsin (more to come on those experiences complete with videos and pictures in the coming days). Looked at in conjunction with one another, the take home message from the two event is that the 18-29 year old demographic cares. I know this is not a novel idea, but if the young vote actually gets to the polls in November, there is no chance in hell that a member of the GOP will be the next President of the United States.
When 18-29 year olds are talked to and shown that they matter, they listen. More importantly they act.
So I plead with producers of any and all news and other media outlets, please use your platform to add something positive to our society.
Stop covering celebrity melt downs. Stop building sports up to such a magnitude that 17 and 18 year old high school kids feel so down that they won't be playing football at the next level that they are compelled to generate a phony "singing day" press conference.
Instead run stories on grassroots efforts underway to fund community fine art programs in poverty stricken communities. Run stories that show how a group of youth were sponsored by local businesses to get funding for athletic equipment by volunteering around their community.
If you build it, they will come.
If these efforts, even on a small scale are exposed to society the efforts will snowball. All great social movements in the history of the United States have their roots with young people. It is time for the media and policymakers to regain some integrity. There is a large population that they can look to for that and they are ready and waiting.
Naive? No, just fed up, and motivated, energetic, and determined to see somethings done differently.
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1 comment:
Sam-
I go through the same thought processes each and every day. If I watch the talking heads too much, I start to break out in hives.
But anyways, I think that part of the problem simply lies in the way that news and media have evolved through this information-technology revolution. Days don't really stop anymore, ya know? These networks and media groups have to find crap to put on all day, all the time, so instead of a nightly news summary or your morning paper covering Billary's day on the campaign trail, they have to come up with "interesting and hard hitting" stories like, every hour. And if one network covers something, they all have to, and it just becomes a fucking echo chamber of completely fabricated, irrelevant crap ALL DAY ALL THE TIME. Yarrrr. Of course the politicians and campaigns know this and they use that echo chamber to really drive their talking-points into our brains.
Sorry for the rant. Here's the real point of my post:
I agree with most everything in this post. BUT... you write passionately about important issues and events and how 18-29 year olds actually do give a shit and want to do something about it. And your conclusion says this:
"If you build it, they will come."
We shouldn't be waiting for the baby boomers (who so forcefully dominate the media/political establishment) to understand these new technologies, means of communication, and production. They don't get it. We do. And we should use that to our advantage. The first generation to grow up on the internet? That's us. Baby Boomers? They're old now, and they're fucking shit up.
I, for one, do not want to wait for the media elite to try to repackage their old-media ways into our current media environment.
You and I are starting to do our part on the web scene, but why stop just there? It's time for US to build it.
Holler.
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