All Things To All Readers
There hasn't been a slow-news day for ages. Things are happening everywhere, from the late-unlamented FIFA World Cup, to earthquakes, to floods, to terrorist attacks in Iraq, Pakistan and Afghanistan, to 'humanitarian' aid-Gaza shipments confronting Israel, to Iran threatening the balance of the world, to wild and wily M.Ignatieff spouting heartfelt lies in China, and the Canadian economy bouncing nicely, yet threatened by economic entropy in the U.S.
So why the hell does the Ottawa Citizen send a photographer and a reporter out to Georgia to cover a non-story? Newspapers are bleeding money as they lose customers to the new electronic media. Their expenses are on the rise as their advertisers fall by the wayside, and yet they splurge for a chase-for-two in Greensboro, Georgia? Do they really think that love-struck females will abandon their Harlequin novels and day-time soap operas to crack open a newspaper?
Oh, it's a big story, all right, just not very newsworthy; rather it should be reported on in a celebrity-obsessed tabloid, a 'people' magazine. What's it doing dragging down the front page of the first section of the newspaper? Who the bloody hell cares about some hockey player and his actor or singer wife who have decided to marry?
Right, people with no life of their own to speak of, who gaze longingly at photographs of 'beautiful' people, at people with celebrity writ large on their foreheads, at people who live lifestyles that the ordinary population feels is glamorous. Refusing to believe the reality that these celebrity-alliances are stunningly brief, too often dysfunctional, and totally irrelevant to their own lives.
This fascination among the public - perhaps mostly teen-age girls imagining some husky dark-haired stranger riding a hockey stick and a whopping big salary coming to rescue them from the obscurity of their ordinary lives - is nothing short of pathetic. This is what 'popular' reflects and what intelligent introspection does not. Short of value and big on thrills. And fairly meagre in the department of priorities and aspirations.
The breathless excitement and inspiration! As though people curious and fascinated with this tripe feel they have a personal investment in this kind of reportage. What the wedding cost, the wedding gown, the happy couple flying off to their honeymoon destination, the frustration of the reporter having to guess at what transpired; poor thing, she had no personal invitation.
Can anyone working as a reporter really take this stuff seriously, and still have some measure of self respect? This reflects our society's values and our women's aspirations? Sad stuff, no kidding.
So why the hell does the Ottawa Citizen send a photographer and a reporter out to Georgia to cover a non-story? Newspapers are bleeding money as they lose customers to the new electronic media. Their expenses are on the rise as their advertisers fall by the wayside, and yet they splurge for a chase-for-two in Greensboro, Georgia? Do they really think that love-struck females will abandon their Harlequin novels and day-time soap operas to crack open a newspaper?
Oh, it's a big story, all right, just not very newsworthy; rather it should be reported on in a celebrity-obsessed tabloid, a 'people' magazine. What's it doing dragging down the front page of the first section of the newspaper? Who the bloody hell cares about some hockey player and his actor or singer wife who have decided to marry?
Right, people with no life of their own to speak of, who gaze longingly at photographs of 'beautiful' people, at people with celebrity writ large on their foreheads, at people who live lifestyles that the ordinary population feels is glamorous. Refusing to believe the reality that these celebrity-alliances are stunningly brief, too often dysfunctional, and totally irrelevant to their own lives.
This fascination among the public - perhaps mostly teen-age girls imagining some husky dark-haired stranger riding a hockey stick and a whopping big salary coming to rescue them from the obscurity of their ordinary lives - is nothing short of pathetic. This is what 'popular' reflects and what intelligent introspection does not. Short of value and big on thrills. And fairly meagre in the department of priorities and aspirations.
The breathless excitement and inspiration! As though people curious and fascinated with this tripe feel they have a personal investment in this kind of reportage. What the wedding cost, the wedding gown, the happy couple flying off to their honeymoon destination, the frustration of the reporter having to guess at what transpired; poor thing, she had no personal invitation.
Can anyone working as a reporter really take this stuff seriously, and still have some measure of self respect? This reflects our society's values and our women's aspirations? Sad stuff, no kidding.
Labels: Ontario, Ottawa, Social-Cultural Deviations
posted by Pieface @ 6:22 PM
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