“We need help from the media, and they’re hurting us.” (Minute 05:58)
On October 15, 2004 Jon Stewart was a guest on CNN’s Crossfire with Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala. In that show Stewart pointed out some very serious problems with television news that is still true today: that the media regularly plays into the political games of the two-party system and uses hackery to further polarize our society.
This is a serious cultural phenomenon in our nation’s history. How is it that the press (one of the chief entities that created and maintained this nation as a free country) has become, in many ways, an adversary to the people? How do we change this fact so that the press becomes an agent for educating voters, and holding governments accountable? How do we shape the press into the kinds of organizations that behave more like watchdogs instead of partisan attack dogs?
I have no experience in the news industry; I am a consumer of news just like everyone else. However, when I see four talking heads on the TV screen yelling at each other I find myself wanting to yell back at the screen, “shut up!” I’m tired of the editorial spin shows that pass themselves off as reporting the news. My distaste for TV “news” applies across the board to the networks and cable – they each have their faults.
In recent years we have heard a lot about the decline of newspapers too. For the news editor I have this suggestion: start covering politics in a way that educates readers and holds government accountable, and flatly refuse to be partisan and watch your readership soar. You might even give cable and network news a run for their money.
Call to Action:
I am not quite sure where this entire blog is going to go over the next 18 weeks until the election, but I hope it will be a discussion about ideas relevant to our lives as Americans and as Floridians, and how we can shape our society and government to be better.
So for this posting I am going to ask that you write two letters. First write to your local paper or TV news station. Tell them you want to see better news coverage than who lost their dog and how many shootings, fires, and bank robberies there were today. We get the point, crime happens and we don’t like it, but we also don’t want to see it 24/7, we would like to know what our city, county, and state government is up to, and what the local paper and TV news stations are doing about it.
Then write a second letter to a national news paper or TV news station. Tell them the same thing, and mention that you agree with Jon Stewart’s sentiments expressed October 15, 2004 – believe me, they know all about that episode of Crossfire. Tell them you want to see changes, and you want them to stop dividing this country along party lines, feeding into the political games that Washington plays.
