In my efforts to depart from the wholly unsavory experience of watching television, I am realizing that the Internet, comparatively, is sort of an intellectual camelot. No, I'm serious; and, yes, I am the same person who has always complained about the deterioration of the web ever since AOL decided to join it, but there is a certain respect fake news possesses when compared with the dichotomously apathetic and sensationalist mainstream media news. Intriguingly, the nearest to a television news program daring enough to earnestly tackle the topic of social security - a system ostensibly dilapidated due to gay married terrorists - is an episode of The Daily Show with guest economist, the sassy Paul Krugman.[1] Thanks to Comedy Central's magnanimity, the episode is available online with limited commercial distractions for anyone who can right-click and select 'fullscreen'.
The waning of the integrity of news reporting isn't new; in fact, seasoned journalist Tom Fenton lambastes his colleagues on what he describes as a slow deterioration arising from loosening FCC regulations and the ending of the Cold War.[2] Left with "thin soup," as Fenton describes the shallow informational content, the plethora of news channels are subsisting by repackaging the same one or two newswire feeds and filling empty airtime with opinions. While fake news is also fallible, as the pompously defensive Brian Williams likes to articulate,[3] its reduced obligation to rehash already well-covered stories lends to being able to skip the cursory coverage and immediately start with deeper analysis, assuming the audience has met the prerequisite by watching 'real' news first.
Another point of interest is that mainstream media news refuses to cover news about mainstream media. Absconding scion Ted Hitler eloquently explains how legitimacy brings access, status, and power, all of which reduce the ability to be as objective as illegitimate news.[4] Particularly, Hitler mentions atrios.blogspot.com (Eschaton) as among the impudent attack-blogs where facts are gathered and collated without the stolidness of mainstream media. However, Hitler also saliently points out how New Journalism, like its predecessor, will eventually gain access, status, and power, and will hence repeat the same mistakes. Dutifully, I pledge that my blog will never reach an audience greater than my fingers let me count, and will therefore shield itself from journalistic decay, despite its never having covered anything of journalistic importance to begin with. I also pledge to wear pants while I blog, from now on.
2005-04-04 21:18 Update — Just thought it would be amusing to point out that Stephen Colbert of The Daily Show mentioned colbertkilledapanda.com, and surely enough, on Feb 16th, 2005, the domain gets registered. Life imitates art, it seems.
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