The Scourge of The 24 Hour News Cycle & Other Bullshit

This is a rant. It’s not sugar-coated or politically correct. But the essence of it is simple…it’s me being pissed off and fed up with all the bullshit floating around out there and magnifying a tiny speck of it as I am wont to do every Friday.

So if this is something that you think might upset your precious sensibilities or political leaning, well have a nice day, ‘cause this isn’t for you.

The onslaught on broadcast technology has fucked us up in many ways that we don’t even notice, and even if we do, we tend to shrug them off because none of us would ever fall prey to that shit. We’re all too smart for that.

But the simple fact remains that we are all indeed the products of an addiction-inducing set of media designed to hold us captive while being spoon-fed information and biased opinion, injecting us with a drug that most of us have found easy to take since we have been consuming media most of our lives.

In fact, I would argue that the consumption of media, at least in the the more industrialized parts of the world, is far and away the most common human activity. Probably even more common than sleeping.

The Drug Dealers

These days, the most insidious of these drug dealers are the 24 hour networks. Not coincidentally, they are also the largest advertising media for prescription drugs of all kinds. Because drug companies aren’t stupid. They know that the news causes all kinds of anxiety and so why wouldn’t they be there with the magic pill to help you.

This is purely and simply a very nasty form of mass manipulation. But the thing that makes the commercial side of this enterprise go is the very addictive nature of the product itself. While it purports to be news, it’s really become all about opinion.

There are all these ‘panels’ of experts discussing whatever the topic de jour might be. And because they are on TV, the vast majority of addicts watching take them at their word.

It’s not so bad in Canada, where most of the panelists are journalists of one kind or another, and in their own half-assed ways are trying to get to whatever passes for the truth these days. And of course, because they’re Canadians they are extremely polite and courteous and hardly ever interrupt each other.

But it the US it it’s the polar opposite. It ’s a complete free-for-all, politicized all to hell. Arguments galore. Crazy Republicans. Angry Democrats. Show hosts who are more like referees than talking heads and all with their own built-in biases.

It’s a fucking dog’s breakfast of opinion, speculation, competition, frustration, pontification and anger. And it’s the very essence of the drug we are so addicted to.

Nobody with an average or even slightly above average level of intelligence can come away from even 15 minutes of this stuff with any sort of clue as to what these people were talking about, or any level of insight from which they could form their own opinions.

So it’s really no wonder that confusion reigns supreme in America.

And the true irony of all this is that it’s all about one malignant narcissist who managed to somehow talk his way into the presidency and knows that all he has to do to hold on this job, for which he is probably the least qualified person in America to hold, is just to keep on feeding shit into the 24 hour news cycle.

At the end of the day, this has worn me to the point where I no longer really give a fuck about what’s going on down there. It’s really hard to care when you know you will never be able to figure it out for sure. All that will happen if you watch too much of it is that you will find yourself making little notes on some of the drugs advertised there and asking your doctor about them.

And you could argue that this is what it’s really all about anyway.

The relentless pursuit of the stuff that’s in your wallet. There’s no scale to measure the amount of greed that powers market capitalism. Or the lengths that companies will go to to separate you from your hard-earned pesos.

Anyway I could go on. But my upstairs toilet made a funny noise a little while ago and I discovered I don’t have a plunger. And since the rains came overnight and melted all the snow, I think it’s time for a ride down to the hardware store.

Keep your eyes on your fries, amigos. Now more than ever.

jim out

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