Faith in the White House
: I happened by the religious PAX tv tonight — for some odd reason, it’s channel 3 on my cable system — and they’re broadcasting the most incredible hagiography I’ve ever seen: George W. Bush: Faith in the White House. I wish I had the energy to live blog the thing but I’m too damned drunk on demon rum.
Bad taste on bad taste
: I was nonplussed (yes, it’s possible) when I listened to this week’s On The Media and heard a parody of cable networks devoting themselves to missing white women. In a bit borrowed from thePoorMan.net, they create a new network called Where the White Women At. Now that would have been funny after the attack of bridevision but right now when the missing white woman of the week is a teenager presumed murdered on an island… well, this was in uncharacterically bad taste, I’d say.
Googlewood
: Google put up its new video service but I’m not on it. As soon as they announced they were taking submissions weeks ago, I put up a vlog just to see how it worked. Now Google’s video service and player are up but I can’t find it. No idea why: Not up to Google’s high standards (“Love ya, babe, but your dialogue needs some work”)… pissed off Google… need a new agent. Doing the latest new ego search, it did find two videos that mentioned me… but those videos, from PBS, are not available, only searchable. Drat. And I was so ready for my close-up.
Dell hell, continued: Self-service
: So Dell knows that my hard drive is broken but after two days, I still haven’t received a reply to the latest email, in which they said they’d set up a service call to get it replaced, whatever that means.
I was thinking about this service process, in which Dell and other computer makers make us suffer through service with them. They take some S&M glee in making us wait on hold and talk to their people for hours (costing them money, by the way).
In what other consumer product or service do we have to have such a role in service?
When my car breaks, I drop it off and tell them what’s wrong and leave. They fix it. They verify it’s fixed. They don’t make me get into the greasepit with them.
When my electricity goes fritz at home, I call in the electrician and tell him what’s wrong and he fixes it and tests it and I pay him and thank him. I don’t have to hang out with him and hand him wirestrippers.
But with computers, we are expected to suffer through the process; we aren’t allowed to say, “Just fix it: The machine you made is broken so fix it and make sure it’s fixed.”
Why the hell do we tolerate this?
Film at 11… and 12… and 1… and 2…
: Every TV news outlets played and replayed the tapes of the BTK killer coldly recounting his crimes yesterday. I watched it on MSNBC. After I left there last night, I listened to it in my car (via Sirius) on Fox and CNN, where Anderson Cooper devoted his entire show to the confession, saying that we would learn something.
But would we? What do we learn from the sick and evil?
I had the same reaction when I first watched Oz and as a result gave it a bad review in TV Guide… though I confess that I did end up watching the series, became riveted by it, couldn’t stay away.
Not to trivialize them by comparison, but we do the same with the perpetrators of massive crimes.
What is it about watching the worst in us? Is it merely sensationalistic voyeurism? Is is relief that we’re sane? Is it bad taste?
So I’m not sure what I think of last night’s instant obsession with the BTK video. I certainly don’t think it was educational. I did think there was something wrong about intruding on this last moment of truth for the victims and their families. I was a little bit ashamed of us all for showing and watching the tapes. But I can’t help but be chilled by the dead-cold soul of this man.
Did I listen to his words passively as producers packed them into the shows I tuned into? Yes.
Did I understand the judgment that went into playing these sickly compelling scenes? Of course. I’m a tab editor myself. I preach “impact.”
But here’s the new question: In a new world of get-the-news-I-want-when-I-want-it, would I have clicked on a link to watch the confession if I knew what I would hear? No, I don’t know why I would have.
So when we become our own editors and producers and pick the news we really want instead of the news others think we want, will we still be voyeurs? Or will we reveal the tabloid editors and producers to have been right about us all along? Who will end up having better or more sensational news judgment: the people or the press?
