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On behalf of the cynical young people
By Ned | July 21, 2008
Hey guys, members of the press. I’m here today to do something that bugs the hell out of me whenever other people do it - I’m going to speak on behalf of a large, diverse group as if it was ideologically homogeneous.
Yep, that’s right. For the purposes of this blog post, I am electing myself official spokesperson for young people. What qualifies me for the job? Absolutely nothing, except that I happen to be young myself. Tom Brokaw, on the other hand, is not young, and is therefore less qualified. So, for the record, Ned: 1, Tom Brokaw: 0. Nonetheless, Brokaw is the latest in a series of well-intentioned but befuddled media figures to wring their hands over what’s making the kids cynical.
The answer, of course, according to Brokaw, is Al Gore. Why? Because he said this:
What politics has become requires a level of tolerance for triviality and artifice and nonsense that I have found in short supply.
Clearly, a man who says things like that is the biggest threat to the hope and idealism of our children since the reefer. But it’s not just him. As Richard Morin said, a couple years ago, Jon Stewart is the enemy of democracy.
Two political scientists found that young people who watch Stewart’s faux news program, “The Daily Show,” develop cynical views about politics and politicians that could lead them to just say no to voting.
That was way back in 2006, but you guys don’t seem to have learned anything since then, so I’m going to have to clue you in on behalf of children of the late ’80’s and early ’90’s everywhere.
The Daily Show isn’t making us cynical. It’s on freakin’ Comedy Central. We don’t take cues about our life philosophies from dick jokes. Young people like The Daily Show because it’s funny.
Al Gore isn’t making us cynical either. How could he? Al Gore’s an idealist, an optimist. This is the dude who thinks that America is going to be able to achieve total sustainability by 2018. That’s the opposite of cynicism.
So if cynicism exists among young people, it’s not because of a nebbishy comedian or an environmentalist with an Academy Award-winning powerpoint presentation. Nope. There are a lot of things that can cause cynicism, but you know what one of the big ones is?
You guys. It’s your own damn fault. For all of your doom-saying about the death of idealism, it’s pretty hard to avoid being cynical about a press that misinforms, skews, and buries stories all behind a hypocritical mask of integrity and paternal wisdom. Why doesn’t Tom Brokaw ask Maureen Dowd why some young people are cynical? Or Rupert Murdoch, Wolf Blitzer or, hell, why doesn’t he just a good, long look in the mirror and ask himself?
The problem isn’t that The Daily Show turns young people into cynics, it’s that young cynics like The Daily Show because it does such a good job of skewering media bullshit and proving why our cynicism is justified.
So please, spare us the hyperventilating. If you really cared about eliminating cynicism, you would do your jobs and produce some actual journalism instead of focusing on bullshit like pillorying a comedian.
Mr. Brokaw, the President of Iraq just endorsed Obama’s withdrawal plan and major media outlets which should be chasing this story follow up with deafening silence. They’d rather make noise about what scenic German setpiece Obama’s going to speak in front of, as if a damn postcard picture is more important than getting us out of this war.
But it’s Al Gore who’s making us cynical.
Topics: The Media |