Posted on 06/27/2009 4:19:59 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Newspaper editors and TV producers undercut the value of serious news media when they let website hits and social media volume dictate their coverage.
Given his recklessly eccentric and peripatetic personal life, Michael Jackson's premature death seems almost foreordained -- one of those deaths Yeats had in mind when he wrote of a friend's lost son: "What made us dream that he could comb gray hair?"
Still, the global outpouring of grief and the frenzy of public attention focused since Thursday on Jackson's death is an acknowledgment not only of his popularity but of the reach and influence of America's most successful export: popular culture. Jackson was an icon and, in the end, perhaps, a prisoner of that now all-pervasive, world-girdling force.
American popular culture's triumphant appeal around the world is the product of several forces: First among them is this country's historic aversion to assigning distinct values to high and low culture. Some would say the result has been a pervasive Philistinism -- that, as Oscar Wilde put it, "America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between." Others would say that a level playing field has opened high culture -- literature and classical music, for example -- to a valuable cross-fertilization with popular media and made it more vigorous by forcing it to compete for its audience.
The real strength of American popular culture, in fact, is its democratic impulse -- a willingness to take into account the reality that, for most people, entertainment is an end in itself. American entertainment bows to what economists call "consumer sovereignty," and Jackson's popularity, with its demonstrable impact on music, dance and fashion, was a clear example of that.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Yes....yes. God. A thousand times “YES”
I was sick of it on day one!
Enough already.
Yes. As of 1985 or so.
I think the media is covering this molesting freak wall to wall to take the heat off the zero’s commie takeover of the country.
Actually it’s a drop in the bucket compared to reporting on Princess Diana or John Lennon’s death.
Also all the reporting has more of a train wreck atmosphere than any sense of tragedy.
And they are doing a good job of it, too! The Libs are watching their favorite cable stations for all of the “important” Michael Jackson news.
From Drudge:
CABLE NEWS RACE
JUNE 25, 2009
CNN 8PM 4,046,000
CNN 7PM 3,916,000
CNN 9PM 3,913,000
CNN 10PM 3,681,000
FOXNEWS 8PM 3,423,000
FOXNEWS 7PM 3,379,000
CNN 6PM 3,098,000
FOXNEWS 9 PM 2,872,000
FOXNEWS 6PM 2,816,000
FOXNEWS 10PM 2,266,000
MSNBC 8PM 1,916,000
MSNBC 9M 1,540,000
Get use to it...this will be a big story for a long time. Custody fight over the kids....investigation of the drugs....fight over his wealth.....
I was sick of it after 30 minutes.
I sent an e-mail to Fox News telling them there was a more important issue like HR 2454 Cap & Trade bill that needed coverage more than Michael Jackson. Didn’t do much good & I decided that Fox News is no better than the Abc networks. When a person is covered more than a bill that will affect all Americans its time to move on & watch other channels like the HGTV & Food Network. I can get all the up to date information on the Internet now & especially Free Republic.
Nahhh -— You think?
Whenever I think of his death, I will think of Fox joining the hysteria.
Reminds me -— I must send them another piece of my mind.
Absolutely! It is frightening to see what the American public seems to stand for.
CABLE NEWS RACE
Do you have the daily spyware counts that he hosts?
Why would you be surprised? Fox News was never a conservative channel, it was always a sex & sensationalism channel. Some of the Michael Jackson coverage is probably displacing even more prurient content.
We got it already: St. Michael, of the Family Jackson, has risen to Heaven. Oh, by the way, some blonde also died the same day.
I agree. It was all downhill for Jackson after Thriller. Everything after Thriller was just a rehash. More yelping and crotch grabbing.
Michael Jackson coverage is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than all Obama all the time.
Who?
It’s only too much if you read it, watch it, or talk about it.
Michael Jackson had "almost no veins left'
Snippets: Although the physician, hospital and city are known to WND, they're being withheld from publication at the source's request since he was not authorized to talk to the media on the subject.
"There were almost no veins left on his arms when he came into the hospital," said the doctor, who was involved in treating Jackson for two days in 2004, when the pop icon came in complaining of extreme foot pain and demanding painkillers.
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