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Posted on 07/11/2003 11:53:39 AM PDT by LibertyBelt
Talking dirty to the American people
An estimated 22 per cent of Americans get their daily news from Talk Radio - bizarre, bigoted and often startlingly misinformed diatribes from radio show hosts hired for their ability to shock first and foremost. TV journalist Sheila MacVicar visited a few and was appropriately shocked. Talk Radio is a peculiarly American phenomenon featuring much rhetoric and not a lot of substance; high volume noise often combined with the absence of facts.
As a journalist living in Europe, working for an international news organisation, it is a phenomenon that I have experienced only as a casual listener, vacationing in the United States. My recent voyage into the world of Talk Radio taught me that it is also a place where prejudices and stereotypes are passed off as real information.
I was asked to promote, on half a dozen or so Talk Radio shows, a documentary I prepared for CNN Presents called 'The Arab Street', the result of an eight day journey overland from Amman to Damascus and on to Beirut. The piece sampled public opinion in this part of the Arab world as the United States, Britain and their coalition partners lurched towards war.
My first call was with a west coast morning show duo called Young and Elder; nationally syndicated, they came together after not quite making it as comedians.
We joked about their prior inability to make an international phone call, then talked about what people had told me of their fears of war, and American occupation and imposition. They asked, "So did you have to walk three paces back all covered up in black?"
If I'd been on camera, viewers would have seen my jaw drop. No, I replied, I wasn't quite dressed for a day at the beach in California, but then, how many places on the planet can you appear in public wearing only a few tiny triangles?
There was the syndicated talk show host out of Washington; ranked by USA Today as one of the 25 most influential in the United States, who demanded "Don't they get it? Without us, they'll be riding camels again." Or the talk show host, skewing for the older listener, who wanted to know whether I was frightened talking to Arabs.
Much of this could have been amusing. But a recent Gallup poll, released in Jan. 2003, found that 22 per cent of those surveyed in the United States said that they got their news every day from Talk Radio, more than double the percentage who confessed the same thing just four years ago.
Al Rantel, of KABC-740AM, and a talk radio host himself, said "Let's not kid ourselves. Talk Radio is entertainment. I'm flattered that many people trust Talk Radio to get their information." But, he added, talk radio is "a three hour editorial. People should know Talk Radio is opinion and commentary and we are not unbiased."
It's one thing to engage in domestic political ranting over the airwaves (the vast majority of Talk Radio hosts consider themselves to be Republicans), and another to indulge in ignorance, prejudice, and even racism. "It's not producing an informed democracy," said Amy Mitchell, at the Project for Excellence in Journalism, a group which strives to improve journalistic standards.
Not only is Talk Radio, and America's increasing reliance on editorial opinion dressed up as infotainment not producing people who understand, and have a factual basis which they can use to evaluate the issues of the day, it is also reinforcing deeply held stereotypes born out of ignorance.
We have heard Arab-Americans talk of their fear in the post 11 September world. We have heard other Americans express great confusion about why they were targeted that day.
Yet, more than two years later, it seems that many Americans do not yet understand the deep well-spring of anger in the Middle East, including anger from middle-class, professionals who speak English (and in addition, it must be said, speak at least one other language), who admire much about the United States, were often educated there, and who are deeply disturbed by American policy.
This administration has chosen, to date, to pay little attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, described to me by Jordan's foreign minister as "the central conflict in the region".
I listened to young, western-educated Arabs, dentists and editors and artists and engineers, talk of their belief that America is entering into a new colonialist era, and seeks to (however temporarily) occupy Arab land. The question of democracy? No one with whom I spoke believed the US had any interest in promoting democracy in the region, and would not support 'democracy' that was imposed.
People in the region talk of the concepts of Jeffersonian and Wilsonian democracy, concepts that I would wager have been lost to most Americans, or least those who listen to Talk Radio, and their hosts.
People with graduate degrees from American universities told me that they were now ashamed to be seen to be supporters of more democracy in the region, because that was now perceived as 'doing America's work', in the words of one key regional advisor.
These are complicated and difficult issues, in complicated and difficult times. It would seem that 22 per cent and growing, of the American population could be better served.
Sheila MacVicar is a CNN correspondent.
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Examples?
Americans do not yet understand the deep well-spring of anger in the Middle East
You're right...I don't. Nor do I care. THEY should worry about OUR anger!
It (Talk Radio) exists because of pathetic journalistic standards in the "old" forms of media.
Statements like this is why more and more people are choosing to get their news elsewhere.
Two, the Middle East better fear our anger. We're the guys with the tech and tools to conquer the world. They AREN'T
Right. And the vast majority of the objective reporters for the networks are Democrats.
Like Rush Limbaugh says, Talk Radio IS equal time!
Actually she doesn't. She dances around the pre-9/11 blame America first type prejudices, hints that it's `about Israel', and blames both the imposition of democracy and the fears about it on...guess who...America. Typical lefty, she doesn't ask why the "one key advisor" fears supporting democracy - and the natural question why are many against it. Is it because of "America," or are the opponents to democracy Islamists who have sincere anti-democratic beliefs?
I'd guess she never read a speech by Osama or Iranian Mullahs - she'd prefer to dwell in her trite explanations but hold on to some continuing post-9/11 validity by at least admitting: "These are complicated and difficult issues, in complicated and difficult times." I hear these issues touched upon in talk radio, never CNN. CNN isn't the filter it once was, and that's why they're worried.
She's quite the dupe, isn't she?
Bravo to the 22% of us who are informed!!
g
Toss in the sort of liberal who imagines that non-liberals must of course be uneducated yahoos, and we get the oh-so-worldly Ms. Sheila MacVicar. I can only imagine how long her snoot must be, and how it faces the sky like a giant rain scoop. No wonder she stays in the Middle East. She'd drown during the first thunderstorm in Virginia. |
Pure unadulterated crap. Talk Radio (dunno why she feels the need to capitalize this, probably due to some deep unconcious fear of TALK RADIO!) listeners are many times more informed on the issues of the day than the average slob who relies only on major network and print media coverage. Opinions of so called 'journalists' ultimately determine which facts get published and which get buried. She is just mad that Talk Radio has taken away her shovel...JFK
You notice that when the left doesn't (or can't) agree with a talk radio host, then said host is always automatically guilty of racism, prejudice & ignorance.
This idiot is about as clueless as they come...
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Where the heck did this line come from? It doesn't have anything to do with the rest of the article. It's pure Bush bashing.
And just who is it that is spreading this garbage to the Arabs? It's a far cry from what you hear on "Talk Radio"...America's minutemen, our voice of freedom.
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There will never be a shortage of Anointed Smart People bemoaning the fact that the plebes aren't paying attention to their betters.