Last week as I watched election returns come in and prepared myself for the analysis, re-analysis, reverse analysis, and overanalysis of the evening’s results, I found myself drawn to one channel more than the others – Comedy Central?
I found that I cared more about what Jon Stewart had to say about the election than any of the talking heads on CNN or Fox News.
And I am not alone on this. In its 10 years on the air, The Daily Show has gone from an anonymous program to a bona fide cultural phenomenon. Much of that transformation is a direct result of the sharp wit and political commentary Jon Stewart brought when he took over the show in 1999. Today, 1.5 million viewers watch The Daily Show each night and even though the show touts itself as a “fake news” program, an increasing number of Americans – especially young ones – are getting real news from it.
The Daily Show’s impact can be seen in several ways. First, Stewart has made the mundane hip – a Daily Show viewer is likely to chuckle at a joke about social security privatization, a sign that the viewer is aware of and understands the unexciting issue being lampooned. Engaging young Americans in politics has always been difficult, but Stewart’s mix of substance and humor seems to be making a dent. But the real reason The Daily Show is so successful with young people is perhaps The Daily Show’s relentlessness in its exposure of hypocrisy and doublespeak in politics. In a field where too many people take themselves too seriously, Stewart does not hesitate to point out the sheer ridiculousness of some of our leaders. Idealistic young people respond to this unmasking as they recognize the shortcomings of their government.
Not everyone thinks this is all that funny. Both the Boston Globe and Washington Post have run op-ed columns in 2006 criticizing Stewart for stoking cynicism, pointing out that increased cynicism may ultimately lead to decreased voter participation. However, these criticisms are blaming the messenger: Jon Stewart and The Daily Show are merely highlighting the flaws in our government and the way the media covers it. If cynicism is being heightened by an increased awareness of flaws in the system, it is the system that is the problem, not the reporting.
While The Daily Show has been receiving critical acclaim for years, it is now starting to receive some scholarly attention as well. During the 2004 presidential campaign, the National Annenberg Election Survey conducted a survey on campaign knowledge with questions on topics such as – get your yawns ready – social security privatization. Among young people, those who watched The Daily Show scored higher than those who watched four or more days of network or cable news.
A clue as to why The Daily Show viewers are so knowledgeable can be found in the results of another study, this one done by Julia Fox at Indiana University. Fox and two IU grad students scrutinized the coverage of the 2004 national political conventions and the first presidential debate on the national newscasts as compared to The Daily Show. The study concluded that the average amount of video and audio substance in the network news was not significantly different than the average amount of substance on The Daily Show. Doing a second-by-second analysis, the IU study found that The Daily Show had more humor than substance, but that the network coverage had more hype, such as references to polls or endorsements, than substance.
The fact that The Daily Show is becoming a legitimate alternative source for news says as much about traditional news sources as it does about The Daily Show. As the IU study concluded, neither of these sources is particularly substantive. But Stewart and The Daily Show are engaging young people in current political issues while exposing the hypocrisy that is responsible for so much dysfunction in Washington, while broadcast news offers no deeper substance and far less humor.
So maybe Jon Stewart isn’t quite saving America. At least he and The Daily Show are doing their part.
Showing posts with label Media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Media. Show all posts
November 13, 2006
October 23, 2006
Spin Zone
North Korea is in rarefied status among the world's evildoers these days. This is due to both the attention President Bush brought to North Korea in naming it among the axis of evil (a good thing) and the inattention President Bush gave to North Korea while concentrating all resources on Iraq (not a good thing). This month’s nuclear test revealed the result of the Bush Administration’s distraction: WMDs in North Korea. North Korea has gone from an isolated, hostile, dangerous country engaged in negotiations with the global community that helped prevent it from developing a nuclear weapon in 2000 to an isolated, hostile, dangerous country that has tested a nuclear weapon in 2006. The George W. Bush era, it would seem, has not been terribly unkind to North Korea.
Yet, to hear Bill O’Reilly tell it, North Korea is working feverishly to support the Democrats in the upcoming mid-term election. In his “no spin zone,” O'Reilly declared the North Korean nuclear test a calculated effort to influence the American election. Similarly, O’Reilly asserted that Iran is ramping up the violence in Iraq so Americans will turn against the Bush Administration. “Why does Iran want the Democrats to win in November?” O’Reilly asks. Iran, it seems, is pushing insurgents to increase the violence in Iraq not to crush Iraqi democracy, but to influence American democracy.
Normally, what Bill O’Reilly says is as meaningless as it sounds, but on this issue, it appears he is not alone in his thinking. Discussing the similarities between the recent spike in violence in Iraq and the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, President Bush threw out the election card: “There’s certainly a stepped-up level of violence, and we're heading into an election.” Lest anyone be confused as to what the President meant, Press Secretary Tony Snow explained that Bush “was making a point he’s made before, which is that terrorists try to exploit pictures and try to use the media as conduits for influencing public opinion in the United States.”
The O’Reilly/Bush argument goes something like this: North Korea/Iran/Iraqi insurgency are taking action aimed at helping Democrats win elections in the United States, so if you vote for the Democrats, you are actually helping the cause of North Korea/Iran/Iraqi insurgency.
But a look at American politics from the perspective of our enemies makes you wonder why these regimes would be so eager to end the Bush era. Assuming that the goal of American enemies is to weaken the United States, it seems that these regimes ought to be rooting for more of the same from the Bush Administration rather than working for a Democratic majority in Congress.
The Bush Administration has done more to weaken America’s standing in the world than any anti-American rhetoric from Tehran or nuclear test from Pyongyang. By thumbing its nose at international treaties, flouting international standards for the treatment of prisoners, and starting a war without an international mandate, the Bush Administration has put the U.S. in an increasingly isolated global position. That position is further weakened by the enormous commitment of resources to Iraq and the lack of short-term success there. Given the kind of bumbling they’ve seen from Bush Administration, why would North Korea or Iran really want change?
Neither O’Reilly nor Bush wants you to answer, or even ask that question. They are instead searching for any way possible to save the Republican majority by shifting the focus off the Bush administration’s record.
Given that record, Democrats do not need any help from America’s enemies to convince voters that change is necessary, no matter what Bill O’Reilly says.
Yet, to hear Bill O’Reilly tell it, North Korea is working feverishly to support the Democrats in the upcoming mid-term election. In his “no spin zone,” O'Reilly declared the North Korean nuclear test a calculated effort to influence the American election. Similarly, O’Reilly asserted that Iran is ramping up the violence in Iraq so Americans will turn against the Bush Administration. “Why does Iran want the Democrats to win in November?” O’Reilly asks. Iran, it seems, is pushing insurgents to increase the violence in Iraq not to crush Iraqi democracy, but to influence American democracy.
Normally, what Bill O’Reilly says is as meaningless as it sounds, but on this issue, it appears he is not alone in his thinking. Discussing the similarities between the recent spike in violence in Iraq and the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, President Bush threw out the election card: “There’s certainly a stepped-up level of violence, and we're heading into an election.” Lest anyone be confused as to what the President meant, Press Secretary Tony Snow explained that Bush “was making a point he’s made before, which is that terrorists try to exploit pictures and try to use the media as conduits for influencing public opinion in the United States.”
The O’Reilly/Bush argument goes something like this: North Korea/Iran/Iraqi insurgency are taking action aimed at helping Democrats win elections in the United States, so if you vote for the Democrats, you are actually helping the cause of North Korea/Iran/Iraqi insurgency.
But a look at American politics from the perspective of our enemies makes you wonder why these regimes would be so eager to end the Bush era. Assuming that the goal of American enemies is to weaken the United States, it seems that these regimes ought to be rooting for more of the same from the Bush Administration rather than working for a Democratic majority in Congress.
The Bush Administration has done more to weaken America’s standing in the world than any anti-American rhetoric from Tehran or nuclear test from Pyongyang. By thumbing its nose at international treaties, flouting international standards for the treatment of prisoners, and starting a war without an international mandate, the Bush Administration has put the U.S. in an increasingly isolated global position. That position is further weakened by the enormous commitment of resources to Iraq and the lack of short-term success there. Given the kind of bumbling they’ve seen from Bush Administration, why would North Korea or Iran really want change?
Neither O’Reilly nor Bush wants you to answer, or even ask that question. They are instead searching for any way possible to save the Republican majority by shifting the focus off the Bush administration’s record.
Given that record, Democrats do not need any help from America’s enemies to convince voters that change is necessary, no matter what Bill O’Reilly says.
January 27, 2006
Internet with Borders
There are over 100 million internet users in China, the most in any country other than the United States. Chinese internet users are just like us – they like surfing and blogging and podcasting and shopping. It was once thought that the seamless communication across borders allowed by the internet would break down authoritarian information controls rampant in China and elsewhere. By providing access to global information and news sources, it was thought, the borderless internet could help democratize the globe.
January 2006 has not been a good month for that theory.
Just after the new year, Microsoft shut down the blog of a Chinese journalist at the request of the Chinese government. And this week, Google announced that it had created a new Chinese search engine that filters out controversial phrases like “democracy,” “human rights,” “Tibet,” and “Tiananmen Square” in order to comply with Chinese internet restrictions.
What these search engines have done is perfectly understandable from a business perspective. Through the lens of shareholder profit, forfeiting access to over 100 million potential users would be unwise bordering on financially irresponsible. Even considering the interests of ordinary Chinese people, the argument articulated by both Microsoft and Google – essentially, it is better for us to be there with limited service than to offer Chinese users no service at all – is compelling. If Chinese users truly are like us, the majority are using the internet more for online video games than for fermenting dissent anyway. No need to punish these users by denying them Google – how could we live without Google? – just because they happen to live in a repressive country.
But there is something unsettling about the willingness of these internet companies to bow to the whims of the Chinese government in the interest of market share. By acquiescing to the censorship and investigative demands of the Chinese, Microsoft and Google have become enforcers of what both would admit are unreasonable laws. Two years ago, Yahoo went even further, providing government officials the information necessary to capture and imprison another Chinese journalist. While this is particularly troublesome in repressive China, the real problem is that the underlying urge to comply with local law to gain access to more consumers is not limited to one country. As articulated by Rebecca MacKinnon at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, “Can we be sure they won’t do the same thing in response to potentially illegal demands by an overzealous government agency in our own country?”
This hypothetical seems less hypothetical in the wake of recent charges of warrantless government eavesdropping. To their credit, search engines have thus far consistently refused to turn over personally-identifiable information unless compelled by a valid and narrow warrant or subpoena. Still, AOL alone responds to over a thousand such warrants and subpoenas each month, often without the opportunity to notify users that their info has been divulged.
We are fortunate to live in a country that recognizes the rights to free speech and due process, so we need not worry ourselves as much when Google becomes an agent of the government. Still, the precedent set in China is not a good one. Both a privacy debate and a censorship debate are happening in China, and internet search companies are siding with the government there.
The internet, it appears, does have borders after all.
January 2006 has not been a good month for that theory.
Just after the new year, Microsoft shut down the blog of a Chinese journalist at the request of the Chinese government. And this week, Google announced that it had created a new Chinese search engine that filters out controversial phrases like “democracy,” “human rights,” “Tibet,” and “Tiananmen Square” in order to comply with Chinese internet restrictions.
What these search engines have done is perfectly understandable from a business perspective. Through the lens of shareholder profit, forfeiting access to over 100 million potential users would be unwise bordering on financially irresponsible. Even considering the interests of ordinary Chinese people, the argument articulated by both Microsoft and Google – essentially, it is better for us to be there with limited service than to offer Chinese users no service at all – is compelling. If Chinese users truly are like us, the majority are using the internet more for online video games than for fermenting dissent anyway. No need to punish these users by denying them Google – how could we live without Google? – just because they happen to live in a repressive country.
But there is something unsettling about the willingness of these internet companies to bow to the whims of the Chinese government in the interest of market share. By acquiescing to the censorship and investigative demands of the Chinese, Microsoft and Google have become enforcers of what both would admit are unreasonable laws. Two years ago, Yahoo went even further, providing government officials the information necessary to capture and imprison another Chinese journalist. While this is particularly troublesome in repressive China, the real problem is that the underlying urge to comply with local law to gain access to more consumers is not limited to one country. As articulated by Rebecca MacKinnon at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School, “Can we be sure they won’t do the same thing in response to potentially illegal demands by an overzealous government agency in our own country?”
This hypothetical seems less hypothetical in the wake of recent charges of warrantless government eavesdropping. To their credit, search engines have thus far consistently refused to turn over personally-identifiable information unless compelled by a valid and narrow warrant or subpoena. Still, AOL alone responds to over a thousand such warrants and subpoenas each month, often without the opportunity to notify users that their info has been divulged.
We are fortunate to live in a country that recognizes the rights to free speech and due process, so we need not worry ourselves as much when Google becomes an agent of the government. Still, the precedent set in China is not a good one. Both a privacy debate and a censorship debate are happening in China, and internet search companies are siding with the government there.
The internet, it appears, does have borders after all.
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