Campaigns show electorate, media to be
vacuous
If
I heard U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., correctly, he’s been quoting an old saw
about politics and calling this the “silly season.” It’s that time of year when
politicians run around trying to get elected. But if you allow me to exercise
some poetic license, I believe the silly season, much like the flu, has become an epidemic.
Hypothesis:
People
appear to have abdicated their right to form considered opinions and have
become silly.
Evidence to the
point:
Let
us for a moment consider a recent silliness.
Now, to be honest, I haven’t seen or heard what Obama’s pastor said, but
it must have really been something to stir up this flap as seen in the media. I
have a question though: are the opinions expressed by Pastor Wright not the
same opinions voiced around America every day?
In the court of public opinion, the media would have us believe that
Obama is guilty by association.
Secondly, if this were Buddy O’Brian’s priest from some small church in
Anywhere, USA, it might have made the letter to the editor column in the local
newspaper.
I’d
like to venture a hypothesis that, so long as we insist that no one speak ill
of government or America, the problems that we face won’t get dealt with; I
believe that is what I heard when I watched Obama’s speech regarding this
issue.
However,
rather than proceeding logically, establishing a protocol to test this
hypothesis and then draw a conclusion based on evidence, the media is content
to report and re-report and re-report the original story. It’s as if the media has some idea that by
dissecting this issue over and over again we will gain some insight into who Obama is. As a
former science teacher I can tell you, the more times you dissect something the
less recognizable it is; sixth grade boys love to chop things down to
indistinguishable pieces.
Opinion: If this isn’t silliness, I don’t know what
is.
Supplemental
Question(s):
Have
our schools failed us so badly that we can’t watch a man while listening to his
words and decide for ourselves what his values and conduct will forecast? Why do we need commentators to tell us what
to make of something? At what point did
we abdicate our ability to think?
The
conspiracy theorists among us might say that it’s a plan by government to
provide such poor schooling that the electorate won’t be able to think
critically for themselves. That would allow the electorate to be manipulated,
with the media as an unwitting accomplice, by the politicians. Sound
far-fetched? America elected and
listened to George W. Bush when he said going to war was a good idea.
Which
is the greater silliness?
A-
To listen to a man personally to know what he thinks.
B-
To listen to sixteen people give their opinions on what he thinks?
The
term disenfranchised has been used of late when speaking of the voters. It’s a
fancy way of saying driven to apathy.
Are we really so silly that we need to watch something be chopped to
bits? If people will eat entrails on TV’s “Fear Factor,” maybe we are.
The
media has disenfranchised me by engaging in silliness.
Obama
issued a challenge; at least I heard one. Unless we acknowledge differences of
opinion and discuss openly and honestly those differences, they will remain just
that. One of the rabbis at a school where I once taught at once told me, “You
don’t have the right to argue with someone until you can defend their point of
view to their satisfaction.” I think he
and Obama would have gotten along very well.
Kevin Swanson, M.S., is the former vice chair
of the Commission on Human Relations, Los Angeles Unified School District.