Media Misfires

Media bashing, a traditional staple of politicians, has become an especially hot trend lately. In fact, it has become so popular that even major media outlets are starting to partake. The latest trend is to point out cases of overreaction, bemoaning the over-inflation of events that are not actually significant. When Michael Jackson died, the major networks gave the story about 24 hours of live coverage. Then, in a supreme act of ironic meta-journalism, the networks all switched focus, suddenly reporting on how much focus was being wasted on an issue that was not as important as many of the other stories that were pushed aside in all the hype. Likewise, after the “Underwear Bomber” failed to hurt anyone but himself in December, the story quickly became how everyone was overreacting. Even Fox News has conceded that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s now-infamous “negro dialect” comment from the presidential campaign of Barack Obama was not so much racist as politically incorrect, leading many to wonder why so many people were talking about it.

The entire phenomenon is pretty bizarre to begin with; the media majors usually maintain the idea that they know whats important, and squabble about the biases of their rivals. To step back and acknowledge the unimportance of what they are talking about is a whole new step. I’m inclined to say, “So What?” The media is only lumbering its way toward a conclusion that most people have know for years: Journalism as we know it is dead. The internet has arrived, eliminating any hope of survival for the human attention span.  Search as you might, you will not find important news, in depth reports or investigative journalism on any major news outlet. The few outlets that still provide this type of service (e.g. The Nation or Current TV) are small and have only a niche following.

So is the media about to blow the cover off itself? Will MSNBC do a report on how unimportant everything we see in the news today is? Will FOX decry its own nightly murder/abduction stories as nothing but sensationalism? Not likely. These companies are not purely made of idiots. But they are walking a fine line by admitting that sometimes they go to far.  Hopefully this coverage of over-coverage will make people realize that most of what they see on news channels is garbage, no more useful, important or relevant than anything you can see on MTV. (Actually, that may not be fair to MTV.)  At the very least it may plant the seed of doubt in the viewers mind, which at this point seems to be all we can hope for.