I watched five minutes of Good Morning America today, and this is what I saw—
First, a piece about an episode in Some Town, USA—lots of frightening images and explosive close-ups, complete with angled shots and shaky filming to capitalize on the feeling of chaos and panic in an already volatile situation.
Second, a bunch of scary Trump stuff, so familiar it’s becoming boring.
Third, ol’ coolehead herself, Hillary Clinton expressing concern over the situation, and saying she sure would try and fix it all for us, if only she’d won the election.
I rarely watch these shows or TV news because of the media’s practice of sensationalizing everything, and the manipulative methods used in keeping us in a highly emotional state of fear, panic, or irrelevant distraction—it’s all just there to agitate us.
But for a fleeting moment today, I almost believed that Clinton was indeed reasonable—she looked pretty stately and surprisingly fresh for coming off the heels of pneumonia (How does she do it?!), but I quickly snapped out of it, and realized how effective the manipulation is.
Then I remembered, Oh yeah, that’s nothing but a seasoned power-hungry politician speaking.
None of what I saw in that five minutes this morning told any more of the truth than the seen-one-you’ve-seen-em-all morning show could spare, but instead, a Mad Men version of the truth, where cigarettes are healthy, and heavy drinking is harmless.
Our media actively instigates and encourages incidents of violence, and actively inflames citizens toward heated reactions and emotional decisions.
Nothing is presented calmly and discussed intelligently.
Everything is an emergency.
If it’s not an emergency, it’s merely “human interest,” not news, because news=crises and emergencies.
The media only provokes us and pushes our buttons so that when someone “overreacts,” there’s someone handy to blame, giving our corporate owners all the more evidence of our need for whatever they’re pimping to us.
Either that, or, as with the constant Trump “news,” they’re numbing us to the point of losing our souls.
It’s enough to make you frustrated, frightened, and chilled to the bone.
Please understand the real purpose of what we see and hear, and who profits from it all.
And then decide not to play that game.
Not to get sucked in.
We have to choose to hold onto our self-sovereignty and self-determination.
If we don’t take charge of how we feel and what comes into our head and psyche, someone else well.
I’m gonna go pet the cats now.
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12 Comments
Add YoursI tend to live in a news vacuum- on purpose. I like my sanity.
Hi Nancy~ Well, I’m glad I can help out, then! (And hey, maybe sanity is overrated?! 😉 )
He loved it!
Awwww. 🙂
P.S.: I’ll go throw some balls for my German Shepherd to catch.
The perfect solution to all that ails us. Give him/her a good ear rub from Coco.
Hey Coco,
I hop on occasionally to read your blog (subscribed for a number of years, but been really silent, did you notice?).
Sooo… “Our media actively instigates and encourages incidents of violence, and is inflaming us citizens toward heated reactions and emotional decisions.” Well, same ol’, same ol’, here in the Old Continent too –and, being “privileged” to be living in post-debt-crisis Greece, I’ve come to realize that our Sept 2015 elections that followed the “Grexit” comedy-thriller and the “threatened” global economic disaster connected with it (does it ring a bell?) were, in reality, a small-scale rehearsal for these “fake alternative” elections of yours…
Don’t know how much of our burlesque show reached the States, or how it was viewed by leftist press & media –but it sure has a lot in common. Yes, it’s depressing!
Hi there, Helene,
Glad you’ve been lurking—most people do, so that’s a-okay with me. I figure people’ll pipe up when they’re good and ready. Thanks for sticking around all this time!
I have thought about this comedy-thriller (nice one, btw) basically running as a loop tape in industrialized countries. Thanks for running the dress rehearsal over there for us, I guess? This “world economy” we’re being sold is more like world control via that every-thinning herd of ever-larger corporations. I swear, it’s like a bad guy is in charge. I really don’t think it’s out of the question to expect a large, winged creature to swoop in and battle it out with the “bad guy” and co., such is the surreal quality of these times.
So yes, we heard about it in the usual “those poor, bad-off folks somewhere else, we hope this doesn’t affect us much” American manner, though I have to give the media credit for not just ignoring it. But one thing I’ve wondered is, how much did hosting the Olympics contribute to the situation? Seems that would have been an enormous burden on a not-thriving economy, but I haven’t investigated it.
“Thanks for running the dress rehearsal over there for us, I guess?”
Not glad to be of *such* kind of service, really…
Btw, killing entrepreneurship & small businesses is the order of the day here. One doesn’t need to be a Cassandra to predict where this is all going.
Yep, the Olympics were a huge bale of straw on the back of the camel and, unfortunately, not the last one. I stumbled on an online article a few weeks ago (most probably inspired by the Brazil Olympics) invstigating how the Games have contributed in bringing down the economies of poor countries that hosted them. Haven’t bookmarked the link, though.
Hi Helene~
I wonder what will be the straw that breaks America’s back, economic or otherwise? Seems we’re on the very edge of something or other over here, doesn’t it? I wonder if any of it will be a “blessing in disguise”?
I agree completely and I am petting my cat!!
Which is exactly as it should be, Sue Ellen! Thank goodness for furry friends.