12th
Something I needed to Share
I love my grandpa, and always will. Unfortunately, he, like many people his age, spends an inordinate amount of time watching Fox News.
Now, the thing is, my grandpa is smart. He’s a nuclear engineer, a pioneer in the field that literally helped write the book on coolant pipe design for power plants. Even though he retired sometime when I was in high school, he still consults with major power companies and presents at consortia in the Middle East. So when I hear how upset he gets by watching the factually inaccurate, sensational bullshit on a certain “news” outlet, it really don’t make any sense to me. He’s too smart to be fooled by that crap. One botched bar graph or logical fallacy years ago should have been enough to wake him out of the Murdoch trance.
Today, I was talking to my grandparents over Skype, and my grandma made it a point to bring up the coverage of the nuclear reactor in Japan. Apparently, the 24 hour news cycle dickheads are practically BEGGING the experts to say that the situation is worse that it really is, that it’s a full blown meltdown and that the West Coast should all be buying lead underwear. This, as it should, has driven my grandpa into a frenzy. To that I responded, “Well then DON’T WATCH that crap! If you don’t like it, DON’T WATCH IT. The only way this stuff stays on the air is if people buy in with their eyeballs.” It didn’t seem to sink in.
Did I mention that they’re a Neilson family? Of course they are. So not only are they feeding the beast for themselves, but they’re ruining it for the rest of us. When this point was raised, again it seemed to bounce off an invisible shield of willful ignorance. I guess what I’m trying to say is that the battle against stupid news is not one of logic and intelligence. It’s not one that we can win by reasoning with the Murdochs and Limbaughs of the world, and that’s the scariest thing of all.
