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in general, i think television is a thin medium--good for footage, bad for information, good for reinforcing prejudices bad for informing debate, good at selling commodities bad at helping you think. the 24/7 infotainment streams accomplish very little of what they claim for themselves--the present little tiny worlds in superficial bite-sized chunks across an endless flashing that keeps you alert for new advertisements. what the medium is best for, and best used for, is footage like that of balloon boy or the amateur footage of the trade center attacks. what it's obviously bad for can be summed up by thinking of the fate of the trade center footage, it's loops, what it established as possible, what it was used for.
every form of fascism has used a mass media to co-ordinate opinion, provide a sense of an immediate relation between spectators and power and to institute a kind of acceptance of almost everything almost anything.
within that, my central objection to fox news is its stupidity. plus i dislike the graphics, dislike the colors. so stupid people saying stupid things framed with shitty graphics. no.
i dont watch cnn either--i dont see that network as being much less stupid. though sometimes i like tuning in for a minute to check on wolf blitzer's giant hair.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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