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I'm wondering if some of the rise in explosive rhetoric we've been seeing over the past decade or so isn't due to Attention Addicts -- people who get an adrenaline kick from people paying attention to them.
I'll freely admit to being one of those. Despite being relatively introverted, I love applause. I love being "on stage" with people watching. I love the 'feedback' of people who like what I'm doing. For me, I get my attention fix through music (directly) and through writing (rather indirectly). Hi -- I'm Steve and I'm an applause addict.
But for those whose interest is politics and whose skills fall into the 'public speaking' area, and who are also attention addicts, they risk invisibility if their level of rhetoric and discourse is calm and well-reasoned. TV, radio, and the internet are mediums that don't want 'calm and well-reasoned.' Calm and well-reasoned is boring. What they want is hyperbole, in all its forms. What they want is visceral conflict, in all its forms. What they want is excitement, and you don't get that by being calm and/or reasonable.
Therefore, if you're an attention addict wanting to get your fix, and you're given a platform, what you do is reach for the extremes. You foam at the mouth. You rail against the stupidity of the other side. You demonize the other side. The more scathing and 'amusing' your bon mots, the more attention you get. The more radical your statements, the more attention you get. The more vicious your comments, the more attention you get. The more outrageous you are, the more attention you get.
Therefore, what we see as 'spokepersons' for one side or the other are the extremists. You get gasbags like Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck, or (to be fair) like Keith Olbermann or Chris Matthews. You get visions of the world that are increasingly one-sided, where the other side is increasingly portrayed as the Devil Incarnate.
And you eventually get to situations similar to what we see today: where what passes for "fair and balanced" reporting isn't giving us the facts and letting us formulate our own opinion, but allowing two gasbag talking heads, one from each side, to contradict each other without the 'newsperson' ever stepping in to say "No, Mr. Gasbag, what you're saying isn't true: here are the facts. How do you explain them" or saying "You're not answering the question. Here's the question again. Listen to it this time and actually give me an answer." Where we have people feeling threatened by a "liberal, socialist, fascist" health care bill that's actually less liberal than the one Richard Nixon proposed. Where we have people so frightened of a government that's actually pretty damn centrist that they're forming militias.
So I wonder -- how do we move away from this form of rhetoric and discourse? Is it even possible? Has it actually never been possible?
I'll freely admit to being one of those. Despite being relatively introverted, I love applause. I love being "on stage" with people watching. I love the 'feedback' of people who like what I'm doing. For me, I get my attention fix through music (directly) and through writing (rather indirectly). Hi -- I'm Steve and I'm an applause addict.
But for those whose interest is politics and whose skills fall into the 'public speaking' area, and who are also attention addicts, they risk invisibility if their level of rhetoric and discourse is calm and well-reasoned. TV, radio, and the internet are mediums that don't want 'calm and well-reasoned.' Calm and well-reasoned is boring. What they want is hyperbole, in all its forms. What they want is visceral conflict, in all its forms. What they want is excitement, and you don't get that by being calm and/or reasonable.
Therefore, if you're an attention addict wanting to get your fix, and you're given a platform, what you do is reach for the extremes. You foam at the mouth. You rail against the stupidity of the other side. You demonize the other side. The more scathing and 'amusing' your bon mots, the more attention you get. The more radical your statements, the more attention you get. The more vicious your comments, the more attention you get. The more outrageous you are, the more attention you get.
Therefore, what we see as 'spokepersons' for one side or the other are the extremists. You get gasbags like Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck, or (to be fair) like Keith Olbermann or Chris Matthews. You get visions of the world that are increasingly one-sided, where the other side is increasingly portrayed as the Devil Incarnate.
And you eventually get to situations similar to what we see today: where what passes for "fair and balanced" reporting isn't giving us the facts and letting us formulate our own opinion, but allowing two gasbag talking heads, one from each side, to contradict each other without the 'newsperson' ever stepping in to say "No, Mr. Gasbag, what you're saying isn't true: here are the facts. How do you explain them" or saying "You're not answering the question. Here's the question again. Listen to it this time and actually give me an answer." Where we have people feeling threatened by a "liberal, socialist, fascist" health care bill that's actually less liberal than the one Richard Nixon proposed. Where we have people so frightened of a government that's actually pretty damn centrist that they're forming militias.
So I wonder -- how do we move away from this form of rhetoric and discourse? Is it even possible? Has it actually never been possible?
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*personally* I lean left, but I really wanted to hear some of the arguements against the health care plan without being called a money-wasting, socialist (and those were the NICE names!). It was almost impossible to sift through all the mess and find information. It's all about sensationalism. Even our news outlets are increasingly polarized.
From: (Anonymous)
Attention Addicts, et al
Good writers rely on the public to vote for them by buying their books. They create conflict in their stories because without conflict, no one "votes" for them.
Journalists today rely more and more on the public to vote for them by watching their broadcasts. They know they must create conflict or no one "votes" for them. This has always been true, but competition for "votes" is stronger than it ever has been. More conflict, more votes.
Voters are the root of the problem. We choose what and who we listen to. The only proper response, if one is actually interested in positive change, is to stop attacking republican/democratic/conservative/liberal people (whichever is your opposite), and instead listen and move on. They are all like ancient gods in that if people don't listen or don't react, they begin to fade from relevance.
But mostly us voters are not actively interested in open discourse and finding common grounds or respecting alternative opinions. Mostly we just want to be right and have the _other_ side stop being so stupid. So we align under a figurehead like Olbermann or Limbaugh because they "fight the good fight."
So, yeah, journalists are attention addicts. And the voters are conflict addicts, and humans on the whole are all about security and the negative, hence we get fed conflict. If we were truth addicts, we would get fed truth. So, what are you? :)
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Re: Attention Addicts, et al
I lean heavily left politically (as you know), but I have no illusions that 'my' side is without faults or that liberalism contains all 'truth.' Truth is an elusive and slippery concept; I'm not certain there even is such a thing. Which is why, religiously, I call myself an Agnostic rather than an Atheist. I strongly doubt the existence of any entity that resembles what most religious people call "God," and if you forced me to check either the box Believer or the box Atheist, I'd check the latter without too much of a qualm.
But I like to think that I'm open to someone coming up with a proof that I can't deny -- to a 'truth' that logic and reason can't circumvent.
And I find I'm agnostic on the concept of truth, too; I don't know that there's such a thing. Politically, most issues have "facts" supporting them on both/all sides. You have to weigh which facts carry the most weight for you -- that's not so much finding "truth" as making an informed decision.
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K.
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So the question is, what are media that encourage big-picture thinking? I listen to public radio myself, and try to read a spectrum of news sorces online. What can be done about the weapons of mass distraction? Turn them off.
From:
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Would that you could be heard by more of the world. I am tired of the constant diatribe from the "scab pickers" and hotheaded zealots. It is time for the world to listen for the important whispers of wisdom that are spoken by the sane. When two sides debate about anything that they see only as black and white it is time to step back and see what can be made of the grey in between the two points. That there is some element of truth in every argument means that we must all make the effort to sift out those bits and throw away the extraneous packaging and trash.
Thanks for reminding me that the effort is not just worthwhile but essential.
Laurel N