JESUS! As if it couldn't be any WORSE,

[PCIntern]

I was just watching the 9NEWS online from Colorado, and the anchor was all set to interview the police chief and when she started the guy turned out to be a Howard Stern Prankster...

There is just no shame...we really are in a cultural death spiral. And please don't bore me with "small turd in a punch bowl ruins everything" rhetoric...

[MADem]

1. Poor journalistic verification ruins everything. It's not shame, it is stupidity.

George Zimmerman supposedly called into the View yesterday, while they were on the air live.

Guess who BW didn't talk to?

You verify your source. You call your source, your source doesn't call you.

What idiot reporter would think, for a second, that a police chief with fifty wounded, fifteen dead and rising, weapons all over hell, and at least two complex scenes to process is going to be calling into a TV station shortly after he did a presser that provided the bulk of the material we know to this very moment?

I mean, really. The turd in the punchbowl is shitty "gotta get the story FIRST, fuck it if it ain't right" journalism.

Ask CNN about the Supreme Court coverage.

One idiot who plays childish Howard Stern pranks is one idiot who plays Howard Stern pranks. The fact that the TV "news personalities" put the call through is where the problem lies.

[PCIntern]

4. I agree but I'd like to add

that we seem to have a plethora of nihilistic 'youth' and young adults which transcends that which existed when I was young...yes I know that sounds almost stupid, but I will tell you that the nature of my work experience is that during the last twenty years or so, there seem to be many more of these folk around me. They just don't care about anything including themselves...maybe it's just me.

[flobee1]

6. agree

nothing matters to them

a whole generation of Patrick Bateman's

[MADem]

7. I don't disagree. But I am old as dirt and that could be my inner Old Fart talking.

I know when I was young, the "adults in the room" thought my generation was a bunch of n'er do wells who would never work for a living and would send us all to hell in a handbasket. That didn't happen, fortunately.

It's a different paradigm. Kids don't "go outside to play" or "come in to dinner/supper" or dress up for a wedding or funeral or other important family event. There are children entering college who have never worn a suit and couldn't tie a tie on a bet. They're wonderful with computers and video games, but they're stumped by a TV where you have to get your big old tired ass off the couch and change the channel manually, and their fingers stumble when they try to use a rotary dial phone (I've got both in my vacation dump). They can't imagine surviving without a microwave. Many don't know the basic essentials of "bachelor" (I don't dare use the -ette version) cooking. Back in the day, even an avowed stoner could make spaghetti and open up a jar of sauce. Now, that's fine dining for some kids. If it doesn't involve poking holes in the plastic and slapping the thing in the microwave, they're stunned into inaction. Not all of 'em, but lots of 'em. OTOH, they have these little phones and gadgets down!

It is a different world. Time marches on.

I've found (because there are quite a number of late teens to thirty ish kids in my greater family unit) that when you talk to 'em, they're not as bad as they come off at first blush. I think that a veneer of inarticulate boredom is fashionably cool, but I also think, underneath all that Joe Cool 'tude, a lot of kids do give a damn and aren't lacking a tender heart.

[deutsey]

2. Really?

You can make the argument that there's a time and place for that kind of thing.

This sure as hell isn't one of them.

[PCIntern]

5. What? Were you replying to me?

[deutsey]

10. I was responding in general to your post

I was saying, apparently poorly, that pranks like this have their place. This shooting isn't one of them. The "you" in my reponse was used in general, not to "you" personally.

[MADem]

9. I am going to defend PCIntern. This is his thread and his conversation and his thoughts.

He is discussing a current event in the appropriate forum to so do. He's expressing concerns he's feeling as a consequence of what happened in Colorado. I'm having a few thoughts as a consequence of this event, too--I was in a situation or two where I was getting shot at and didn't much like it in my younger years, and I am experiencing a great deal of empathy for the families of the dead and the wounded and I'm also thinking about how I felt when I was trying to avoid getting killed. I'm also remember how pissed off I was at the assholes with the weapons.

This is a discussion board, and what PCIntern is doing is discussing. You don't have to jump in, you know.

There is a button called TRASH THREAD that will help you if you don't want to see this thread in your queue. That will make your "time and place" suitable for your sensibilities.

[deutsey]

11. I apparently wasn't making myself clear

There's no need to defend the op because I wasn't intending to attack the op.

I was speaking in general in reaction to the stupidity of the dunce who pulled the prank. There is a time and place for such asinine behavior, but the mass murder of 14 people isn't one of them.

The "you" in my note was not intended as a reference to the op. It's early in the fucking morning, so sue me if I'm not up to my usual care in crafting eloquent responses here to op's on DU.

[PCIntern]

12. sorry I misinterpreted...

no offense intended, that's why I asked if you were responding to me...it didn't make any sense.

[deutsey]

13. No problem

I'm just so appalled by this shooting...I'm not expressing myself well. It's just so overwhelming.

I can't believe some jackass would see this as an opportunity to pull a prank like this.

Take care,

[MADem]

14. No need to get upset. If you re-read your post, it does sound like you are giving the OP some shit.

Now that you've clarified, we're all good.

Go have some coffee and breakfast. Try to find something cheerful about your morning.

[deutsey]

15. Shitty way to start the day

Sorry for my snippiness.

It just gets so tiring sometimes, you know?

Take care.

[MADem]

16. I hear ya! nt

[Surya Gayatri]

3. Cultural death spiral...drugs, guns and hate.

Lethal combination perpetuated by gun-crazy mad people.

[DrDan]

8. what is even sadder is that there is a group that will consider this

clever and will worship stern's form of entertainment even more.