The pleasure of living in a vacuum...

[Javaman]

It's as if society has blinders on and the only images they see or remember are the ones that pass right in front of their eyes.

The litany of crimes, near crimes and non-crimes is quite long. Yet, because the general publics attentions span, which as been reduced to somewhere around 3 1/2 minutes, is such that any and all "controversies" all become front page breaking news.

Why? Not because they are stories worthy of our attention but because the network mass media has to fill 24 hours of time.

So when you have to come up with a new story line each and every week to keep eyeballs on the screen to maintain ad revenue to pay for those high priced bobble heads to regurgitate bullshit, the networks challenge is to make sure their mouth breathing audience is enraged about one thing or another so they tune in for the "latest update" on total and complete bullshit.

The people of our nation no longer weigh and decide. They now knee jerk and accuse. It matters not who the person is, was or could have been. It matters not what the incident or issue is, the people of this nation pass judgment via an electronic media spewing a message that tells them how to feel and how to hate.

Instead, we hurl our 2 minute hate each week at targets which we, as a nation, are told to hate.

Someone else posted regarding the 3 core meltdowns in Japan. Postulating about how they have become a side note to the National Enquirer-esque circus of Rep Weiner.

The news cycle, such as it is, has gotten shorter and shorter. But the milking of a story has gotten longer and longer, until it has no more milk to give and the public has grown so tired of the saturation, regardless of how many lives are lost, that they become callous to the tragedy and almost come to resent it.

It's at this point that a new "outrage" story is pumped up. Regardless if it has legs or not, it will be propped up on a pair and taught to run even if it is unable to.

It's really pathetic how easily lead the public has become. But then again, maybe they have always been this way and it's the vacuum of the 24 news cycle that only amplifies our transitory attention span?

Two weeks ago, it was the head of the IMF, the following week it's the some guy from Egypt. (That one didn't have very strong legs and was then over shadowed by Weiner). Now it's Weiner.

When will we stop being duped by shiny objects? When will we stop thinking that everything is a controversy? When will be finally understand that this is all a bullshit smokescreen for ratings?

Probably never.

Pass the popcorn, I'll just sit over here and observe.