=UGLY! (boo hiss!)"When again we can hold a fair election on real issues, let's vote, and not till then."
~ W.E.B. DuBois
i love that quote. after spending the majority of my Spring semester reading about democratic philosophy and theorizing about the meaning of democracy in modern America, looking for hope that the youth of America are becoming more engaged in their communities and are participating in political activity, i feel obligated to watch the democratic debates, even though i LOATHE them.
nevermind that most of it rapidly, inevitably devolves into immature bickering and quibbling, or that they NEVER answer the questions, or that they're always using the same empty rhetoric over and over ("Change" vs. "Experience" - as if they're completely separate and we can only have one!) ...
most of all, i hate the spectacle that politics has become. i gave this debate an honest shot. i took half an hour out of my already really packed day to watch the debate in the hopes i'd find something redeeming in either one of the candidates. because we're voting here in Ohio in less than a week, this undecided independent young adult minority woman (an important demographic, i believe?) needs to decide how to get her vote on!
i've been following the debates and the campaigns, with ever-growing disdain and distaste and disinterest and complete lack of faith in our political system. it was tolerable back when John Edwards was still in it. he was sensible, well-spoken, and miraculously managed to diffuse the awkward tension and animosity between Barack and Hillary. but let's face it, the media machine never even gave him a chance, it's always been Obama vs. Clinton from the beginning. and now look at the mess we're in! it doesn't matter who gets the nomination at this point, they're not going to pick each other as running mates (which leaves... Kucinich? if only...) and all this nonsense mud-slinging is doing nothing to get anyone excited about voting for either of their sorry asses!
this is exactly why youth, across the board, in surveys and polls on civic engagement, continually abstain from political activity. BECAUSE IT'S UGLY! why would we want to participate in a system that continually reeks of corruption, greed, equivocation, and disregard for real issues in the name of competition? i hate having to watch adults - full-blown grown-ups dressed up in power suits fer cryin' out loud! - whining and picking on each other to try to win sympathy from a (let's face it) apathetic crowd. these are our supposed leaders in D.C. and i can't even trust them to sit there and have a civilized, well-reasoned discussion for half an hour?! and you want me to vote for them??!!! i can't even believe i made the foolish mistake of turning on the TV to watch this garbage when i didn't even eat dinner today because i had so much work to do, i was worried leaving my room to grab a sandwich would be too much precious time lost. clearly i don't have any sense of propriety!
not that the idea of political theatre should be news to my generation. no, on the contrary, we should be pros at spotting it now. i'll admit i'm exceedingly suspicious of Obama because of all the media hype he's getting. it's almost trendy to be in support of his campaign. now, i can remember maybe 2 years ago or more hearing about the young junior senator from Chicago who was a great orator, and being kinda excited. but after that the spark faded. and when Hillary brought up his inclination to vote "present" on bills, rather than taking a side, that really turned me off. i want stances, not easy passes. and i'm still wary of his predilection to play it safe, taking neutral positions and employing flavorless rhetoric in an effort to offend as little as possible. the tendency to play the middle road reminds me of the mass media industry's practice of producing homogenized, low-quality, formulaic media fare in the interest of accumulating mass audiences, at the expense of accuracy, progress, and authentic representation. you can spin it as "unification," but it looks more to me like ball-less neutrality, and we all know you can't be neutral on a moving train...
at some point in the debate, Hillary and Barack were bickering and talking over the moderators trying to interject their various points of contention (what else is new? yawn yawn, right?) the camera cut to some slick-looking NBC guy, while Hillary was still talking, as he tried to cut to a commercial break (which would be incidentally filled with campaign commercials), saying "TELEVISION DOESN'T STOP!" indeed, it's apparent now, this spectacle does not stop, not for anyone. even if we want it to. we've got to jump off!
so screw it, i've had it. clearly politics are theatre and this theatre is vaudeville. worse, it's bad television!
i've always said a vote for Nader is a wasted vote. so maybe i'll just vote for (*gasp!*) Huckabee. because there is no way in hell our next Chief is going to be called "President Huckabee" (sorry, Mike!)
feeling disenfranchised,
stephan!e
nevermind that most of it rapidly, inevitably devolves into immature bickering and quibbling, or that they NEVER answer the questions, or that they're always using the same empty rhetoric over and over ("Change" vs. "Experience" - as if they're completely separate and we can only have one!) ...
most of all, i hate the spectacle that politics has become. i gave this debate an honest shot. i took half an hour out of my already really packed day to watch the debate in the hopes i'd find something redeeming in either one of the candidates. because we're voting here in Ohio in less than a week, this undecided independent young adult minority woman (an important demographic, i believe?) needs to decide how to get her vote on!
i've been following the debates and the campaigns, with ever-growing disdain and distaste and disinterest and complete lack of faith in our political system. it was tolerable back when John Edwards was still in it. he was sensible, well-spoken, and miraculously managed to diffuse the awkward tension and animosity between Barack and Hillary. but let's face it, the media machine never even gave him a chance, it's always been Obama vs. Clinton from the beginning. and now look at the mess we're in! it doesn't matter who gets the nomination at this point, they're not going to pick each other as running mates (which leaves... Kucinich? if only...) and all this nonsense mud-slinging is doing nothing to get anyone excited about voting for either of their sorry asses!
this is exactly why youth, across the board, in surveys and polls on civic engagement, continually abstain from political activity. BECAUSE IT'S UGLY! why would we want to participate in a system that continually reeks of corruption, greed, equivocation, and disregard for real issues in the name of competition? i hate having to watch adults - full-blown grown-ups dressed up in power suits fer cryin' out loud! - whining and picking on each other to try to win sympathy from a (let's face it) apathetic crowd. these are our supposed leaders in D.C. and i can't even trust them to sit there and have a civilized, well-reasoned discussion for half an hour?! and you want me to vote for them??!!! i can't even believe i made the foolish mistake of turning on the TV to watch this garbage when i didn't even eat dinner today because i had so much work to do, i was worried leaving my room to grab a sandwich would be too much precious time lost. clearly i don't have any sense of propriety!
not that the idea of political theatre should be news to my generation. no, on the contrary, we should be pros at spotting it now. i'll admit i'm exceedingly suspicious of Obama because of all the media hype he's getting. it's almost trendy to be in support of his campaign. now, i can remember maybe 2 years ago or more hearing about the young junior senator from Chicago who was a great orator, and being kinda excited. but after that the spark faded. and when Hillary brought up his inclination to vote "present" on bills, rather than taking a side, that really turned me off. i want stances, not easy passes. and i'm still wary of his predilection to play it safe, taking neutral positions and employing flavorless rhetoric in an effort to offend as little as possible. the tendency to play the middle road reminds me of the mass media industry's practice of producing homogenized, low-quality, formulaic media fare in the interest of accumulating mass audiences, at the expense of accuracy, progress, and authentic representation. you can spin it as "unification," but it looks more to me like ball-less neutrality, and we all know you can't be neutral on a moving train...
at some point in the debate, Hillary and Barack were bickering and talking over the moderators trying to interject their various points of contention (what else is new? yawn yawn, right?) the camera cut to some slick-looking NBC guy, while Hillary was still talking, as he tried to cut to a commercial break (which would be incidentally filled with campaign commercials), saying "TELEVISION DOESN'T STOP!" indeed, it's apparent now, this spectacle does not stop, not for anyone. even if we want it to. we've got to jump off!
so screw it, i've had it. clearly politics are theatre and this theatre is vaudeville. worse, it's bad television!
i've always said a vote for Nader is a wasted vote. so maybe i'll just vote for (*gasp!*) Huckabee. because there is no way in hell our next Chief is going to be called "President Huckabee" (sorry, Mike!)
feeling disenfranchised,
stephan!e
4 comments:
Dear Lord! Amen, sister!
02/28 09:24 Wow, ur inspiring me to redawn my (ahem: purple) power suit and run on a non-campaign of cooperation, non-confrontational anti-bickering positively reenforced uplifting focus on what we agree on, and the technique from the Old Country: when in doubt, fist fight each other then get pissed on real beer, like Newcastle or a bitter pint. For this I can only thank our grate leadwhores, The Big Bad Black Man and The Crazy White Woman (or who I affectionately have been calling privately, Ole Evil Eyes).
Staying warm, do well with your business (from english meaning to be busy) and, um, when did you say you were in the running? I, thoust PR, could become an american citizen just so I could vote! Zen could manage! Please put your speech up on urtube (I miss ur videos!).
Both-handed handshakes & I love you,
remaerdyaD
(BTW of a open secret: any blip.tv account can be used to just host audio files, with rss encapsulation you can have a podcast (some do))
BTW PS Maybe check out victoryspeaks on blogtv.com tonite at 20:30 if you. Or not. Later!
daydreamer,
are you suggesting i run? it's always been my dream to be the first minority woman president... maybe i still can be... take care of both "firsts" in 2028, when i'll run.
STEF 4 PREZ in 2028. (wow, that sounds really futuristic...)
-stephanie
Forget sugesting and try demanding.
Just think of what it would do for my rep as your blogr PR dude if you ran and won!!!
As for 'minority', I duno. I would think more along the lines of the first president who wasnt suported by m/bilionaires (historicaly adjusting for inflation) and, amongst your many other traits, you could alas reform bono, who wil be like touring with his yelow shades along side the roling stones during your first term.
Fun!
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