Broadcast Personalities

Today, Friday February 27, 2009, is the last day of existence for The Rocky Mountain News a newspaper that has served Denver for nearly 150 years. It is the victim of the general move from print to broadcast and internet. Should we lose The Denver Post, Denver will be completely reliant on the sound bites of television and radio, and on the selective reporting of the internet. The final edition delivered to the house this morning provides a time to reflect, I would say, on the passing of one form of media and the potential dangers of what will replace it.

Not many people know that my late husband, Charles, was once a news broadcaster for KHVH Radio in Honolulu. He had the voice for it and approached his profession with the ethical stance of the old time newsman—that is, he approached human events with objectivity and accountability. I have pictures of him with various political and entertainment figures he’d interviewed, whom he’d talk about with varying degrees of respect for their ethics and rapport with the media.

But it wasn’t just the interviewees he evaluated with his keen, analytical mind. He often commented on his fellow broadcasters. He had particular complaint about one of the talk-show hosts on another station. On air, this man was obnoxious, inflammatory, sarcastic, and bombastic. Probably just your garden-variety host. The thing was that we knew him. In person, this fellow was almost bland. But put him behind a mike with a headset for security and he turned into the closest approximation I’ve ever seen of a raving lunatic.

Chuck found this dichotomy more than distasteful—he thought the man unethical and an agitator primarily because he admitted with something of a wink that he didn’t believe what he was spouting. He said it was what people wanted to hear, it gained listener ratings, and attracted sponsors who paid his salary. He accepted no responsibility for what listeners might be stupid enough to do. If people acted on the bile they heard on his show, it was their own fault for not recognizing that he was providing entertainment.

I was reminded of this the other day when I accidentally tuned into FOX and listened for a while. I found it hard to believe that these people are not actors playing their parts and that when the day is done, they go home to some sort of real life. Seen that way, the Howard Sterns and Rush Limbaughs deserve Oscars for their performances as over-the-top commentators. But they’re not the only ones by any means: Lou Dobbs leans that way (although I have less beef with him) and Keith Olbermann as well. When I hear people wanting to nominate these men for president, I shudder. Obviously, many listeners don’t get the entertainment part. They don’t see that these are created personalities who make a very good living by confirming the prejudices of their listeners, for whom they may feel a good bit of contempt.

Peter Sellers, an over-the-top personality himself, was famous for his disguises and personas. From the Goon Show to the movie Being There, he was never the same character. He created personalities galore and the worlds that surrounded them. He was so authentic that one could forget it wasn’t real. Someone once asked him who the real Peter Sellers was. According to his biographer, he resorted to the voices of his various characters and never answered the question. Maybe he had forgotten—maybe he never knew. For him, the personas he created had taken over his life. Perhaps this is the case with the rash of media preachers who spout morality, claim to be surprised by their own humanity, and beg forgiveness from the very people they have whipped up into a frenzy of self-righteous judgment.

Wisdom suggests that we stand back and take a long, hard look at the motivations of the preachers, entertainment/news personalities, and politicians—all those people who create over-the-top personas made possible by broadcast media of various kinds. If we consider that everything is staged for some purpose (usually money), we may become more informed consumers of the “entertainment” they provide us.

Charles used to say sadly that conflict, not news or commentary, sold newspapers. No one buys good news. Hearst papers knew that war would sell, so William Randolph did all he could to create one. In an earlier blog, I argued that corporations are not governments because their self-interest is not the public good. I would say the same thing about the broadcast media and caution people to listen wisely to whom they award their attention. All the minute analysis of politics often presented by people who have only opinions is not designed to inform us but to agitate our prejudices and motivate us to tune in tomorrow.