Some look at the mass media and conclude it's functioning properly because it reports on things people are interested in - such as car wrecks and sex scandals. After all, it's a democracy, and people vote with their dollars, right? What this "wikireality" logic overlooks is the important difference between real news events and "Survivor" - news matters. Freedom of the press is great, but only if it's actually exercised. Weather and sports every 10 minutes is not such an exercise. A box of jelly donuts maybe, but certainly not an exercise.
Here, in New Jersey, we are lucky to be home to a hard-hitting news outlet that insists on the facts and nothing but the facts - as long as you take the word "fact" to mean pullout posters of swimsuit models and sensationalized headlines. The Trentonian serves the greater Trenton area as a daily reminder of what all print journalism would be like if the world were run by reactionary xenophobes. (Did I say 'if'?) Reading this quality publication feels like being on the receiving end of a full-frontal lobotomy performed with American flag scalpels. But don't take my word for it.
Take, for example, what The Trentonian ran as its top story just a few weeks ago. "Toxic Squrrels Off Menu: State Warns Don't Eat Squirrels Near Toxic Dump". Sound advice, I suppose. But is this really front page news? And just like the titans of tabloid they are, The Trentonian staff had the journalistic integrity to add a few more brushstrokes to this masterpiece. In addition to the standard 800-point font and fluorescent comic book-like colors it uses everyday, there is also a picture of a squirrel - presumably toxic - in a frying pan in front of 55-gallon drums of hazardous waste. Each front page also reminds readers The Trentonian once won a Pulitzer Prize - presumably for toxic squirrel journalism.
But lest you think this paper vain, they devote the sixth page of each edition to pictures of scantily clad nubiles and celebrity gossip. Just pages after the squirrel story, there was an editorial blaming black parents exclusively as the reason for the illegally inferior education their children are more likely to receive. Ignorance and ideology - it's an "infotainment" double play!
You can also count on The Trentonian to report all national events - so long as those national events are sports. When Rumsfeld resigned and every other paper in the country ran it as their top story with extensive coverage, all The Trentonion could muster was a blurb on page nine - three pages after its semi-nude co-ed coverage. Likewise, when the president's State of the Union address was front-page news nationwide, it only managed to make page five. I'd hate to see what would happen if girls in bikinis ever got into a toxic waste dump. They'd probably have to run a special edition.
But even more disturbing than a world where news is so unapologetically distorted through the amplification and suppression of selected stories is a world where nobody seems to care about it. Despite its "Weird NJ" style of "news," or more likely, because of it, The Trentonian is the number one paper in its area, with a circulation of 219,100.
But because it's popular, that means it's doing something right, right? Wait, is this journalism or third grade? The blending of information with entertainment - whether through tabloid journalism or satire ala The Daily Show - is inherently dangerous for any democracy that relies on citizens to make informed decisions at the polls. Joke - why is a misinformed voter more dangerous than Osama bin Laden? Because misinformed voters are the ones who elect politicians like President George W. Bush.
There is another way America is like a third-grader. It seems to lack the maturity and perspective to see the difference between what it wants and what it needs. We need a press that actually reports the news and helps hold politicians and other officials accountable. We need a press free from the influence of corporate conglomerates. We need voters who know enough about what the heck is going on in the world to make informed choices. We don't have any of these things, but we do have 24-hour coverage of the Anna Nicole Smith spectacle - and yes, I am the real father.
At the end of the day, this is the exact same reason President Bush will go down in history as a failure. He pretended there was no global warming, so he could bend over backwards, serving his friends in the oil industry. He wanted to get Saddam, so he pretended he posed a threat, and thereby, took our time, money and attention away from fighting terrorism. He pretended the mission was accomplished, so he let the situation on the ground deteriorate. No wonder Americans twice voted him into office. He's our kind of guy!
But even America can deny reality for only so long before it finally catches up with us. What makes the American experiment so exciting is we actually have the power to divert resources to our wants and totally deny our needs if we so choose. What we need is to lose this archaic notion that popularity is the divine sign of truth and beauty in the world. It's not. Just listen to popular music for five seconds. What we need is a democracy whose citizens care about both their wants and their needs. We need information, not "infotainment."
Patrick McKnight is a Rutgers College senior, majoring in philosophy and sociology. His column, "The View from Nowhere," runs on alternate Fridays.
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