Turn Off the Media Bullies

Isn’t most of America by now sick up to here of the Limbaughs, the Hannitys, the Coulters, the O’Reillys — the stagnant, toxic side of human nature? Doesn’t just about every American know better than to listen to what those egomouths are jabbering off the top of their pinhole heads? Don’t most Americans care about polluting their airwaves with hatred and their minds with venom? Don’t most Americans desire emotional tranquility and rational thought? Don’t most Americans believe in building community, rather than unleashing pitbulls?

Sure, at one time, way back in the beginning of the vast nervous breakdown that has culminated in this disastrous president and his apocalyptic war, these bizarre personalities were new; they were ciphers with industrial-strength opinions, they were different, clamorous, argumentative — and in a true democracy, views of all kinds deserve to be heard — but to give them a bullhorn in America’s living rooms?

One sad implication of the success of these spirit-thieves is that the listening minds may be so vacant as to welcome the mindfill. This slick shield of acid innuendo, nuanced to resemble truth, has been corroding community airwaves for years now. It got the de facto failure elected and re-elected, and is still spreading bile throughout the ‘homeland.’ That these emotional hypos should be arbiters of community discourse at the heart of America’s noble ambition is beneath travesty; it is tragedy, and that is where it is leading America headlong.

Every grownup remembers the bully in their schoolyard who belittled the weak, demeaned the righteous, and could only be silenced by courage. Now those bullies use the printed page or the microphone to put your opinion right where they want it. But surely, don't most Americans recognize these creatures for the sunless things they are? Most of us walked away from those schoolyard bullies, and only later realized what cowards they truly were. So how can it be that now we read and watch and listen to their shadows every day, build our lives, structure our communities in deference to their words? Have so many Americans sunk so low as not only to demean themselves, but to deserve it?

Make a democratic vote and turn those malignancies off. Be a better person for it, and a better-informed citizen.

Article Author: Robert Brady

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