really...should we worry about Israel and Iran, or Taylor Swift and Blake Lively????

[FCD]

Just a simple question.

Who is more important...

Taylor Swift and Blake Lively, or Israel and Iran??

I'll leave you to answer.

Edit...And let's cut to the real chase here...which news story will YOU click on first????  (i.e. "Taylor Swift falls ill and pukes blood all over her new 845' super yacht in the middle of the Atlantic requiring an 'all hands" US Coast Guard and US Navy response"...versus..."Iran nukes Tel Aviv, tens of thousands inured and dead"...???

Personally, I think the former will get more clicks, as opposed to the latter!

Society is lost.

[BIAD]

Who is more important... Taylor Swift and Blake Lively, or Israel and Iran??

The true answer is none of the above.
In terms of endangerment to life -of course, the residents of Israel and Iran can appreciate how
they have priority to the word 'importance' rather than a couple of wealthy troubadours struggling
to understand where their yearning for footlight-veneration ends.

It's really all about content. Those established conveyors of what we call 'daily news' have -not only
self-elevated themselves into the stratum of celebutante and dragged the viewers/listeners' interests
of what they wish to indulge themselves with, but have also left behind a reality that the majority of
people exist in day-to day simply because they've decided it's not interesting enough.

True, a school-appointed road-crossing guard who's been warned about giving high-fives to kids
passing on his/her location may get a mention, but the regular quest of keeping their customers
in either camp of emotive exasperation is always there, even in what the media used to call a
'Man-Bites-Dog' story.

There was a time when most outlets left the tribulations of what Frank Sinatra and latest squeeze
were going through to the more-Hollywood-orientated magazines, but now with a well-financed
system of talking-heads/influencer agencies and infotainment being easier to generate without
leaving one's desk, celebrity-trivia now sits beside earthquakes and moon-landings
Hence, what some say is 'dumbing-down' now can be no longer recognised.

Let's be truthful, the politics that's offered to the everyday consumer of news isn't real. The actual
policy-makers are not displayed or interviewed and instead, a guy or woman with a microphone in
his/her hand relates his/her translation with a hopefully-disguised leaning to one side or the other.

But it has the potential to either put the viewer at ease or more favoured these days, infuriate them.
Sadly behind the camera, the charged-rhetoric is merely a means to get them from a previous story
dripping with negativity to the shapely Charlene and her weather forecast.

Ratings are everything and if it means looking serious when taking about Bigfoot or flying saucers
instead of mocking the subjects in the past, it's earnest faces all 'round as they stare into the camera
and tell you how the world turns.

[FCD]

BIAD,

Thanks for the very insightful reply!!  BTW...your answer is the correct one, and I'm glad you were able to see this!  There's at least a few people 'out there' who don't fall for the media hype.

As you note, it's not that the conflict going on with Israel and (well, about everyone) isn't important, it's that what the world is being presented as "news", or what's "important", by the MSM and social media is both filled with propaganda and much of it is not even real.  It pains me to see just how shallow people's understanding is today of the world around them.  What's on the headline of the news cycle this morning is completely different from yesterday.  And, the reason for that is, as you also point out, the never ending quest for ratings.  Ratings, wether it's likes, clicks or whatever, equals money.  So, what's really important isn't Taylor Swift or Blake Lively, or Israel and Iran...it's whatever it takes (and I literally mean anything at all) to get the most clicks, likes, views or whatever metric is being measured.  Absolutely what ever it takes, bar nothing.

Don Henley of the Eagles should receive a Nobel Prize in Philosophy for the 1983 classic, "Dirty Laundry".  The lyrics to this song really said it all better than anyone else ever said it in five minutes and thirty eight seconds.

[Ninurta]

I don't know either Taylor Swift or Blake Lively, so their triumphs or tribulations are exactly none of my business, and hold no interest for me. I DO know some Israelis, Iranians, Syrians, etc., so what happens to them may be of some passing interest to me. So, I would be more likely to click on the second option over the first.

I also have an abiding interest in Shapely Charlene, but this is the first I've been informed that she does something called a "weather forecast"! Is that what all of those out-of-focus squiggles on the wall behind her are about? I thought that was just some new kind of art deco wallpapaer!



.

[FCD]

...

I also have an abiding interest in Shapely Charlene, ...

Ninurta - Did you mean, 'Christene' (as in Christene Lundstedt, longtime TV news person at KABC-TV Los Angeles), the person Henley allegedly based the song, 'Dirty Laundry', on?  Although Henley denies this...but she was a longtime television news investigative reporter and fixture in LA TV news scene.

Or, were you referring to someone else?  (If so, who was Charlene?)

[Bally002]

...

I also have an abiding interest in Shapely Charlene, ...

Ninurta - Did you mean, 'Christene' (as in Christene Lundstedt, longtime TV news person at KABC-TV Los Angeles), the person Henley allegedly based the song, 'Dirty Laundry', on?  Although Henley denies this...but she was a longtime television news investigative reporter and fixture in LA TV news scene.

Or, were you referring to someone else?  (If so, who was Charlene?)

Might be a tilt on this one Nin?  Just guessing.

Otherwise I'll take the back door out.

Bally)

[Ninurta]

...

I also have an abiding interest in Shapely Charlene, ...

Ninurta - Did you mean, 'Christene' (as in Christene Lundstedt, longtime TV news person at KABC-TV Los Angeles), the person Henley allegedly based the song, 'Dirty Laundry', on?  Although Henley denies this...but she was a longtime television news investigative reporter and fixture in LA TV news scene.

Or, were you referring to someone else?  (If so, who was Charlene?)

"Charlene" is a generic stand-in for all of the feminine newscasters chosen more for their looks than their brains, which is quite a lot of them. She doesn't represent any particular specific person. I don't recall ever having seen any LA news personalities, although I had a Socialist friend who was a long-time columnist for various "news" and entertainment organs out there in LA (Ron Garmon).

Ron once came to my defense when some low-life socialist called me a "murderous, baby-killin' bastard!", although in looking back on it, I can't be sure whether he was coming to my defense, or the defense of that specified low-life. Sometimes, the life you save may NOT be your own!

He also once roped me into being an officer in some goofy "peace fellowship" back during the Cold War. I wasn't really interested in the sort of "peace" they were promoting, which seemed more like "capitulation" than "peace" to me, but I WAS interested in keeping an eye on them, from the inside.

.

[FCD]

Ninurta - 

Gotcha!

I had to read the name of your columnist acquaintance twice, because the first time I read it I thought I read..."Ron Burgundy"!!!!

AH-HAHAHAHAHAHA! (smackin' leg, snort)