Michael Jackson’s Death Has Hijacked the News! (But No One Was Paying Attention to the News to Begin With)

Usually, I hate putting down the media. They seem to get a lot of unnecessary criticism from all sides, and quite a bit of it usually seems too harsh. Overall, I support the various types of news media–television news networks, newspapers, and internet sites, because I believe that it is important that Americans, well, people all over the world, really, keep themselves informed about what’s going on. Our world is shrinking. Once, people never traveled more than fifteen miles away from their hometown, if that. Now, just by logging onto the internet, people can connect with others from all around the globe. A webcam can allow people to speak to other people hundreds of miles away without even leaving their own office. And that’s not to mention all of the overseas travel that is now available. One can go across the world in a matter of hours. We are more connected now than we ever have been, and that has given us the responsibility to know what is happening around the world.

However, the news media also has a responsibility, which is to provide relevant and informative news to its audiences. Most of the time, it does. I was actually quite enthralled by the news last week and earlier this week, as most of the major coverage had to do with the protests in Iran, which is definitely something that Americans need to be informed about. There were also some local stories that weren’t having a major global impact, but they were certainly relevant.

And then Michael Jackson died. Now, I’m not saying that his death was completely unworthy of any news coverage. A famous and controversial pop star dies and people are going to want to know about it. I’m sure that his family and fans are grieving. His contributions to popular culture, music, and dance are certainly worth remembering. (Yes, just like everyone else, I think that the Thriller album was amazing!) But does his death really deserve so much coverage? Tonight, I just watched news anchors spend fifteen minutes (of a half-hour news program) discussing the fact that his autopsy results will not be completed for several weeks. Does that information need fifteen minutes worth of coverage? All they have to tell us is that we won’t know for sure what caused his heart failure for a while and that it might have something to do with some prescription painkillers he was taking. Then they should get back to giving us some real news that actually has some substance. For instance, the House passed a bill that will attempt to cut down America’s use of fossil fuels. I’d think that a story like that would get precedence over a celebrity’s death.

Now, I mean no disrespect to Michael Jackson and his grieving family and fans. I was never a huge fan of his and I thought he was a little strange, but he grew on me a little after a professor in one of my English classes had us analyze his “Thriller” music video. We ended up having a pretty insightful discussion about the portrayal of race in American media. Plus, the song was really catchy. I’m not trying to downplay the impact that he had on popular culture or the right that his fans have to mourn his death and celebrate the positive contributions of his life.

But does every news network have to spend their entire program time doing that? There are people dying all over the world. Many of them are dying because of intolerance or injustice! Shouldn’t the news be enlightening us about their situations instead of talking–and essentially saying nothing because there is nothing definite that can be said at this point–about the fact that they will not know for several weeks what caused Michael Jackson’s heart failure?

I sometimes wonder if this doesn’t have something to do with the internet becoming Americans’ main news source. Because you know Americans: we want what we want, and we want it now, and we want it to be the newest, shiniest, freshest whatever-it-is that’s out there. We feel this way about our news too. We want it now, and because the internet is becoming available nearly everywhere, it’s the most immediate way to find out what’s going on. It can also be updated more quickly than, say, a newspaper.

We Americans are also very specific about what we want. We usually don’t want to hear opinions that differ from ours. We want our own opinions presented as truth. We also don’t want to be bothered with news that doesn’t interest us. (I’m proving my own point by complaining about how much Michael Jackson’s death has been covered.) We only want to hear about what we’re interested in. With television news, we really can’t do that, unless we flip the channel. (I tried that, and I only found that every news station out there was discussing nothing but Michael Jackson’s death.) With newspapers, we can flip to another page. But newspapers’ coverage tends to be kind of bland. Aside from the editorials, journalists present the facts with as little opinion and explanation as possible. This is actually a great way to be unbiased, but Americans tend to prefer reading biased news, provided that bias is in accord with their own.

So Americans are turning to blogs for their news! (That is, if Americans are even paying attention to the news. Only 11% of Americans watch television news. Only 12% of Americans read the newspapers. And the people who are getting their news from the television and the newspapers, and the internet are all the same people! Only about 12% of Americans actually know what’s going on in the world. My statistics are a little out of date, I admit, but, still, that is a scary thought. We are the most powerful country in the world, and none of us know what’s happening in the world. Does anyone else see a problem here?) And we all know what a great source for news blogs are! I sincerely hope that no one is reading this blog and expecting to get accurate, cold, hard data about what is happening across the globe. I’m writing my opinions. That’s all I’ve got to offer. Now, for my own personal integrity, I try to make sure that I have some basis in fact to back up my opinions. I try to research issues as thoroughly as I can before I make up my mind regarding them, but I can make mistakes too. (Typos abound, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.) And in a blog, there is no editor to call me out when I make mistakes. Television news networks and newspapers have such editors. Blogs really don’t have this kind of checking system.

But even if they did, would they still be the best source for news? I’m not sure. When the internet first became available to the public, a lot of people thought that it would bring all sorts of different kinds of people together–that it would encourage dialogue between peoples of different backgrounds and worldviews. And the internet still has an amazing potential to do just that! The problem is, the internet also has the potential to let people filter out whatever ideas they don’t want to hear and surround themselves only with the ideas that they already agree with. And that’s the potential that the internet is living up to. When we get our news from the internet, it’s much easier for us to only read blogs that pander to our tastes. I know this because I do it. There are no blogs that I read regularly that present current events from the conservative Republican point of view. I might stumble across them once in a while, but I don’t read them regularly. The blogs that I read regularly for news present their information from the perspective of liberal Democrats. I shut out the voices that don’t agree with mine. And I’m not alone. In general, most other Americans do the same thing that I do–they ignore what’s out there that they disagree with and they only concern themselves with the information that supports their beliefs.

The problem with living this way is that it breeds intolerance and it does not promote understanding. If you never come into contact with people who are different from you, it becomes easier to marginalize them as the “other.” It becomes easier to see them as stupid or not human or ridiculous. It also doesn’t help you learn how to talk to these people. If you don’t know how and what they think, you certainly won’t know how to start a conversation with them. Even worse, you probably won’t even bother trying to have a conversation with them in the first place.

Like I said, the world is getting smaller. That means that our minds need to be getting bigger. We need to start realizing that the way that we think is not the only way to think and that it is not necessarily the way that other people think. We also need to realize that just because other people do not think exactly the way that we do, that does not make them stupid or ridiculous or less human than we are. This also doesn’t mean that we have to accept every idea that we happen to come into contact with, but we should be willing to consider other viewpoints, even if we don’t adopt them as our own. Instead of avoiding diversity, we should be embracing it.

That being said, I feel like looking up that old “Thriller” music video on YouTube. And I should also probably go read some conservative blogs, so that I can say that I practice what I advocate.

The Beauty Industry Makes Idiots of Us All: What the Iranian Protests Have Taught Me About American Standards of Beauty

Before I begin this post, I have to apologize to my mother. She is a wonderful, caring, intelligent, and creative woman. This post does not represent her as she is all of the time, and it’s meant to be more of a reflection on society and its values than it is on my mother personally.

With that being said, something happened this week that made me a little disturbed. On Thursday last week, my parents and I were watching the national news on TV, which was covering the protests over the “election” in Iran. For those of you who haven’t been following Iran’s election, here’s what was going on: Protestors, dressed in green, were peacefully marching down the streets. They were causing no one any harm. They were not violent. They merely wanted a right that we Americans take for granted–the right to have free and fair election of their president. They believed that Mahmoud Ahmadinejhad had been unfairly elected and they wanted a new election rescheduled. The Iranian government responded harshly to the protestors’ peaceful march, and the news coverage was grim. People were being beaten, some to death, by police. (If you would like to see videos of protests and get more information, follow this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdK35ZkbdIc&feature=related.)

I was watching this and feeling sickened. I was also hoping, fruitlessly I knew, that the Supreme Leader would let a new and fair election be held. (He declared on Friday that he would do no such thing.) My point is, my reaction to this was horror at what was happening to these protestors and hope that their sacrifices would not be in vain. I was thinking these thoughts as the news showed footage of the marchers in the city, when my mother said, “They’re all so thin! They look the way Americans used to look back in the ’70’s!” (And when my mother said “thin,” she meant “attractive.” Trust me, I’ve heard my mom bemoan her weight, which, by the way, is perfectly normal. I’ve watched her go on ridiculous diets. And I’ve heard her compliment her friends on losing weight. When my mom says “thin,” it means “beautiful.”)

I could only stare at my mother. People are being killed because they want the freedom to fairly choose their country’s president. People are bravely defying their government. People are risking their lives for a cause that they believe in. And my mother’s only thought is, “These people are good-looking”?!

I’ve read Naomi Wolf’s The Beauty Myth. I’ve read Germaine Greer’s The Whole Woman  and Eve Ensler’s The Good Body. And I never quite believed them when they said that all of our society’s concern about women’s appearances is a red herring to keep women from thinking about serious things, like actually taking on positions of authority in society. I never quite believed that all of this worry about women being beautiful enough could really serve to totally distract women from important things going on in the world. Surely, I always thought, women are smart enough that even if they do worry too much about which brand of foundation to buy, they can also think about things like the global economy, the environment, international affairs, and other important topics.

But now I’ve seen a women watch people protesting a rigged election and can only say, “They’re so thin [attractive]!” Really? Is that all she can think about? Never mind the political implications that these protests have for Iranian politics. Never mind what gains Iranian women could make if a new election is held and Mir-Hossein Mousavi becomes Iran’s new president. Never mind what effect this election is having on global politics. None of that is nearly as important as the fact that the protestors are thin and attractive! Yes! That is what we should take away from all the news coverage and YouTube videos of these protestors! They are good looking, so who cares about what they are actually trying to accomplish! I can only sigh, shake my head, and wonder how in the world someone could watch people literally dying because they want freedom and change and only think about what these people look like!

Sadly, I don’t have to wonder too much. Undoubtedly, at some point, there was a commercial break, and our household was invaded by ads for beauty creams, makeup, bras, lingerie, and God know what else women desperately need because they will be UGLY-terrified shrieks–without these products! And, oh my Lord, being ugly is the worst thing that could ever happen to a woman! No, seriously, it is. Our society tells women that if they are not beautiful enough, no one will love them. No one will care about them. No one will respect them or treat them with kindness. They will not be able to advance in their jobs because, statistically speaking, more attractive people are more likely to get promotions. In other words, without beauty, a woman can have nothing. If you’d been told this message from the day you were born and for your entire life, you’d be terrified too. You’d waste your money and time on the anti-aging creams (none of which work) and StairMasters.

So what do we women do? We buy make-up. We buy clothes. We buy diet products and exercise machines. We spend money on gym memberships and workout clothes. We consume Slim-Fast and other brand name low-fat, low-calorie, tasteless bars of something that is not nutrients.

And the waste of money isn’t even the most disturbing part. What’s even more disturbing is how much we women hate ourselves. No matter how we look, there is always something wrong. We are never enough. We are never good enough. We are never perfect enough. Women spend their lives consumed by self-loathing because they don’t look like supermodels. Guess what, ladies? Supermodels don’t look like supermodels either. They spend hours having their hair done and their make-up applied by professionals. They have special photographers who take pictures of them from just the right angles. Then, these pictures are sent to computer labs. This is where the woman in the picture, who was previously just a woman with a lot of makeup and hairspray, becomes a supermodel. The computer trims baggy thighs, lifts sagging cheeks, smoothes wrinkles, and plumps thin lips. Then this image can be smeared on a billboard or copied onto a magazine and women all over the country can be told that unless they look exactly like that picture, they are not beautiful.

The standards of beauty for women in the West are absurd! Even worse, they are set down at the only definition of beauty. There is no definitive definition of beauty. The definition of beauty is a social construct. When I was a little girl, I had a book of Russian fairytales in which the heroines of these stories were always described as “plump and lovely and ladylike.” They were a far cry from the Disney princesses that I saw on TV. (These Russian fairytale princesses were also unusual in the fact that they often actually did things to try to save themselves from their horrid situations instead of sitting by wishing wells and humming, “Someday my prince will come…”) What beauty is changes from society to society. It even changes within societies! There is nothing inherently beautiful about big boobs, a miniscule waste, and blond hair. That is only considered beautiful because our society says that it is beautiful.

And, because beauty is just a social construct, it can change. We can decide that our society needs a more inclusive view of beauty–a view of beauty that allows all women to be beautiful. Ladies, however you look–fat, thin, average, flat-chested, full-chested, big thighs, no thighs, normal thighs, thin lips, full lips, asymmetrical lips, green eyes, blue eyes, brown eyes, grey eyes, thick hair, thin hair, grey hair, brown hair, red hair, blond hair–tell yourself that you are beautiful every time you look in the mirror. Tell yourself that you love your body. It will feel false and ridiculous at first, but eventually you will start to believe yourself, I promise. Do things that make you feel good as a person, as a woman. Appreciate yourself and your body. Eat what makes you happy, not what you think will make you thin. You are beautiful, and you are deserving of love and respect, no matter what you look like. And girls, do we really want to be like supermodels? Look at that idiot Carrie Prejean! I would hope that we’d all aspire to something more than that.

Not that this is all women’s faults. We buy into it, yes, but men certainly don’t help us fight against it. There are men out there who pressure their wives and girlfriends to be skinnier, prettier, more exciting. These men are just assholes who should be glad that they have any sort of female companion, because if they keep treating her so badly, they’re going to lose her. There are men who look at porn and expect their wives/girlfriends and their sex lives to be just like what they see in videos or in Playboy, never mind that pornography does not represent a realistic or even desirable image of what sex should be like. These men need to grow up. And women, why do we even want to please jerks like these guys? Why should be pander to their immature fantasies? They don’t deserve us. (There are also some wonderful men out there who treat women with respect and realize that what our society says about sex and beauty is all a sham. I applaud these men.)

So, instead of worrying about how we look, we women should learn to love ourselves and be happy with our bodies exactly as they are. Then maybe we can start worrying about more important things, like the Iranian protestors, for instance.