MSNBC presenter Mika Brzezinski refused to read a Paris Hilton story as the lead news story, believing that Republican Senator Richard Lugar’s attack on Bush’s Iraq policy should have lead the news:
Somebody should have the same guts at online “news” bottom feeders and hit wh*res, the Smage online. Here’s how Fairfax covered Brzezinski’s actions:
News anchor loses it over Paris story
Their story was followed up with an exciting item about:
An empty gourmet dog food can plundered from Hilton’s rubbish bin has launched an eBay bidding war reaching $US1.5 million ($1.8 million).
The most read story at their purely online “newspaper”, The Brisbane Times, which some naively thought would give the Curious Snail a run for its money with serious Brisvegas journalism? Beauties brave Brazilian wax. The Brisbane Times employs fifteen journos. I swear MX has broken more news.
Good on her. What a heroine. “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this any more!”
I assume she has been fired by now. And did you see the way those blokes interrupted, belittled, mocked, humiliated and talked over the top of her, all in the name of good clean fun, while pretending that they were on her side and that they too were cool, serious, intellectual Paris-mockers?
And did you see how terrified they were of what she might do?
Heh.
Yep, and yep!
Note that she only stops reading it in the first place after one of the blokes starts having a go.
And the guy on the right apparently assumes that she’s only able to act because she wants to “make a point to her father”…
One swallow may not make a spring but today, for the first time in weeks, the Good Weekend supplement actually carried a political story again!
Dunno why I waste my money on the Saturday Age these days.
Ampersand Duck has just posted this at her own site, where she remarks that those two men deserve to be clubbed to death with their own genitals.
I’d reply that that would be very difficult, but I’m scared someone will turn up and flame me for discriminating against men on the basis of penis size.
Um … No I’m not.
It’s a metaphor, dudes.
Femmobolsholy speaking!
Sh*t yeah!
Well not for Catherine Deveny’s column, I hope.
The Weekend Australian is a much better buy even if you don’t agree with its editorial line.
Yes’m, and whenever clubbing ta death with genitals is advocated, I think we can all assume a metaphor is being invoked. Large or small, X or Y chromosome, their utility as a club aint gunna win any prizes at the Arms Bazaar.
The total panic when a talking head goes off-script is the most delicous part in that bit. They keep numbly intoning “Paris Hilton” until the grand over-ride of the next bit kicks in. I aso enjoyed the cry-baby panic when a cigarette-lighter was flourished; most males enjoy setting things on fire.
Yes, that was very funny too. Anyone would think they didn’t trust the studio to have the sprinklers working.
Speaking of total panics when talking heads go off-script, I don’t suppose anyone else was lucky enough to see Daryl Somers’ expression when Farmer Dave sponanteously offered to withdraw from Dancing With the Stars — in the middle of Daryl’s big fake tension build-up to the announcement of this week’s loser — so that Kate Ceberano wouldn’t get eliminated?
Yes yes, I know, but I find rubbish television soothing. And the rewards, as in the above case, can be very great.
best use of a shredder on tv.
the initial reaction of the big boofy bloke was to blurt out - “this is a cop out” and “take control of your life”…talk about instantaneous projection.
The basic problem with trying to club a guy to death with his genitals is that you’re working against the clock - you don’t have that much thrashing time before the exsanguination gets him anyway. All up it’s a damned nice close run thing.
The real purpose of playing up Paris Hilton is to distract attention from the showdown between Bush and Cheney and Congress. Did you know that Cheney has just declared that his office of Vice President is not part of the Executive Branch?
Daryl Somers is alive? I always thought that when the ostrich-puppet died they walled him up in tomb with it, so that he could serve the ostrich in his next life. Guess the doughty little blighter escaped.
Those guys are insufferable *s. I support Ampersand Duck’s interventionist stance re: beatings unto death with genitals. Mika Brzezinski is my new hero.
Lol, Mr Creighton.
For those into amazing trivia, Mika Brzezinski is apparently the daughter of Jimmy Carter’s former National Security Advisor, Zbig Brzezinski. I’m not sure how spontaneous her righteous indignation actually was but it’s certainly refreshing.
Joe made me think what it would be like if Bert Newton was doing a news program.
Most remarkable was the number of times the smarmy two drew attention or alluded to Mika’s gender, including calling her “wench”, groping her around the waist, and then in a definitely spontaneous mirrored act, fetishising the piece of paper she’d screwed up, one by momentarily pocketing it, the other by burying his nose in it and then sweetly praising its alluring scent.
Phew, what a psychoanalytic goldmine.
Reality note here:
Question: Why did the studio director have a camera already trained on the shredder?
Answer: everyone was in on the set up.
No improptu gender battle going on here.
Move on folks. There’s nothing to see.
(Whatever happened to the “media savvy” generation?)
It’s live tv, Katz. You don’t think they can reposition cameras? Or anticipate what she might do?
They can, but this was a preset. Watch the cut away.
It’s an elevated camera in a place of no relevance to the normal presentation of a news program.
Inconceivable Mark. Next you’ll be telling us that Whose Line Is it Anyway wasn’t tightly scripted or that Oprah doesn’t use audience plants.
I’m guessing half and half; there was obviously some off-camera discussion and disagreement about how the segment would go, but past a certain point those blokes are definitely not acting, and neither is she.
A loose production directive, followed by some orchestrated disagreement.
Reminded me of the Footy Show.
With Joe as Sam Newman, yes.
As I’ve said, I think it’s very likely that it was, to use Tony T’s word, loosely set up to start with. But that’s a separate issue from the nature of the situation as it developed and the way the participants were interacting.
If there are people who can’t see the gendered tension and frustration (and I don’t mean that in a good way) escalating in that exchange, then I’m sure no amount of verbiage from a third party will persuade you otherwise. But many if not most women have to put up with this kind of belittlement disguised as so-called ‘joking’ in their professional lives on a weekly if not a daily basis. And the fact that many men can’t see what the problem is with it and don’t realise when they’re doing it themselves is a very big part of what makes it so infuriating for women.
Beautifully put, Pavlov’s Cat. The whole *dig* “What? Nothing just happened!” scenario is crazy-making.
Yes, well said Pavlov’s Cat.
I thought from watching it that the producers kept the story as the lead in news breaks following her initial refusal to read it - which would allow time to position a camera and get antsy.
If anyone at work grabbed me like they grabbed her, they would be Sorry.
I’m afraid i’m with the set-up theory.
I believe the sentiment was true, they joked around about it in the run through, and just went,, Hey lets just do this for real…..lets act out what everyone is saying…
Gotta be the best ratings they had for a while.
THe media knows how to play the You Tube game too.
Reminds me of a new work up of the ’secret affair’ formula…i.e. arrange to have an up and coming starlet who needs more media exposure photographed coming out of a major celebrity couples’s apartment one night. Media frenzy ensues, focus goes to finding out who the secret woman is, tipped off paparazzi happy as pics sell for good money, unknown starlet happy as profile is increased, and…in a week or two. original celebrity couple happy as they can sell the real story of how it was just and innocent mistake (they’re all just good friends and our relationahsip is stronger than ever blah blah blah)to a magazine for lots of money.
What Dr Cat said. Spot on. It doesn’t matter if it was partly orchestrated or not - she would have been the person who said “this Paris crap shouldn’t be the lead” and the “joshing” from the blokes is clearly all their own work.
And don’t be messin’ with Zoe, trolls everywhere!
There are layers and layers to the nasty misogyny of this. Sure, many viewers would be blind to that misogyny or frame it as either premeditated innocuous theatre or routinely normal.
The bloke micro eye searching the reaction of the people behind camera, is as PC said, terrified. I would add, vindictively jubliant.
These Rosencrantz and Guildenstern buffoons and whoever it is that played the tape of Paris Hilton, engineer in this instructive mise-en-scène a ritualised, linked act of humiliation of both women. Really nasty yet everyday stuff.
As per usual, the po-faced fembots have got it arse over tit:
“Brzezinski said her actions were not planned before last Thursday, but it was at that morning’s news meeting that she had just felt that she could not stand silent as the Hilton story was put on the top of the news agenda. ‘My co-host and I had problems with the story at 6am, when we had our first morning meeting. I let my co-host Joe know and he told me to go with my gut. I want to thank him for his support in that,’ she says.
”
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/focus/story/0,,2115800,00.html
Brzezinski is now a media star and if she is sassy enough she’ll get a nice big pay rise and promotion.
How about closing jaws and opening your ears, you sadly mirthless mannikin’s? Mmmkay?
Fascinating backgrounder, though why Melaleuca would think this discounts what fembots as he revealing calls us, have written, is anybody’s guess.
How delicious. Quite made our day. Speaking on behalf of the international sisterhood. Mika can’t be fired because of the groundswell of support she is getting.
Chuckle. GUFFAW!
Evidence for set up, part 2.
Question: Where does Brzezinski get the lighter from?
Answer: From the hand of the bozo to her left.
Question: Why is he holding a lighter?
Answer: Because it was a necessary prop for the mini-drama. The bozo on Brzezinski’s right was scripted to give it to her.
Don’t be a knucklehead. She can’t be “fired” because she has just boosted the rating and thus profits of employer by a tidy sum. The boss will no doubt give her the “employee of the month award”.
Err, that should be “to her right”.
Sigh. You are stating the obvious, Katz. However, sadly, our fembot friends have a gaping blindspot and little common sense.
Wow, you boys are really literal thinkers. LOVE a deep thinker. Are your dicks as small and narrow?
Even if it were scripted, which no-one has denied, what does the content of the script say about gender relations, the portrayal of women in the media, and the role and perception of female journalists?
Seriously, she was never going to be fired.
In the words of the business, she gives good copy.
Why else would they have re-lead with the Hilton story each hour unless they wanted her to continue the fabulous outburst. SHe was giving voice to the groundswell of opinion about hilton that had been gaining momentum for days around the cash for interview scandal.
That’s a different question Jinmaro.
The question of the scenario being scripted wasn’t even considered until I raised it.
If you do concede that the scene wasscripted, then you’d have to concede that Brzezinski was complicit in its construction.
So does that make Brzezinski an Auntie Tom of the Patriarchy? Or was she forced to play her role?
mel, stop being an arse. It is possible for your view to be correct as well as the “fembot” interpretation of the dynamics to be correct. You haven’t proved them wrong, so stop acting like a dickhead.
Speaking of good copy, contrast this with the Stamos interview on Kerri anne’s show.
She and all her producers clearly knew he was ’smashed ‘ from the beginning. She said so during the interview. He was being a mysoginist dickhead (groping Kerri anne, the bottle thing etc etc ). THey could so easily have shut down the interview if they wanted, but it was too facinating a train wreck to look away.
And its one the most popular clips on You TUbe at the moment.
Do you think Kerri anne was complicit in the sexual harrassment?
John Stamos’ subtance enhanced appearance on Kerri-Anne’s show
Anna,
It is the usual suspects who have piled with their radical fembot interpretations that are baseless. Mika B has thanked her colleague. I’ll take that at face value.
Also see http://larvatusprodeo.net/2007/06/21/laughing-at-with-the-advertising-standards-bureau/#comment-381490 The fembots are out of touch with the coal-face. Don’t shoot me for pointing this out.
It wasn’t and wouldn’t have been that closely or totally scripted and anyone with a gram of empathy can read both Mika’s and the two clowns’ expressions: among the most spontaneous, genuine, conflicting and revealing facial narratives I have ever seen on live current affairs tv.
The enacted script incorporates the two men’s sexist contempt of her and PH, their puerile humour at the expense of both women, the drawing attention to and aligning of their colleague’s sexuality and that of PH.
The female journalist wass a willing accomplice and author of this?
Well, yes, if your opinion of women is that of total contempt.
Well, sure, mel. Point out anything you like. Your method of expressing, however, makes it appear to the casual observer that you’re more interested in impressing your fans.
Incidently, whats this current obsession with citing opponents (alleged) small penis size - as mentioned in this thread, the speeding adds and John Stamos in this clip?
“Po- faced”, “gaping blindspot”, and now a impressively absurd non sequitur.
Bravo.
How about closing jaws and opening your ears, you sadly mirthless mannikin’s? Mmmkay?
Hmmm, mistaking idiotic and offensive for clever and ironic. Do you do this often?
All those facial tics and significant looks to figures off camera, etc., can equally be interpreted as those of non-professional actors who are compelled to keep a shtick going when props don’t work, i.e., no one tested the lighter.
There is no doubt that the default setting was of sexism and sexual stereotypiing. Everyone reverted to type when under performance pressure.
That’s just silly. Such an assessment has nothing to do with what one thinks about women, or anyone else. You are asserting that it is impossible for a woman to act against her own best interests. Nonsensical.
Have no idea and care less who John Stamos is, was, or could be. Sublime Cowgirl must watch way more tv than I or many care to or could even contemplate.
Yes women can act beyond their own best interests, but mostly women don’t set the parameters, as I am sure Mika Brzezinski couldn’t and didn’t.
But in this case she did nevertheless manage to convey exactly what was going on, and her protest at it, hence the response she has got from women and the brilliant way her bolshevism has saved her job and made her a hero.
Ole.
i would love to take this debate into the territory of the very complex set of factors, inherent rewards, fustrations and pay offs at play when very attractive and smart women find themselves surrounded by (or even more controversially surround themselves with ) less intellegent and or stupid men, but perhaps thats more apt as a feminist spin off from our Fruedian thread.
i would love to take this debate into the territory of the very complex set of factors, inherent rewards, fustrations and pay offs at play when very attractive and smart women find themselves surrounded by (or even more controversially surround themselves with ) less intellegent and or stupid men, but perhaps thats more apt as a feminist spin off from our Fruedian thread.
But isn’t the dupe the ‘masculine’ role par excellence? Think of the role of the father in psychoanalysis, or, for that matter, the comedies of Ricky Gervais.
AW says:
“Your method of expressing, however, makes it appear to the casual observer that you’re more interested in impressing your fans.”
Rubbish. You might want to review the comments that preceded mine. My “method of expressing” was in exactly the same vein. Obviously you found the fembot references to Bolsheviks and cocks appealing.
Jinmaro, i have never ever watched Full House, Oceans 11, 12, or 13, or even E.R. (I only saw House for the first time on a recent long haul to Europe. LOL. .)… but i read voraciously.
I raise the issue of Stamos in the context of the You Tube cross marketing phenomenon.
If you think for a moment that this kind of exposure is detrimental to the networks ratings you are being niave. What you saw was a brilliant slice of ‘reality tv’ where the players are being true to themselves, but in the wider sphere, they retain their ratings appeal to a mass audience who hold these diffent range of (sexist) opinions . Yes you can deconstruct this in terms of gender and power, but if this is an example of the true dynamics in this workgroup, it raises a raft of questions around who is actaully holding the power here. In this case i’m postulating that it is Brzezinski, who made a calculated choice to dummy spit in this instance, knowing the consequences were all in her favour.
Contrast this with Channel 10’s crap management of the Merlin Refugee protest, albiet a more complex social issue than Hilton.
I think you’re onto me…..shhhhh
Melaleuca, just like the men to the left and right of Ms Brzezinski, obviously wants to seize on anything he can find to accuse her of being a “fembot”. If he can’t understand the workplace/gender dynamics that might pressure her into retrospectively defending Mr Left and Mr Right, then perhaps he should stick to trying to work out whether Freud was a cocaine addict. Or something.
You must be drunk Mark.
I respect Mika Brzezinski. It is the womyn who have lined up to insist she is a “victim”, even though she clearly says she isn’t and has come out a winner, as SC notes, that I find as comical Monty Python’s dead parrot.
Correct, melaleuca.
Apologies if I misread your comment.
Though I don’t resile from being able to watch the video and seeing very typical patterns of male behaviour, which are also negative in the extreme. Nor do I think that anyone was saying she was a “victim”.
“Victim”?? I called her a heroine, myself. But I do think everyone should definitely go on over and read that link of mel’s — the whole thing, I mean, start to finish — for Brzezinski’s own official line on what happened: loose setup, got slightly out of hand. Here it is again.
Thanks for re-posting the link, Pavlov’s Cat, and thanks, mel, for posting it, although due to a few red wines tonight, I missed it the first time round.
I think it goes to confirm the interpretation Kim had above:
The degree to which it was, or was not, known that she would refuse to read the story before the segment went to air seems to me to be a red herring, as she must have told people before the segment went to air that she didn’t intend to. And, nor, in my view, does it detract at all from the appalling manner in which her co-hosts belittled her, and in very gendered fashion.
Jinmaro, noooh!!
Puhlease!
No alibiing for Hilton.
In a wide sense, as a an example of brainwashing and reification, mebbe. But in that case you must also offer sympathy for that pitiful neolib pratt ‘droid producer Brezhzinski went to war with.
The Sublime One is so exponentially much closer to the money. People are fed up both with the Vacuous Vapid One and the even more unforgiveable Hilton Ltd Spindoctoring Inc. They resoundingly reject the threadbare, thrashed-to- death “victim” defence without reservation .
the REAL issue is agreed though, the fundamentally sick state of(capitalist /patriarchalist/ neither/ both!)media.
And if newsreaders across Australia, including public broadcasting, had the guts to do what this heroinic newsreader did, we would finally be spared the propaganda that aesthetic atrocity called the News on every TV channel across Australia masks. Bliss would reign supreme, instead of lies.
Because, at my age, I can assure anyone else with the wit to frequent this thread that MEDIA would rather burn for all eternity in the very flames of hell itself, in a fit of anal pique, than even CONSIDER putting actual news stories on the News.
BTW, any one else noted latest SMH re Britney Spears…
Has put out a restraining order on her (own) mother?
Whoo-oooooh!!!!!!!
I guessed alcohol correctly with Mark.
I’m guessing cocaine or amphetamines with PW.
Is that two out of two?
Another thing that emerges from reading the Guardian report - the You Tube video is a compilation of three incidents which each occurred an hour apart, rather than one prolonged on-air argument.
So those of us - including me - who assumed that the You Tube video shows what happened on air in real-time, and commented on that assumption, got it wrong.
Ah - the power of montage,eh?
Dr Cat started it, in her femmobolsho mode!
Actually, I lie! Dr Cat merely linked to Ampersand Duck’s post. Apologies!
Gummo has gripped the squirrel by the ephemerals. Its a bloody montage that has been misread.
I’ll bet anyone $100 bucks that Ms B and her colleagues are peeing themselves laughing about this whole beat-up.
Good point Gummo
So, just who is making a fool of who?
Mika or ‘da boiz’
Kerri-anne or Stamos? (i think this one’s a no-brainer)
Da Meejah, You-Tube or Us?
Melaleuca - behave.
sc, btw, you should have come out tonight. Mark and I went to an ace alt.country gig on the occasion of the Troubadour’s forth birthday. I’m just composing a post about it now. But there were quite a few sublime cowgirls (and boys!) enjoying some red wines and some music about drinking too much…
Etc!
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=58180192
Of course we should have texted you to tell you! Sorry! It was a very spontaneous outing…!
Noooo dont tell me after the fact!!!
I would have been so up for that too.
I love the ‘dour.
The kids and assorted relatives arrive back tomorrow so its back to mummy land for me then.
I did go over to a friends last night, however, and my very good week of sugar and alcohol detoxing the vodka hit waaay to hard.
Sheesh!
Sorry, sc, we should have thought before the fact, not after!
Oh, well, vicariously, here’s the post:
http://larvatusprodeo.net/2007/07/02/put-on-your-red-dress-baby-cause-were-goin-out-tonight/
Do you have a red dress?
One of the Texas Tea songs went “put on your red dress, baby, cause we’re goin out tonight”. So I wore one!
No such luck Melaleauca. If you’ve a spare cone I wouldn’t say no, tho.
What actually troubles you, to a cause of such harsh words, little woody one?
“What actually troubles you, to a cause of such harsh words, little woody one?”
Catholics and noses, Paul. Catholics and noses.
I was hoping the cowardly “women who want to be womyn” and “men who want to be myn” who attacked Mika Brzezinski’s colleagues in the Paris Hilton spoof piece would’ve had the fortitude to come back an apologise.
But overestimating the conga-line of suck holes who detect sexism on an hourly basis has always been one of my weaknesses. Sigh.
Melaleuca seems to have a few screws loose. Mark Latham never made the category mistake of overestimating a conga line of suck holes.
Moreover, if anything, he was restrained in his depiction of said suck holes, who are never contrarians but rather hopeless social conformists, much like, well, Melaleuca. Latham said that Howard, e.g., “has got his tongue up Bush’s clacker that often the poor guy must think he’s got an extra haemorrrhoid.”
Good to see the blogosphere is continuing to hail Warrior Mika and denounce the flaccid louche male foils.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen the words ‘flaccid’ and ‘louche’ in the same sentence before in my whole life, yet look how well they go together.
“flaccid louche male foils”
Sounds like a headline in Variety.
Jinmaro says:
“Melaleuca seems to have a few screws loose.”
Sorry sister, but you’re the one with the rope and a blood curdling lynch mob.
I’m the one who finds this “trial by conjoined youtube segments” distasteful. Downright medieval, in fact.
melaleuca says:
Melaeuca, your (projected perhaps?) desires are never mine. Ropes, blood revenge and mobs are abhorrent and irrelevant to me.
The dynamics enacted in the filmed scene/s are so familiar they’re borderline boring. These three colleagues know and have thought a lot about each other. Situation normal. The men (still, fittingly, nameless) agree with Mika about news priority. After all, this demeans them all as much as everyone else: protagonists,recorders, viewers. The three workmates plot some sort of protest-comment. Perhaps the producers are in the know, but not necessarily, likely not. In any case, the audience reaction was correctly judged, so all knew there’d be no retribution.
There is a difference though, in the actions of Mika and the nameless ones. A mighty difference. Mika makes a clear, unambiguous stand. And what happens? The troops do what? Sure they agree, that’s plain, but when push comes to shove these bozos are breathtakingly gutless. Their ironic commentary is literally valueless. Their response thus narrowed to a merely sexist and prurient one. Sexist to both Mika and to PH, drawing negative and derogatory attention to the sexuality, gender and even sanity of both.
Gutless, valueless and sexist. There for all to see. Quite shameful.
Morning Joe is named for the main presenter, I think, but apart from that, spot-on comment, jinmaro.
I think what I responded to was a feeling that I get when I observe a certain kind of behaviour from men towards women. Set up or not, heavily mediated and constructed or not, that aspect of the video is still there for me.
Who is the best person to determine if the two males, who have been dehumanised in this debate, have behaved like sexist ogres?
I maintain that it is Mika B rather than some sniffy outsiders armed with an Arts degrees who can only speculate about the relationships, circumstances and personal dynamics involved.
Mika is on the record thanking at least one of her colleagues and the story should end there. Only a wailing Banshee could think otherwise.
Well, consider me a Banshee if you’d like, but it struck a chord with me what some commentators have said about the affective dynamics of the scene. It is a sexist practice so mundane and naturalised that I think it is frequently borne with good grace by the woman involved. Indeed, taking it in stride may be the condition of ’sociability’ in a masculinist context.
“… affective dynamics of the scene.”
Yes but it is NOT a scene. It is three segments spread over half an hour or more than have been joined into the one YouTube clip. And first year media studies undegraduate should be aware that “reality” can be manipulated by a clever cut and paste.
I imagine an adept editor could, for example, edit one hour of your verbiage in such a manner that you (unfairly) appear to be a pompous tosser.
Of course it is a construction, but I think it is speaking to something that I have observed and felt in everyday life. That may be beyond the intention of it’s creators, or of those involved, but what I am saying is that it is ‘in there’ for me. I don’t think the fact that it is constructed means that this ‘excess’ - which must have eluded those who put it together at a number of levels - is not there. Given that the entire incident is heavily mediated, I guess I would take a step back and suggest that it presents an opportunity to look at those mundane forms of patriarchy - whether implicating those men or not, and cognisant of the fact that it may be an ‘effect’ rather than true to what happened in the studio. The constructed ‘characters’ of those two men, for me, were unsympathetic irrespective of the truth of their actual characters in everyday life.
melaleuca, please avoid personalising your responses to other commenters.
Thank you.
Retrospective.
My computer is shaggged, so I didn’t get to see the byplay with the two male ” -anchors” and stuck with the press report concerning the (alleged) blue with the producer.
I can quite believe that the male newsreaders would have been patronising toward Mika ( thanks, Geoff, was wondering about Ziggy ). A small section of the male population that sports particularly huge egos a bit like a related species, the Sam Newman sport tellyhack, as Pavlov’s Cat mentioned.
Can beleive, if the thing was not a stunt, that Mika will be in longterm strife and must now await a ‘boning’ ( as would most blokes in the same position who similarly transgressed the interests of the network ). You cannot take on anal types like the news producer without facing an ultimate demise. BTW that has been the rewarding talking point, here: just what factors are at play that create certain types of seemingly- supernumerary people of one gender or another.
Would other contributers agree with the basic premise that news services have deteriorated exponentially recently?
Am aware btw that what is “news” to someone is not to another,( eg paris hilton v footy results- both can be necessary OR a boring imposition, to different people) the same as one person’s terrorist is another’s freedom fighter.
But surely intelligent people would agree that certain things would count as news in a hierachy and what is not “news” and that tv stations transgress the genre for the worst of reasons.
Good to see that it’s still ok to make jokes about clubbing men to death here. Be careful though folks, jokes about women will see you moderated and probably named and shamed on Emily’s List.