Rabu, 14 Desember 2011

That Was the Year That Was


Inside Television 583
Publication Date: 12-16-11
By: Hubert O’Hearn


That Was the Year That Was

Do you like NASCAR? Do you like those race finishes where a couple of the boys come banging around the final lap and one of them just manages to rattle over the line while a fender or two comes falling off, black smoke’s boiling out of the tailpipe and you just know there’s going to be a no hold’s barred slobberknocker slugfest down pit road just as soon as they get the helmets off? Welcome to 2011.

Yeah, we just about made it to the end and it’s been a bumpy ride. At some time a decade or two from now I guess we’ll know if this is the year the world turned a corner. Actually, it definitely turned a corner; it just remains to be seen if that corner led to an open road or a brick wall. What do you think? Or are you afraid to think, preferring to just turn off the lights, unplug the phone, slip a long knife under the bed pillows and softly whisper, ‘Mommy? Help?’ You poor thing.

This was the year when my long-predicted shattering of the myth of the hit show truly came to pass. In the U.S., for the week of November 28th, the highest-rated show was NBC Sunday Night Football, drawing a number of 11.5 representing about 18 million viewers. the highest-rated scripted show was CSI:Miami at 6.8 or 10.5 million viewers. Going back not very far in time, a rating of 6.8 would you get you canceled instantly. There are no more hits. There are no more focused cultural events. Instead we all retreat to our corners, our comfortable niches, and measure success by whether or not a show or star is trending on Twitter. It’s a pity Cole Porter isn’t around to write a song about it.

The last living TV star...


If TV drama doesn’t concentrate the public attention, TV news certainly does. It has become fiction at a level that would equally delight or appall George Orwell. This was the year where a study emerged from Fairleigh Dickinson University indicating that people who regularly watched Fox News actually knew less about current events than people who watched no news at all.

Not that we should be all that smug in Canada either. The CBC, under constant budgetary pressure from a Conservative Government that carries its majority like a sledgehammer, has reduced itself to openly pimping for, among other items on the Stephen Harper agenda, the Tar Sands oil project. When the U.S. government was deliberating whether or not to approve the Keystone Pipeline (more on that in a moment), CBC showed lots of scenes on Alberta Premier Alison Redford walking down Washington hallways, while protests against the pipeline were given the shortest shrift and generally described as being against Canada’s interests. Of course Canada has no interest in the environment. Ex-news anchor Peter Kent just told us as much.

This was the year the majority of the public gave up on politics. There were brief rallying cries - the last hurrah of Jack Layton in the Canadian election, and the on-going Occupy movement. Occupy itself though fascinated because it has given up on politics. It sees the sham of the Obamas, the Palins, the pick your favourite flavour of the month who speak for the little guy and govern for the big guy. Keystone will be approved. Obama has argued against it; therefore it will follow his pattern of resist and cave.

Even in the toy department world of sports this was the year where we started to realize that maybe we have let the lust for violent collisions grow to dangerous levels. Concussions dominate the hot stove debate much more than trades. And by the way, Sidney Crosby, the finest Canadian hockey player since Mario Lemieux should not even think about lacing on a skate again until 2013. He’s 24, he’s a wealthy young man and I’d like to see him become a wealthy old man.

This was the year when the economy hit the fan. Europe is being asked to go into austerity so that it can pay its bills. In other words, the elderly, the sick and the poor will be asked to do with less so that there will not be defaults on the massive loans underwritten by the giant banks. And this somehow is called ‘recovery.’

Well, I’m certainly in a lousy mood now and I apologize if I’ve ruined your morning coffee. There is only one person I know who can improve all our perspectives on the world and that will be my choice as Person of the Year … coming to a newspaper column near you, next week.

Be seeing you.

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