Wherever we once had gravitas — dignity, seriousness and duty — we now have entertainment — upbeat, trivial and prurient. That sums up much of modern culture but never more so than in the world of television news. It all came to a head last week, when on one side of the ring we had Mika Brzezinski — an American newsreader with integrity — and on the other, Paris Hilton, who is well, famous for being rich and going to parties.
In case you missed it, this is what happened live on air on MSNBC’s at 7 a.m. last Wednesday. Brzezinski refused to read the lead news item of the day: Paris Hilton’s release from jail. First she tried to burn the script, then she tore it up, before shredding a second copy of the script handed to her by her producer. Brzezinski was angry and fed up with the wall-to-wall news coverage of Paris Hilton, particularly on a day when there were a number of important news stories, and she is absolutely right.
Whereas the television news was once a chance to sit still and take in all that had happened of importance during the day, it is now a whirlwind. We get short, sharp bursts. News segments vie for our attention, knowing that in a fragment of a second we can press a button on a remote control and turn to one of their competitors. You could call it audience attention deficit disorder.
So what we get is what gets our attention. And if you want to know what gets our attention, just listen to what people are talking about. And hey presto, gossip and entertainment becomes top news.
Paris Hilton epitomizes this trend. She is nothing. That is a dreadful sentence I realize. I am sure she is a decent person and worthy of love, but purely in terms of news worthiness, she is nothing. She has not achieved anything or done anything worthy of the media attention she generates.
In fact last March, AP (the news agency) decided to impose a Paris Hilton news blackout for a week. In that one week, the experimental ban resulted in two “stories” not being reported: Hilton’s birthday celebrations and a trip to Puerto Rico to promote her fragrance. That alone gives us a glimpse of the business of being Paris Hilton: Celebrity for the sake of celebrity, keeping herself in the glare of the media long enough to enable her to sell products simply because they bear her name.
The AP experiment poses interesting questions. For a start it reflects increasing alarm and disenchantment among journalists about the growing cult of celebrity and the general dumping down of news output. A few years ago, a friend of mine summed it up nicely: “So this is why I went to journalism school, so that I can write a story about David Beckam getting a haircut!” The problem is that stories about David Beckam’s hair or Paris Hilton’s drunken exploits are more likely to grab our interest than stories about war in Iraq or congressional hearings. If the sole role of the media is to sell stories, then clearly that is what we will get.
What is missing is the notion of public interest. Rather than asking, is this what people want to watch or what people want to read, the question used to be: Is this what people need to know? It boils down to information versus entertainment, social responsibility versus financial accountability, engaging attention as opposed to seeking attention.
Even the good old august BBC has suffered from this trend — and that despite being funded by the public purse. You can understand why commercial stations are forced into providing output with the lowest common denominator, but how depressing that this should also apply to a public service provider like the BBC. The main casualty is current affairs. Recent analysis found that the amount of airtime dedicated to news and current affairs had fallen to the lowest level in 50 years.
But it’s a chicken-and-egg situation. If people don’t want to watch it, should we produce it? Should we not just give people what they want? After all they’re paying for it. Returning to Paris Hilton, the story of her release from jail is appealing. You can understand why 3.2 million viewers tuned in to Larry King live on CNN to watch her talk about her experience. It’s classic stuff: Spoilt rich kid thought she was above the law but short spell in jail helps her find God and redemption. Richard Hutton, her lawyer, had already set it up beautifully by telling us after Hilton’s first night in jail that his client was going to use her time in jail to “reflect on life to see what she can do to make the world better.” Take note folks, Hilton is going to make the world better, maybe all that media attention is justified after all!
