I found this essay to be (no offense of course!) rather boring and over opinionated. While I understand what Saunders' point of view is, I just found his tone coarse and a bit repulsive. He has ideas that are absolutely true, but if he had presented them in a less arrogant way, I would have enjoyed the essay more.
When Saunders was talking about the Megaphone guy not being "the smartest person at the party, or the most experienced, or the most articulate" but everyone was listening to him anyway, I believed that to an extent. If someone with a megaphone just started talking about something and kept saying a phrase over and over, then I know that I would start to use that phrase whether I wanted to or not because it would be fresh in my brain.
I agree with the author when he is talking about the ridiculous news stories around Christmas time. I actually used to watch the news often, so every once and awhile a story would come up like this. I am just realizing that now, when I would be watching the news it did not even cross my mind that I was watching an absurd story. News productions can get away with this kind of stuff because it is a 'safe' story. No one is going to be hurt or offened or embarrassed when they are talking about why the mall is so crowded in the holiday season.
I think over opinionated is the perfect way to describe this essay. It was a lot to take in and he didn’t make it very easy to agree with him because of the way he presented all the information, even though all of his points were valid ones. Like the silly stories the news will broadcast in order to get an audience and he says the problem is that we watch it and give them more incentive to show a story like that again. So in reality we are the real enemy. Which I agree to be true, but if he went about it in less of an offensive way maybe more people would be willing to listen.
ReplyDeleteI didn't enjoy reading this essay either. But it did make me realize some of the dumb shows we actually PAY to watch. Saunders could have made his point in a less rude more direct way. All his metaphors just made his point more confusing, and in my opinion less interesting to the readers.
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