Wine has robbed my people of their understanding. They ask a piece of wood for advice! They think a stick can tell them the future! Longing after idols has made them foolish. They have played the prostitute serving other gods and deserting their God. They offer up sacrifices to idols on the mountaintops. They go up into the hills to burn incense in the pleasant shade of oaks, poplars, and terebinth trees.
(Hosea 4:11-13 NLT)
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A short while ago Anna Nichole Smith passed away. It was something like 2:30 or 3:00 when it first started hitting the news. I found out about it sometime around 4:45. In switching from a lunch to a dinner shift at work I was now near 4 TV's. 3 of them were playing various news channels and on all three her death was taking center stage nonstop with virtually everything else subjected to the scrolling news reel on the bottom. I think it was sometime around eight when I finally saw something besides the same various clips or photos or interviews with friends.
On the same day, North Korea reopened talks on nuclear weapons. China confirmed six new outbreaks of the bird flu virus. The senate voted on a major asbestos bill. The new "Green California" environmental website was launched. South Africa launched its biggest AIDS vaccination trial ever. A judge excused a contractor who has twice been accused of scamming the US military. Employees at Harley Davidson were on a major strike. Turkmenistan announced it was fully prepared for what is to be their first ever free elections.
Granted none of these news stories are really edge-of-your-seat, the-world-stops-and-watches stories. But for virtually none of them to get any airtime on any of the major news networks for over five hours straight? That's ridiculous. Now don't get me wrong, I don't want to make light of anyone's death, but what really did A.N.S. really do? She didn't win a Nobel Prize. She never orchestrated a major treaty, or submit a bill to Congress. She never even held an office. She never gave any famous speeches or founded any orphanages. OK, her estate might have done some charitable work but it is not what she is known for and to my knowledge nothing like this was getting any airtime.
Even if we get into the more frivolous aspects of culture: She never won a national championship. She didn't even participate in any sports at even a semipro level. She didn't win any major music awards or even have any chart topping hits. She never won an oscar and if she did have a lead role in any movies I can guarantee they aren't the type you could find at your local blockbuster. She didn't really do much of anything. She simply was.
Every day millions of people die and it will not be noticed by the media at all except for a few who will be noticed on the obits section of their local newspaper. Every day multiple thousands who have made a far greater positive impact on world will die and go virtually unnoticed except by the lucky few whose lives they touched. And here we spend the first five hours on every major network exclusively covering Anna Nichole Smith's death. In the couple weeks that have followed these news networks are still spending a major chunk of their daily coverage on the details surrounding her death. It just seems foolish.
That is exactly what our longing after cultural icons (or should I say idols) has made us. There are daily shows that cover such trivialities as who is marrying who how many days after their divorce from so and so and what this other person wore to their wedding. Just yesterday CNN spent quite a bit of time covering Brittney getting a hair cut. If I had hair I'd pull it out in frustration right now. WHO CARES! ! !
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The sad fact is we do. These are our idols. And our television screens are our mountaintops where we go to worship them. And the time we spend and the words we speak about them is the incense we burn up to them. And the angels in heaven weep. And the demons in hell laugh And our foolishness goes on.
yep, im really tired of these bad news coverage. its very sad, i want to know more about n. korea, and not A.N.S. people really should wake up, i would of hope people learned from 9/11, to pay more attension on whats going on in the world. but people make the same mistakes over and over :(
nice blog! 2 kudos for you! and a great big Blessing from God :)
ANS DOMINATED the news for like a solid week I think every time I turned on the news station the next several days it was like 90% Anna... 10% the rest of the world.
I heavily agree with your message there. In my opinion people like Paris Hilton should not be around either if you ask me. But personally what I got out of the whole thing bout Anna Nichole Smiths death is more of an exampleary thing. Now I understand that not all people are like me, but haveing to hear more about her life and some of the things that she did in her life and how she chose to live it was pretty much showing me of what not to be, who not to look up to and learn from people like that. The media needs to get some common sense going and start figureing out what to show and what not to show. I mean there are kids watching this kind of stuff and hearing that their favorite role models are dressing in certain ways, living wicked lifestyles like their jobs are being playboy stars and so forth, doing drugs and haveing alcahol addictions. Such titles as: "Lindsey Lohan Checks into Rehab" yeah, the fact that Lindsey Lohan checked into rehab and actually WANTS to turn her life around is great! No doubt about that, but some other people are gonna do whatever it takes to be the "next" Lindsey Lohan in their own communities and so forth. Thats where things go wrong. I mean yeah the media has been spending WAY too much time on a person who really didn't do a whole lot of positive things in her life, but I do think that what the media, as far as that story goes, really did score in showing the world of what not to be and so forth. After her son died, the media also did a good job of showing that regardless of what kind of a dirty rotten person Anna Nichole Smith was in her life, no parent should ever have to burry their child. Thats just my two cents on that.
I can say that A.N.S's death is more comparable to the worlds of 'Girls-Gone-Wild,' post-feminism, and Sidney Lumet's satire, 'Network,' where trashy women/girls are famous for being famous (i.e, get rich and popular the laziest way possible via the uterus), and then become another piece of (there's no nice way of saying this) bastardized hard news, if you want to call it as such.
Maybe both of us can go rent American Dreamz, which reflects this cultural nonsense of it all...
that's exactly what i thought. someone i know of who wasn't even a fan was hysterical crying and said he can't imagine anything more tragic... i went into an editorial tirade.
Amen! Anna Nicole Smith was nothing more than a $20.00 lap whore who placed her additions and selfish lifestyle above everyone, including her own children!!! I hope she has a fun time in HELL...
I do understand what you're saying. I agree that it's absolutely ridiculous (and invasive on the family's part) to over broadcast her death. They even videographed her body going into the morgue! I swear, our society has a big problem. We need Jesus! Thanks for the post!
That is one of the reasons why I felt passionate about constructing a 24/7 music only Christian network webcast radio station. The message is in the music, not the tele or commercial radio. Of course, turning everything off and picking up His Word and seeking Him to reveal it is the best news source ever.
I have not watched the news..or tele..but it's the same ratio on radio. : )
