Marilyn Thipthorpe
How far can the media be blamed or held responsible for the rise of candidates, dictators and terrorists. Their roles in the past ages have increased to a point where people are dependant on them for facts… and fiction! But why has no one retaliated and stung back and why has no one decided to which point the media can take an issue and then have to drop it in the favor of the greater good or even common sense. Something a just meant to be private while others aren’t; who decides which?
The media and public, even the current President of the United States are having a field day with the recent shenanigans of the presidential candidacy; Donald Trumps romps in public and not to mention that of his wife. Everyone is holding the media responsible for propagating these news and events. Nicolas Kristof and Jim Rutenberg, regular columnists of the New York Times have written asking weather the media needs to be more accountable for their deeds. In fact, in 2014, Mat Bai, a National Political Columnist, wrote a book on the collision of entertainment and political journalism, called “All the Truth Is Out” which actually anticipates the rise of the Trump phenomenon, but the man who really gave light to distortions of events by the media was Gary Hart in 1987. Gary was the intended nominee for the Democratic Party in 1987after narrowly loosing in 1984, but all went awry for this brilliant man when photos of him having an affair with a young girl went viral, so to speak. The man who was at that early time talking of the rise of stateless terrorism and high-tech economy was forced to go into seclusion by the first modern political sex scandal. What happened next was more interesting and should be held up as an exemplary answer. Hart was sent a regular, contrite and bland press release by his press secretary which made him puke, he immediately called up Warren Beatty, his close friend and asked for advice, together they devised a speech which blew the minds of all who heard it and turned the hunter into the hunted. Hart stepped before national media to deliver one of the most stinging speeches in history, saying “In public life, some things may be interesting, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re important” He went to say that there was a serious lack of good candidates because of all the hullabaloo surrounding private incidents of private lives; he further expressed a fervent wish that the people who had so passionately stood behind him in the past would now step forward to change he system as most of it was just a mockery anyway. If a system like this continues to exist only to destroy a person’s integrity and honor, then that very system will eventually turn on itself and be destroyed in turn.