mr dave

political satire has been around for as long as there have been politicians, as such whether or not the daily show is satire is irrelevant.

the fact that their target demographic (for marketing purposes) is high school seniors and first year university students is irrelevant.

i really do think these shows ARE lowering the standard of political discussion in the general public. there are a lot of people who recognize that it's satire yet don't bother following up with an actual factual news article. it's like the people who read the headline and infer the rest of the information based on it.

best example i can think of, a few years ago we had a provincial election (2006). one of the party leaders (a woman in her 40s) was being interviewed on the radio. she gets asked a question about where she draws her international views from. her legitimate answer - the daily show.

you could practically here the radio host's jaw hit the floor before trying to tack on some sort of response to try salvaging this political trainwreck's career. she obviously did not get elected.

it's not that the show is 'bad' but i think the way it presents itself so closely to the same way the news presents itself allows for a lot of lazy viewers to gloss over the actual details. it's as if the events and issues discussed within the show are simply plot points you can discuss with anyone out in public so long as you don't go past the surface of the issue.

it's the same logic that has morons eating fast food everyday because they figure a big mac meal is somehow healthy because there's a bit of lettuce on the burger and the fries started off as potatoes.

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i am the universe

mr dave

congratulations. you get it. would you like a gold star to go along with that?

the question at hand is not whether or not YOU get the daily show but whether or not the general public does. is it actually fostering worthwhile public political discussion or dumbing it down?

to some people the fact that any sort of discourse is taking place is a victory and from that regard the shows are effective. for anyone with a clue about what's going on talking to someone who gets the entirety of their political views from the daily show is like trying to teach your dog abstract math.

like it or not i think it's safe to say the amount of people who DO chose to adhere to satirical views of politics has increased in line with the ratings for those shows.

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i am the universe

boo boo

But you're making it out like it's their fault, as if they have some responsability for all the stupid people in the world. In that case. Everything should be put into questioning, every book ever written, ever movie ever filmed, every tv show ever broadcasted.

Lets refrain from creating any art or entertainment just to avoid stupid people misinterpreting something.

Since when does appealing to stupid people invalidate something? That should invalidate everything.

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mr dave

who's blaming the show?

correlation does not equal causation.

just because the standard for political discussion in the public eye has diminished in line with the increase of the popularity of the daily show does necessarily mean the writers and producers of the show are responsible for the qualitative decline in political discussions.

i'm not seeing anyone but you trying to tack on any type of responsibility (or lack thereof) on the writers and producers.

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i am the universe

Urban Hat€monger ?

Maybe I missed something somewhere but isn't the whole point of having newspaper columnists & presenters of these opinion type magazine shows this that they ARE biased.

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sleepy jack

Yeah but that's not what the Daily Show is. It's a comedy program sort of similar to the Day Today except not nearly as funny.

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right-track

sleepy jack

tr00 dat homie, tr00 dat.

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TheBig3

see what i mean!?!?!?!?

/thread

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Son of JayJamJah

Whatever; Scoreboard Brittan

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