Television
February 09, 2012
January 15, 2012
Colbert Super Pac's Romney Attack Ad
July 21, 2011
Michael Sandel on The Colbert Report
| The Colbert Report | Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Michael Sandel | ||||
| www.colbertnation.com | ||||
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July 10, 2011
Gender/Sex on Futurama
Futurama is back with a new season on Comedy Central. Gender is a theme in one of the new episodes.
| Futurama | Thursdays 10/9c | |||
| Prattle of the Sexes | ||||
| www.comedycentral.com | ||||
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June 29, 2011
Stewart vs. Fox News
The Stewart vs. Fox News saga continues. Ever since Stewart's last interview on Fox they've been trading barbs over who is more biased.
Here's the key point. Fox News presents itself as a news agency. Even if Jon Stewart is not "just a comedian" and engages in political activism on his show the notion that we should hold Stewart to the same journalistic standards of objectivity and impartiality that we expect news agencies to live up to is laughable. So, please Fox News, stop trying to pretend that The Daily Show is equivalent to your one hour of news programing or your many ours of opinion shows like The O'Reilly Factor.
June 21, 2011
Jon Stewart on Jon Stewart on Fox News
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Fox News Channel - Fair & Balanced | ||||
| www.thedailyshow.com | ||||
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Fox News even selectively edits their interviews about media bias and selective editing as you can see from the unedited version. However, it looks like Stewart's claim that Fox News viewers is dubious. It's true in my personal experience with Fox viewers though. Regardless, Stewart does a good job of dismantling the dubious pretention to journalistic objectivity of Fox's "fair and balanced" slogan. They aren't fair or balanced. They tend to set up and attack a straw man of liberalism. And, their alleged balance is no more than presenting a particular slant on the news that fits the conservative worldview and that they feel is missing from mainstream media, as Wallace admits. It's more about appealing to a particular demographic than it is about presenting information for citizens to examine and think about.
June 20, 2011
The Price of "Over-Parenting"
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
June 15, 2011
Virtue Ethics in South Park
"The List" episode of South Park draws attention to one of the three most influential approaches to normative ethics in Western philosophy, virtue ethics. All the girls at school make a list that ranks the attractiveness of the boys. Butters is exuberant that he's ranked No. 11. But, suspiciously, is ranked quite low on the list, which is a blow to his self esteem. Abraham Lincoln then appears to teach Kyle that being physically attractive is not all it's cracked up to be. What really matters in life is being a good person and developing virtuous character traits.
This approach to ethics emphasizes the notion that cultivating virtues is required for living the ethical or good life. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle provides us with a classical example of a virtue ethics. Just as a plant requires water, nutrients, soil, and sun light in order to grow or flourish as a plant so too human beings require virtues like justice, patience, courage, truthfulness, etc. in order to live a happy life or flourish as a human being. So, according to this view, Kyle should really work hard not to become an asshole. Assholes are vicious people or people who have not only failed to cultivate virtuous, but that have managed to cultivate negative character traits that impede our pursuit of a human flourishing.
Primary Source Reading
- Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics.
Secondary Readings
May 31, 2011
Sarah Palin's Next Reality TV Series: Running for President
As a journalist, watching the flailing press coverage of Sarah Palin's bus tour has been the most sobering experience since Donald Trump helicoptered into New Hampshire masquerading as a presidential candidate and a horde of reporters hung on his every word.
Most observers acknowledge that Palin's so-called "One Nation" tour doesn't have a coherent point, and even that Palin would be a weak presidential candidate. And yet, literally scores of reporters -- as many as 200 -- are following Palin around as she busily fails to say anything meaningful. Reporters unlucky enough to be assigned to cover Palin on Memorial Day created a #wheressarah Twitter hashtag as they raced around trying to guess where she would land next.
via www.salon.com
I guess running for President is Sarah Palin's next reality TV series. Unlike "Sarah Palin's Alaska," this one isn't on TLC or network television. Like Donald Trump's short lived reality show about his decision whether or not to run for President, Palin's show airs on cable news channels and is shot in a documentary/reality-show style. It follows follows reporters 'tracking down the hard news' about whether Palin is going to run in 2012. Be sure and check your favorite cable news channel for more information. Or, just turn on Fox News.
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