Thursday, June 29, 2006

News or Views??

Thats a line I picked up from my dad while we were watching the news the other day. Its crazy how much the news is not the fact behind an event but rather a colloborative speculation that has the credibilty of someone talking in his sleep.
I was channel surfing the other day, and I saw the 'TOP STORIES' on Aaj Tak. It was Rakhi Sawant's kissing controversy. At the same time, the 'BREAKING NEWS' on India TV was that the hosts of the Laughter Challenge had been sued. Then the worst, there was this channel called Totally that actually had the result of a cricket match! Aaaargh! I hate cricket, and to give it air-time during the headlines slot is murder! What the hell happened to regional, national and international news that didn't involve celebrities? Are we to believe that only celebrities create news? One channel shows Preity Zinta and her court case while another shows Salman's case. Throw them all out the window and show some real news.

The worst thing about these so called 'News' channels is that there's nothing goddamned new about them anyway. The same story is recycled over and over and over again, and then again! The same old graphics, tele - correspondents, live correspondents, and studio anchors over and over till your brain is ingrained with their dressing sense. How many times have we seen a studio anchor speak on the telephone to some correspondent in and not have them hear him/her? Theres always this blank dumbass look that the correspondent has when he hasn't heard the studio anchor. The look doesn't go away either, as he/she drags on an on about who did . Who cares? Get the real news from the people that really matter!

Who are the people that really matter, you ask? If I knew that, then hell, I would be owner of my own show, now wouldn't I? But I do know, that I don't give half a Siamese twin's ass if Salman goes to jail or his hair returns due to a miracle cure (Yes people, that was actually on the news).

Totally really takes the cake. There was a news item today involving a lot of screen graphics, media 'footage' and demographics (surveys of the populace's opinion) on, wait for it, the SIMILARITY between Shah Rukh Khan and Ronaldinho!!!!!!!!! How can you compare a Bollywood superstar to a football superstar???? Here are the similarities in a nutshell, so you don't have to watch the inevitable retelecast of the same shit.

1. Both are human.

Thats it! There isn't anything else. But noooooo! The dumbass reporter (and I use this term loosely here) actually came forward to say that while SRK was the king of Bollywood, Ronaldinho was the king of Football. You don't say??!!! I would never have known that if you hadn't told me. Now I can get on with my miserable, pointless existence knowing full well the similarities between an actor and a sportstar. 'Totally' BULLSHIT!

Stop throwing useless statistics and fancy computer graphics in an overcrowded screen. Take a cue from DD. Remember the old news show, where they had ONE studio anchor and one inset picture of a lady miming out the news for the benefit of the deaf? Am I supposed to think that somehow the number of deaf people watching TV has drastically decreased in the last ten years? Man, I wish I were deaf so I didn't have to listen to their senseless drivel. Wait a minute, I wish THEY were dumb so they couldn't spout their venom on screen.

Newsbytes are the latest things now. Little bits of irrelevant information that have no bearing on the outcome of anything important, are continously scrolled at the bottom of the screen so as to be highly efficient and useful to the legions of couch potatoes who don't have anything else to watch. Screw them all, I say. Stick to the newspaper. Atleast you can do the crossword in it.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

There is one thing u have failed to touch upon- haven't u noticed the freaky accents coerced with a trail of well arranged mistakes from their reporters- even ones hailing from Delhi?? during independence day, a specially intelligent reporter was found interviewing a group of homeless kids- gnawing them with nasty questions like 'do u know our national anthem' while they won't even know wat a wholesome meal is..she taught them to sing and.. and.. it was nasty listening to high pitched-worse- english reporter and those orphans burst out into an unsurpassed cacophony.the news channel had to cut it mid way when the reporter was found saying something like 'today we got freedom.err..err..children dont know wat it is.hmm..mm..so they singing national anthem'.. hey- i could have written a blog myself..