Current Affairs - Exclusive!!!! Keeping Society Stupid

Here we go...... Current Affairs programs struggle with their own propaganda - telling themselves that they are good and decent and concerned only with making society a better place. Only problem is that doesn't rate well and lets face it as much as they believe their own hype it's all about getting viewers AT ALL COSTS. Sure they occasionaly do some good things exposing con man and shonky deals but does the rest of the damaging misbeliefs, propaganda and mistruths make up for all of that - absolutely not. Let me explain. Ever since the Paxtons incident many years ago i stopped watching curre.nt affairs shows, that whole episode highlights how a big TV organisation and a whole lot of really smart journalists can manipulate one innocent family. Could the Paxtons kids have gone out and gotten work, yes of course they can, was ACA interested in helping them find work, hell no. Finding them actual jobs would have killed the story. Then they take a strugglng resort in desperate need for publicity and further exploit these kids who had no real knowledge of how they were being pushed and pulled for the holy grail - Ratings. Take the recent bully story for example. Interview with Casey, the hero in all this, everyone was going to watch and it was always going to come off well for Casey. But the interview with the bully, that was never going to come off other than one way, badly for the bully. His parents should never ever have allowed him to be interviewed. The publics minds were made up about Ritchard, they weren't about to be changed, however TV shows like ACA and TT are experts at convincing people why they should get in front of the camera and tell their side of the story. But did it make a good story, YES, did lots of people watch, YES, did their advertising rates go up because of their increased audiences, YES. What's the purpose of these shows, to sell advertising and make money, but to what expense - any. Let me give you another example - ACA often uses their real estate expert, Neil Jenman, the do gooder of the real estate industry or so he is protrayed. Let me give you a clear picture of who Neil Jenman is. Neil created the Jenman system, essentially a franchise like bakers delight or subway except for real estate. Neil created such fictional classics as Common Mistakes Home Sellers Make, with outstanding facts like, don't list your home with an agent who wears a nice watch... etc.. Neil earnt a portion of the commission of every sale from people who sold using the Jenman System... his entier ethos is to direct people to him Jenman System agents from which he earns a commission however shows like ACA use Neil to comment on the industry so he can target his competition and why do they use Neil, because he make controversial statements that generate negative feeling towards the real estate industry ... it's like getting comments from the CEO of Holden about the motor car industry and he explains why all cars except holdens are rubbish... But he's their indepentant industry expert.... Can anyone spell conflict of interest. My one experience with the media in any form was about 4 years ago. We had two dogs, Mojo and Chilli, Chilli was still a puppy but he was a deadshit, no really he was asw dumb as bat sht and just couldn't learnt the simplist of commands. One day when walking the dogs at 5am I let them off the lead and Chilli spotted a couple wth a germah shepherd and a doberman. Lets just say it didn't end well for Chilli. See the horrific nature of his death really effected me... I was deeply effected and had trouble dealing with it and found solice in writing my feelings and emotions out. I wrote to the local paper. A journalist phoned me and wanted to do a story. During the interview I commented that I felt that dogs like that, in teh context of what I was saying was dogs that for whom will attack and kill another dog at will should not be roaming around a park without a lead. It was reported in teh paper that i said that dogs like that german shepherds should not be allowed. Subsequently receiving threatening calls at home. When I rang the jounalist the editor had editted the story that way... really they deliberately misquoted me whilst using my name because it read better. Imagine how easy it is for news and current affairs shows to manipulate people and facts for their own purposes. In my opinion the good things that current affairs show do exposing con artists etc.. just make a show called Con artists or something..... Current affairs shows appeal to the lowest common denominator and unfortunately Australians generally operate on the lowest common denominator. Current affairs shows keep a dumd society dumb. They operate on a level where the truth is what they want it to be. You can be garuanteed that every thrid week there's a plastic surgery or breast cancer story just so they can show breasts on tele, every three weeks there's a weight loss story and so on and so on.. Good news and great stories just simply don't rate like drama and scandal does. I think that in the end I want to give society more credit.. I want to believe that people aren't that nieve that they can see through the smoke and mirrors, i want to believe that people can think for themselves, I want to believe that people want to see both sides of a story in an impartial manner, but i'm kidding myself what a shame that the chase for more viewers and the almighty advertising dollar can get in the way of facts, integrity, ethics all get in the way of a g0ood story... lets face it, if you increase the intelligence of your audience then current affairs programs won't get away with the crap they produce... it's in the interest of the programs to keep society dumb and dumber. For a great laugh and a real true look behind the scenes of a current affairs program, pick up a copy of the Frontline series, one of the countries best and funniest TV series ever.