Art Attack Central

Fixing stuff, myself included…


The Oprah Filter

Went to PJ’s Pub just after 4:00 PM yesterday. While sipping my vodka and tonic, and making idle conversion with the barmaid, I noticed her attention was elsewhere as was the attention of the other five occupied bar stools. All were focused on the large screen TV above the bar. The volume was turned up; we are usually only subjected to this during Saturday afternoon sports mania. There was Oprah larger than life interviewing Andrea Yates husband: “Do you think you’ve really dealt with it”? and “Did you see any signs that this was coming”? That may not be the exact wording, but that’s the gist/drift of the questions.

So?

First let me say that I also saw the Oprah Winfrey show on the afternoon of the six month anniversary of 9/11. Oprah on my TV screen is not larger than life. However, her questions to the husband of the once beautiful young woman, who was terribly burned during the world trade center attack gave me the same strange feeling. Strange is not the right word, the word is somewhere between frightening and disgusting, and it’s not so much the questions that left that taste in my mouth (always nice to have something there besides my foot).

What exactly was it then?

I was struck by the idea of Oprah as the American digestive system. “You’ve come along way baby”; we’re not talking about Jerry Springer or Ricki Lake. Although if anyone remembers those are Oprah’s roots. Wonder why we don’t have reruns of the really old Oprah shows? Maybe they’re on late night television, and I’m a morning person. Anyway, back to what exactly it was. It was the concept that America grows and defecates with Oprah; by the way she’s on another diet I think. But I digress, so it’s the ups and downs of America, and how many American’s view of the world is epitomized/congealed/jelled/enveloped in, filter through and broadcast by Oprah. To me this is a very, very scary thing to contemplate.

“The Church says that the Earth is flat, but I know that it is round. For I have seen the shadow on the moon and I have more faith in the Shadow than in the Church.”

–Ferdinand Magellan …perhaps we need more faith in ourselves than in Oprah

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“Designated driver, on the information highway.”