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Jennings’ death
ushers in
new age
Our
view
The
London Bridge has fallen down. Atlantis
sinks. People pillaged Rome. The Berlin
Wall is now in shambles. Humpty Dumpty
had a great fall.
What all these events have in common is that they evoke iconic images. We see
within them pictures of falling, falls that undoubtedly lead to change.
It was a transformation to move the London Bridge to Arizona or destroy an
entire mythical continent. Humpty Dumpty and the king’s men certainly
didn’t appreciate Humpty’s unfixable cracked state of change, either.
To be added to this list of great change is the recent passing of Peter Jennings,
news anchor for ABC and one of the major figures in network television news.
Though certainly more admirable than a distraught falling egg, he is also comparable
to Dumpty in that he was beyond saving. He died from the hazards of long-term
smoking at age 67, certainly achieving many great journalistic sucesses along
the way.
His final departure from the network news scene now officially ends an era
of oligarchical control over television airwaves. For many years the big three
of television news, Tom Brokaw, Dan Rather and Jennings, gave the nation the
scoop nightly. They kept viewers in the know.
They had class. They were contenders. As Will Ferrell might say, they were
kind of a big deal.
But how things have changed since their glory days. No longer are the times
where they are the only men on the boob tube from whom viewers get their information.
While the big three, ABC, NBC and CBS, danced together like butterflies in
the ring, the inevitable bee sting came when the ring changed around them.
Some critics complained the mainstream media was too liberally slanted. Such
complaints were put somewhat to rest after the entrance of Fox News and talk
radio.
Now new journalistic boxers come into the ring throwing punches, not just from
the left but from the right as well.
And there was choice. Choice is essentially good for the viewer seeking alternate
points of view from all sides, but for men like Jennings, such choices were
bad. They were unwanted competition.
Now the news reader and watcher has the Internet, the radio, the political
commentary show and of course, the newspaper to choose from.
But with such beautiful choice comes responsibility as well. With so much information
pervading the airwaves, papers and computer screens, who is to know what is
the real deal? Who is the straight shooter? Who is the lying liar?
Perhaps now truth is in the eye of the beholder. While we have substituted
for more choices, was it better with only a few men like Jennings in control
rather than multitude of unknowns sharing power today, ultimately leading to
more confusion over what is real?
It comes to a fork in the road over stability and oscillating freedom. There
was once stability in news with main sources but less freedom. Now there is
greater freedom but less consistency.
While Jennings’ passing marks the end of an admirable era, a new, more
eclectic era is already emerging. Now our responsibility lies with not leaving
the stability of the big three era behind in the dust. |
