Reality Killed the TV Star

Last night while I was perusing Twitter looking for baseball arbitration news, I discovered that there was all this buzz about this TV show called Dancing With the Stars.  I know of the show though I don't  watch it (the video of Tom Delay shaking his booty almost made me hurl).  In fact I don't watch reality TV at all, though I will admit to a brief fascination for Queer Eye for the Straight Guy because I got some great tips on there.  Seems one Bristol Palin of the Alaska Palins was a contestant.  What caught my attention, and my disappointment was the sheer volume of Tweets concerning Ms. Palin's 3rd place finish in this contest. Tucked amid the torrent of #DWTS tweets there was the occasional tweet about the conflict between North Korea and South Korea and the terrible plight of the unemployed (a group of which I am a member), and of course some baseball arbitration news.

Now I am a fierce believer in freedom of speech.  I tweet my share of trivia as well.  Let's face it, baseball, though a particular passion of mine, is not going to decide the fate of the world. However, the obsession with Ms. Palin and Dancing With the Stars disturbed me. I realize that Ms. Palin's competition in this contest is newsworthy to a certain degree, being who she is the daughter of and all.  But I see this as a burgeoning symptom of a disease that has been growing in this country over the last decade----Ignorance Related Apathy Syndrome---a/k/a I Don't Know What Is Going On In The World And I Don't Care.  This disease is spreading and is threatening the well-being of every person on this planet.  It is potentially fatal.

Our society and societies everywhere are threatened because Ignorance and Apathy are two of the Deadly Sins (not the biblical ones, but those other ones).  Our way of living in the US is controlled by the people of the US (at least that is what the Constitution says).  And when a large majority of those people know who Kate Gosselin is, but not who the Vice President of the United States is, Houston, we have a problem.  Ignorance is a cancer that is eating away at the organs of our society.  Okay, so I like metaphors, but the point is, Americans have become lazy.  They make decisions based on little or no factual information.  Instead they rely on political pundits or TV and radio "entertainers" who tell them what to think. Yes, we are becoming a nation of pod people. 

So, WAKE UP AMERICA.  Try this concept.  There is still objective journalism out there.  Find it.  Educate yourself.  Deduce.  Reason.  It's really not that hard, trust me. 

And for God's sake, find out who the Vice President of the United States is.