By Daniel Rigney
As an urban anthropologist I observe and interpret the cultures of the people I live among. I'll take my ethnographic insights wherever I can find them, including the grocery checkout line, where I like to browse the tabloids and occasionally buy one to take home for further scholarly analysis. Inquiring minds want to know, as Aristotle said.1
The National Inquirer is only the best-known of these half-sheets. Many others, including niche publications like Lurid World and The Morbid Weekly News, compete fiercely for our time and eyeballs in the national and global attention economy.2
Most of my tabloid data come not from the traditional medium of newsprint, but rather from screens, and especially from cable television shows. As you very well know – and don’t pretend you don’t – tabloid television contains within its ample bosom a variety of subgenres. There is, of course, the celebrity gossip story. (See, for example, the potential rumor of a purely hypothetical Sheen-Lohan affair -- or Lohan-Sheen affair, as her agent would prefer -- as previously reported here in “How to Scoop-Search.”)
Then there is the conspiracy theory genre, ably represented by that guy who used to wrestle and govern Minnesota. September 11 was an inside job. The government is covering up alien invasions. That sort of thing.
Then there are the shows that feature the personal tragedy of the week, usually centering on a little blond girl from the heartland who’s “gone missing” (as they invariably say) and is feared kidnapped or worse. (A tip for tabloid television watchers: Always suspect the boyfriend or former boyfriend of the mother.) Nancy Grace and others who work her subgenre have no interests at heart but the interests of the victims, and of the viewers whose heartstrings they pluck like a country fiddle. I understand that they and their networks donate most of the show’s profits to charities that help children in dire need. Bless their hearts.
We could linger over other tabloid television subgenres, including voyeuristic programs devoted to crime, plastic and other surgery, wild partying, rehab, and what some have called political porn (also frequently heard on AM talk radio). But instead we take you now to a late-breaking story from the world of local tabloid news. We go to Houston, live, for this report.
It’s about 8:55, CT on Wednesday, March 31, and I’m watching the five- minute segment of local news that directly follows CBS’s Early Show on Houston’s KHOU, Channel 11. (See "Trend Anxiety" in a previous column here.)
The Channel 11 News, by the way, is the station I usually turn to for local events. The winner of several National Edward R. Murrow Awards for excellence in broadcast journalism (as it reminds its viewers frequently), Channel 11 is by no means the worst of its kind in this region. In fact, it may be the one of the best. But you be the judge. We report on the reporting. You decide.
What follows is my attempt at a faithful and honest rendering of this five-minute news segment. None of this is made up, although I have compressed my account for the sake of brevity. [My interpretive subtext is shown in brackets.]
If It Bleeds, It Leads3
And now for a five-minute update of your local KHOU News. A hit and run driver in southeast Houston has plowed into a group of people, knocking two into a ditch and sending one woman to the hospital. Ambulance footage accompanies the story. [Worry about your health.]
A youth was killed in a gang-related shooting yesterday evening following a powder-puff football game at a local high school. At least ten police cars appear in the aerial view of the scene. [Worry about crime, gangs, and dying.]
Today’s weather will be sunny and cool, warming to 76 in the afternoon.
Traffic update: There’s an accident slowing traffic in the HOV lane at Greenpoint at this hour. Traffic is also slow on other freeways and tollways throughout the city. Stay tuned for updates on your drive to work. [Worry about tolls, traffic accidents, health, dying, and being late to work.]
We'll Be Right Back After These Cultural Messages
Tune in to the new CBS comedy (“Chaos”) about the CIA. [Will national security anxieties be aroused? And will zany hijinks help us deal with them? I swear I'm not making up the premise of this series.]
Buy a used car at car.com, where confidence comes standard. [Good. I need a car I don't have to worry about. I'll go to car.com.]
Buy a “certified pre-owned” car from Audi. [Don’t call it a used car, and don’t buy one from car.com.]
Watch KHOU, because “KHOU Stands for Houston." This message is accompanied by a generic jingle with sample lyric: “Our Houston spirit reaches deep inside us.” [It does what?]
Enjoy the Reliant Energy Final Four and the Reese’s (chocolate candy) College All Star game at ncaa.com. [Nothing says athleticism like coal-fire and candy. Worry about your lungs, your caloric intake, and your receding youth.]
Stay Tuned For …
“Great Day Houston” with Deborah Duncan.
[It will be a great day if I’m not late for work, sold a used lemon, injured in a car accident, killed by a gun or worse. And it’s only 9 in the morning.]
Houston News. Keeping you informed. Because inquiring minds want to know.
NOTES
1, Aristotle (384-322 BCE), in The Metaphysics, observes that “All men [sic] by nature desire to know .”
2. The insightful term “attention economy” is from a book of that title by Thomas H. Davenport and John C. Beck, 2001. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
3 The phrase “if it bleeds, it leads" is not mine. A quick scoop-search (see "How to Scoop-Search" in a previous column) reveals that the phrase has been pervasive for years, both inside and outside the news industry, and especially among those who watch television with a critical eye. Likewise "tabloid television" and similar terms.
As an urban anthropologist I observe and interpret the cultures of the people I live among. I'll take my ethnographic insights wherever I can find them, including the grocery checkout line, where I like to browse the tabloids and occasionally buy one to take home for further scholarly analysis. Inquiring minds want to know, as Aristotle said.1
The National Inquirer is only the best-known of these half-sheets. Many others, including niche publications like Lurid World and The Morbid Weekly News, compete fiercely for our time and eyeballs in the national and global attention economy.2
Most of my tabloid data come not from the traditional medium of newsprint, but rather from screens, and especially from cable television shows. As you very well know – and don’t pretend you don’t – tabloid television contains within its ample bosom a variety of subgenres. There is, of course, the celebrity gossip story. (See, for example, the potential rumor of a purely hypothetical Sheen-Lohan affair -- or Lohan-Sheen affair, as her agent would prefer -- as previously reported here in “How to Scoop-Search.”)
Then there is the conspiracy theory genre, ably represented by that guy who used to wrestle and govern Minnesota. September 11 was an inside job. The government is covering up alien invasions. That sort of thing.
Then there are the shows that feature the personal tragedy of the week, usually centering on a little blond girl from the heartland who’s “gone missing” (as they invariably say) and is feared kidnapped or worse. (A tip for tabloid television watchers: Always suspect the boyfriend or former boyfriend of the mother.) Nancy Grace and others who work her subgenre have no interests at heart but the interests of the victims, and of the viewers whose heartstrings they pluck like a country fiddle. I understand that they and their networks donate most of the show’s profits to charities that help children in dire need. Bless their hearts.
We could linger over other tabloid television subgenres, including voyeuristic programs devoted to crime, plastic and other surgery, wild partying, rehab, and what some have called political porn (also frequently heard on AM talk radio). But instead we take you now to a late-breaking story from the world of local tabloid news. We go to Houston, live, for this report.
It’s about 8:55, CT on Wednesday, March 31, and I’m watching the five- minute segment of local news that directly follows CBS’s Early Show on Houston’s KHOU, Channel 11. (See "Trend Anxiety" in a previous column here.)
The Channel 11 News, by the way, is the station I usually turn to for local events. The winner of several National Edward R. Murrow Awards for excellence in broadcast journalism (as it reminds its viewers frequently), Channel 11 is by no means the worst of its kind in this region. In fact, it may be the one of the best. But you be the judge. We report on the reporting. You decide.
What follows is my attempt at a faithful and honest rendering of this five-minute news segment. None of this is made up, although I have compressed my account for the sake of brevity. [My interpretive subtext is shown in brackets.]
If It Bleeds, It Leads3
And now for a five-minute update of your local KHOU News. A hit and run driver in southeast Houston has plowed into a group of people, knocking two into a ditch and sending one woman to the hospital. Ambulance footage accompanies the story. [Worry about your health.]
A youth was killed in a gang-related shooting yesterday evening following a powder-puff football game at a local high school. At least ten police cars appear in the aerial view of the scene. [Worry about crime, gangs, and dying.]
Today’s weather will be sunny and cool, warming to 76 in the afternoon.
Traffic update: There’s an accident slowing traffic in the HOV lane at Greenpoint at this hour. Traffic is also slow on other freeways and tollways throughout the city. Stay tuned for updates on your drive to work. [Worry about tolls, traffic accidents, health, dying, and being late to work.]
We'll Be Right Back After These Cultural Messages
Tune in to the new CBS comedy (“Chaos”) about the CIA. [Will national security anxieties be aroused? And will zany hijinks help us deal with them? I swear I'm not making up the premise of this series.]
Buy a used car at car.com, where confidence comes standard. [Good. I need a car I don't have to worry about. I'll go to car.com.]
Buy a “certified pre-owned” car from Audi. [Don’t call it a used car, and don’t buy one from car.com.]
Watch KHOU, because “KHOU Stands for Houston." This message is accompanied by a generic jingle with sample lyric: “Our Houston spirit reaches deep inside us.” [It does what?]
Enjoy the Reliant Energy Final Four and the Reese’s (chocolate candy) College All Star game at ncaa.com. [Nothing says athleticism like coal-fire and candy. Worry about your lungs, your caloric intake, and your receding youth.]
Stay Tuned For …
“Great Day Houston” with Deborah Duncan.
[It will be a great day if I’m not late for work, sold a used lemon, injured in a car accident, killed by a gun or worse. And it’s only 9 in the morning.]
Houston News. Keeping you informed. Because inquiring minds want to know.
NOTES
1, Aristotle (384-322 BCE), in The Metaphysics, observes that “All men [sic] by nature desire to know .”
2. The insightful term “attention economy” is from a book of that title by Thomas H. Davenport and John C. Beck, 2001. Boston: Harvard Business School Press.
3 The phrase “if it bleeds, it leads" is not mine. A quick scoop-search (see "How to Scoop-Search" in a previous column) reveals that the phrase has been pervasive for years, both inside and outside the news industry, and especially among those who watch television with a critical eye. Likewise "tabloid television" and similar terms.
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