About the 'half time' show........

From my in-box :

Note - I'll be sending this to my local paper, the FCC, CBS, Senators
Thomas and Enzi, and Congresswoman Cubin. Feel free to forward this to
your friends. I don't normally do the big e-mail thing, but I really feel
CBS missed the point. Sorry if you think I'm a nut. I'll just have to
live with the consequences.

- John Thurman
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What was really wrong with Super Bowl Sunday?

February 3, 2004

To the senior management of CBS:

I, along with millions of other Americans, was disgusted with many aspects
of CBS's Super Bowl production. By now, we have read many news stories
about Janet Jackson's right breast. That was a cheap and degrading
publicity stunt, and I'm sure Congress and the FCC will deal with it
properly. But, the problems with CBS's programming go much deeper than
that.

Before the game, I read news stories indicating the Super Bowl is the most
widely watched television event in the world, with an estimated world-wide
audience of 2 billion people. In that context, CBS should have realized
it's obligation to represent America to the world. This isn't just a
football game; this is the United States of America on display for the rest
of the planet.

So, how did CBS choose to present us to the world? With a half-time show
of vile, tasteless, disgusting acts. The entire episode, start to finish,
filled me with revulsion. But, really, what else did we expect? I'm an
American, and, since I was a child in diapers, I've been fed mindless,
disgusting drivel through the so-called entertainment medium of broadcast
television. By now, I'm used to it, and I, like the rest of America, will
get over it. The network will pay some fines, Janet Jackson will
temporarily revive her rapidly declining career, Nellie will keep grabbing
his Willie, and Kid Rock will continue to be famous for being a bizarre
example of white trash. Such is life in the USA.

But, what really bothers me is that, after reading all of the news stories,
I find that CBS still doesn't realize what they did, and why it was wrong.

Well CBS - here is why: American soldiers are engaged in a culture war in
Iraq and Afghanistan. At this point in the battle, it's no longer our
armies against their armies; it's our ideas of freedom and liberty against
the enemy's ideas of fear and repression. America has put out a message of
hope to the world - live free, have hope, and enjoy the fruits of a free
and open democratic society. The Super Bowl half-time show poisoned that
message. Given the opportunity to share the best of America with the
world, the shows producers instead chose to showcase the vilest, narrowest,
most hedonistic aspects of our culture - and it was broadcast to the
biggest world-wide audience CBS will have all year.

You could have showcased the best of America. Instead, you glamorized the
worst.

But what of free expression, one might ask? If showcasing free expression
and the rights of political dissent were on the agenda, the Dixie Chicks
would have performed at center stage, rather than Nellie holding his wiener
and Janet flashing her pasty. CBS had the opportunity to positively
portray the character of America to a world-wide audience of some 2 billion
people. CBS squandered this perfect opportunity to take the moral high
ground, and instead chose to titillate (pardon me) it's audience with a
program whose entire content bordered on the edge of smut.

Well, CBS, I don't know what's worse; that you hurt the war effort by
giving such obvious moral ammunition to the recruiters of Osama Bin Laden,
Al Qaeda, and the Taliban, or that you didn't even realize you'd done it.
Perhaps that's the saddest observation on your half-baked half-time show.
Your apologists still think it's about a boob. I think I can tell you,
it's about much more than that. It's about America's image on the world
stage.

Please hire some employees possessing the most basic understanding of
manners, morals, and good taste. And take the time to consider the
implications of your programming on your entire, world-wide audience. This
really is important. Our soldier's lives may depend on it.

Sincerely,

John Thurman
Worland, Wyoming
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