A simplifying bias

THE American Presidential debates have got under way and this seems a good time to take a look at a new book which examines what television has done to political discourse in the United States. In The Sound Bite Society - Television and the American Mind, Jeffrey Scheuer puts forward the provocative theory that the emergence of television as a political force and the collapse of American liberalism are connected. He argues that a culture driven by sound bytes impoverishes political debate, and that the U.S.' popular and political cultures are dominated by money and profit, imagery and spin, hype and personality. Through television, politicians sell themselves much more effectively than their ideas.

One consequence is that, though a mature democracy demands a respectful discourse across a broad range of responsible opinion, television is not delivering such respectful discourse for American democracy. Scheuer believes that TV has a simplifying bias which promotes and epitomises conservatism. "Television in nearly all its forms and functions, and for both economic and structural reasons, acts as a simplifying lens, filtering out complex ideas in favour of blunt emotional messages that appeal to the self and to narrow moral-political impulses." Perhaps that is why the number of successful television personalities on the right in the U.S. far outweigh those on the left, going by his enumeration of them.

The second part of this argument is that simple does not mean simplistic or simple-minded. Rather, a simple theory of government and social contract is one that demands less of individuals and offers less in return. One that argues for smaller government, lower taxes, fewer services, less regulation, preferring to leave the market alone rather than to regulate or offset it. That is the conservative vision, it is a simpler vision than the liberal vision, and it plays well on the airwaves. (Example: George Bush Sr's "Read my lips, no taxes!") It was very much evident last week in some of George W. Bush Jr's soundbites: "(Gore's plan) empowers Washington versus empowering Americans," he said. And talked of Gore proposing "Big exploding Federal Government that wants to think on your behalf."

The belief that the media is liberal arises, the author says, from the fact that those in the media have a more liberal profile than those in many other professions. But that does not make the television medium an agent of liberalism. On the contrary, its propensity for simplification makes TV a handmaiden of conservative values and messages and a hinderance to the more complicated values and messages of liberalism. While Gore was clearly better on detail last week, Bush had the more effective put-downs. He simply dismissed the details by disparaging Gore's "Washington fuzzy math." And the ultimate anti-intellectual put- down: "Not only did he invent the Internet, he also invented the calculator!" That line will be remembered when Gore's details have been forgotten.

Scheuer does not buy the assertion that television is neither liberal nor conservative but simply commercially driven. Its electronic currents have simplifying tendencies, he says. Television's increasing domination of the political culture has coincided with the ascendency of what he calls the "Electronic Right", and contributed, he argues, to making the U.S. a more conservative nation, a theory supported by electoral results in the Senate and Congress and by the nature of legislative initiatives since the 1960s.

Since the Kennedy-Nixon debate of 1960 which inaugurated television politics, Scheur thinks political discourse has coarsened on television and the winners in the new game of electronic politics have been on the right, not the left. A Kennedy or a Clinton might exploit the medium, but as a prism for personal charisma, not as a conduit of liberal ideas. TV rewards simple messages, it sells personalities more easily than ideas. It is driven economically and technologicially by dramatic, visceral and emotional messages that please or anger or incite, not by complex ideas that might make people think or act or cooperatively. Sample Bush last week on abortion: "I want to promote a culture of life for America." On tax rebates: "He thinks the surplus is the Government's money. It is hardworking America's money."

The other aspect of this book's argument is to explore the kind of news that is gaining ascendency in the contemporary U.S.: tabloid sensationalism on TV on the one hand, and soft, uncontroversial news magazines on the other. Both amplify TV's antipathy to complexity. Television's visual and commercial characteristics are suited to the tabloid style - sensational, heroic, personalised stories with simple narrative structures, and conventional underlying values.

It is a medium of visual story telling, not of theorising. It has an inherent structural difficulty in covering processes, abstractions or trends. It can show you a tree falling or an unemployed logger but it cannot as easily assess the trade-off between logging jobs and old growth forest. It forces news to bend to its technological needs. It has an aversion to ideas, explanations, contexts. It demands quick and final solutions to complex and intransigent problems. (Doesn't that remind you of the Star News anchors: "so tell us quickly, yes or no?" Or, "your final statement please, in 10 seconds.") Furthermore, the rise of tabloid and soft news has been accompanied by a decline in both hard news and public affairs programming. A further defeat for liberalism in the U.S..

He reasons that television speaks a simple and reductive language and systematically banishes what we might call "anti-language", the universe of deeper more complex discourse. It favours heroes and villains over complex eccentric ditherers, Kojak over Hamlet. It favours individuals and small groups over large collectivities. And judging by last week's debate, it forces candidates for the most powerful office in the world to personalise their vision through emotive stories of individual Americans as both did last week.

And to grope for the most effective sound byte.

Later in the book, Scheuer moves on to discuss complexity and ideology, and the political dimensions of complexity which cannot be dealt with in the limited confines of this column. As he puts it, the argument is to intrigue and provoke, not to settle any matter with finality. But his answer to whether television has served democracy well is no. Funny, because in India where television brings leaders and their agendas to millions who have no access to the printed word, the answer to that question would probably be yes. Scheuer tempts one to probe a little further. Are we perhaps measuring politics and politicians by superficial criteria because of TV? The book has a website: www.thesoundbitesociety.com

For Formula 1 addicts: "Inside Formula One", 9 p.m. Discovery Channel. Takes you to the factory in rural England where the Formula One cars are built, and then on the test drives. Through the week, same time, other new episodes of the old series, "Car Crazy".

What competition does: Nine Gold on the Metro Channel hit upon the idea of getting big film stars to do a tribute to yesteryear siren Helen next weekend. Sony got to know, and was quick to grab the same idea and same stars for the same day! At the time of writing, it is not known whether Nine Gold is going ahead, but Sony's invitation for an event to announce the big event is in hand!

On Star Talk tonight at 7.30 p.m.: P.C. Sorcar Jr. talking about how he can make the Taj disappear. On Star News.

SEVANTI NINAN

E-mail the writer at sevantininan@vsnl.com

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Features
Previous : Versace smiles again
Next     : Acting has nothing to do with genes