Following my last blog post on the negative effects of political rhetoric, Saturday Night Live preformed a skit which enhanced my discussion on the subject by taking jabs at the rhetoric used by Fox News. Since this is such a heated topic on the current political front, I thought that I’d supplement by adding SNL’s take on the use of civil discourse in politics. My last blog post framed the question—do you think a renewal of civility could ever be achieved in reality? The answer to this question came through the use of the obvious satire employed by the SNL cast. The video is essentially a spoof of Fox News trying to tone down their political rhetoric and embrace “civility” into their network. In the beginning of the skit, Kristen Wiig (who plays Fox News host Greta Van Susteren) takes on an obvious satirical approach to the newscast attempting to “put aside heated rhetoric when discussing political viewpoints”. Right away, the notion of any restoration of civility into our society is framed as, simply, a big joke. If it only took about one day for SNL to fire a mockery against the view of “embracing civility”, my question has been answered. In reality, honest civility cannot and will not ever be attained in America. The skit continues as the cast tries to euphemize the word “job-killing” and fails horribly (and humorously) to do so. Finally, at the end of the skit, an answer to why the notion of “embracing civility” may never work in society is presumed. Fox invidiously introduces CNN’s James Carville (played by Bill Hader) and instantly, civility is diminished. James enthusiastically announces to the cast his day, which is filled with some of the primarily democratic ideologies such as the legalization of gay marriage and free x-rays under Obama’s healthcare plan. The Fox News cast, who has been stated to be conservatively biased in the past, becomes obviously agitated in reaction to each statement, suggesting that our political spectrums (and the media that employs them) may just be too polarized to ever reach a civil consensus.
Pretty funny. Especially with the conservative pundits squirming in their seats as they allow their liberal counterpart to speak. But it does make a really good point about how politics often fails to act in a civil manner.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that our political spectrums are just too far for civil consensus to ever be the case. It is just upsetting to see how politicians cannot act in a civil manner when dealing with other peopl with opposing views. Thanks for sharing
ReplyDeleteI saw this earlier and had a similar reaction. I wonder at what affect satire like this has on our perception of the situation, though. It's pointing to a truth about the difficulty, of course. Does this skit (or others on the Daily Show or Colbert Report) encourage us to accept this easy answer/simplistic depiction of people's attitudes? I don't know, but it does seem as if satire, sarcasm, and the like are treated as the final word. They're valid concerns, to be sure, but hopefully that's not the end of our debate.
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