⇥ Stephen Colbert scares me
From this article on Reuters:
The comedian’s supporters cast 230,539 write-in votes to name the new module at the $100-billion space outpost “Colbert.” The top NASA-suggested name, “Serenity,” finished a distant second, more than 40,000 votes behind.I’ll be honest and say that I don’t like Stephen Colbert—I simply do not find him funny.
However, in this particular case I can’t decide what’s scarier: that Stephen Colbert manage to get more than 230,000 votes, or that he’s showing us how irremediably screwed democracy really is, and we’re too busy guffawing at his stunt to notice.
This is my problem, not Colbert’s. I simply do not like people who try to be funny at the expense of other people who are not in on the joke. It’s a fine line, of course—humour is always made at the expense of someone—but it’s not fun when the butt of your joke doesn’t know that he is, well, the butt of your joke. For this same reason, I’ve never been much of a fan of shows like Candid Camera, Punk’d and Just for Laughs.
Comments
No, what this shows is that Colbert has more fans than the space program.
“or that he’s showing us how irremediably screwed democracy really is, and we’re too busy guffawing at his stunt to notice”
I’m not sure how you conclude that the opinion of the majority winning is showing that democracy is screwed. I’d view it as the exact opposite. If NASA decides to throw out the name that actually won and instead goes with their own then I would say it’s a blow for democracy (albeit it one that probably isn’t even worth noticing).
I think if the name had ended up being something having to do with a community you are involved in you would most likely have had a much different outlook and tone to your post. Because you don’t care for Colbert (and by all means that’s fine, I’m not a huge fan either) you take a look at the entire thing as being unacceptable.
@mike I look at it as an expression of what people care about—no offense to Colbert, but he is hardly what I would call a person who deserves a spot in history (albeit a small one). But perhaps you’re right, I’m allowing my personal taste to get into this. Regardless, the fact that people can be convinced to blindly do just about anything scares me
The Crowd by Gustave Le Bon can show you just how scary people really are.
Lots of people acting blindly is not a bug, it’s a feature of democratic system.
Eventually NASA decided to name the toilet after him (seriously). That’s something I actually find funny
And what exactly has this to do with democracy? NASA wants to name something and decides to do a poll. It’s their project, not something the public directly owns. Plus the voters most probably care about ISS as much as you care for Colbert. That way they see that as a joke. If in a democracy someone sees voting politicians as a joke, he might also choose the funniest guy. There just are far less people who don’t care about democratic elections, so no real problem (well there are, but not like the Colbert Toilet Seat).
I agree with others, this really has nothing to do with democracy. It’s just the naming of a module on the space station. Yes he is making fun of the system, but he is allowing his viewers to be in on the joke by actually participating in the joke itself. Colbert has thrived at this type of viewer involvement and it’s one of the reasons he is so popular.
This is the simplest example of democracy possible—and it shows that people are like sheep. That’s why it scares me.