• GRAAARRG. That is all.
• I'm listening to Doug Stanhope: 12 - Tits & Buttfucking are Il

May 15, 2006

According to researchers, The Daily Show deters young viewers from voting.

Hang on, something's beeping. Be right back.

Ah, yes. Just the trusty ol' Bullshit-O-Meter, letting me know that this hard-hitting research discovery is a big load of poopoo dookie.

Maybe I'm just not as smart as my mouth is, but something tells me that a presence of voter apathy has much less to do with Jon Stewart's rapier wit and more to do with uniformly shitty candidates that are no more than glorified criminals in suits. Between the assholes on one side ripping everyone off while half of their slack-jawed constituency leers at NASCAR and gets all tweaked out over someone who's not from Shitsville, Kansas, and the consistently lackluster politicians on the other end of the spectrum (with the exception of a select few, but that's a different therapy session), how could anyone dare to *gasp* not care about voting?

Now, I'm not making excuses for voter apathy. Voter apathy, to me, is one of the most lame-ass cop-outs ever, next to the endings of most M. Night Shyamalan films. Not to be cliched I think that you make the changes that you want to see, even if voting seems like something that's a total waste of time...because it's really not. And even if things don't work out the way you hoped, at least you made an effort.

But there's so many more lame-ass research projects they could have helmed. Projects that had equally fairly obvious results, such as "Do most dogs like beef? Let's find out!" or "Why do fat kids sweat more?" Instead of looking at the source of the problems, the subjects that are more than ripe for mockery and disdain, the politicians that deserve every bit of scorn and insults thrown their way, they decide to look at....the show.

The show. What the fuck?

All the show does is peel back the layers of not-so-cleverly designed spin to reveal the twisted, soulless husks of men within. Instead of cheapening the world of humor with fart jokes and videos of animals humping (although the clip of the bull slipping and falling on ice while mid-mount gets me every time), they expose the political world for what it is: a dog-and-pony show laden with con artists, crooks, and some people who are just weiners (seriously, I'll take bets on the last time Scott McClellan got laid). Of course, their exposure is wholly satirical, and most of the stuff that they champion on there is to be taken with a boulder-sized grain of salt, but their hearts are in the right place...beating a slave-like existence for the Comedy Central money machine.

That's beside the point.

Blaming a television show for voter apathy is like blaming a quadraplegic for leaving muddy footprints on your rug. Sure, it's a (half-assed) means to an end, but it leaves everyone else wondering if the accusations are even based in reality.