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Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Canceling HBO

Most of us know that most of the content on television is inferior, designed to appeal to the inner depths of our worst qualities. Watch "The Soup" one time and you can see just how terribly low some channels have gone to gain an audience in an ever expanding market.
  I'm picky about what I watch because nothing imprints itself faster on the human psyche than visual images; indeed, how burned are the brains of today's children with images of violence, nudity, bizarre behavior and unnecessary risk taking.
  There've been a couple shows I enjoyed on HBO but, meh, it's just okay.
  Arm yourself with a ROKU, an iPad or one of today's DVRs and you can access so many programs through alternate means than cable so, in that sense, HBO has some real and increasing competition.
  I've just paid the HBO bill for years, tolerated Bill Maher saying the "c" word about someone I admired; actually even if I didn't admire Palin, I would have been disgusted with his language.
  But he's free to say whatever he wants on HBO. He can claim he's "just a comedian" but it isn't true. He's deep into liberal indoctrination of his audience, who ape his behavior and laugh like jackals at the appallingly crude epithets he lobs at people he doesn't like. He doesn't know them; he just disagrees with them philosophically, so much so that he enjoys mocking even their children.
  So "Game Change" was it for me. I couldn't take it anymore. I heard clips from the movie, read the criticism, decided I wouldn't watch it (which is always the choice), but then something just snapped when I went to pay the bill.
  Why, I though, should I pay HBO to make fun of me? I live in Ohio (flyover country), I'm politically conservative, and the only original program I ever saw on HBO that might even come close to my philosophy of life was "Taking Chance," which was probably an anti-war protest in its ultimate message. But that was ok for me, because it was an excellent and thoughtful piece.
  Then the clip of Maher and Pelosi's daughter mocking the poorest people in the country, their lifestyles and their politics.
  Dear God.
  These are hardworking people, not very articulate but sincere in their desires to remain as independent from the government as possible. Oh, Maher and Pelosi laughed, they didn't have to go far to find a toothless old guy who needed social security but claimed he wanted independence.
  All she had to do was to pick her way daintily between the cow pies, avoiding the detritus of a farm from staining her Manolos, thrust the microphone and camera into the old man's face, and ask a question which she was sure he would blow.
  I guess nobody sees the cruelty in this. 
  I guess it's fashionable now to make fun of poor people, at least the ones who don't agree with your handing them free birth control pills. 
  I guess the perpetrators feel no shame when they return to their 1% apartments and estates, having to wash off the "dirt" of conversing with the real 99%.
  I guess "news" people think they've done their job to reelect Obama, never thinking they were performing the same jobs in the same way that Stalin's, Lenin's, Kruschev's, and Castro's "news people" did too.
  So I called Buckeye to cancel, who were very nice.
  And then I called HBO in New York, whose customer service leaves something to be desired.
  Working with many other customers, apparently, I waited ten minutes on hold, with encouragement every 20 seconds to leave a message and hang up, which I didn't do.
  When I finally reached a human who coolly offered nothing in return, I explained that I do not believe in limited free speech but I didn't have to pay over and over to be insulted or listen to foul language.
  Saturday's movie went too far, I explained, and I just wanted to make sure they knew why I was canceling.
  If there any balance at all at HBO, I wouldn't have canceled, I explained, but there isn't.
  Instead, there's a repeated and concerted effort to make people like me feel stupid and that's why I waited 10 minutes to tell her that.
  She said ok and hung up.
  I don't suppose there are any ignorant opinions on the left.
  I don't suppose there are any racists on the left.
  I don't suppose there are any poor moochers on the left.
  Again, here's the video:

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