My new electronic buddy, Michael, from The Netherlands, asked me to write a guest post for his blog, Small European Country. Since I love his stuff, I said yes.
You can find it here. While you’re there, check out some of his other posts.
Author: wdfyfe
Before WD called himself a writer, he worked at a number of different jobs from stacking lumber to interior design. He studied English at UBC and creative writing at ASU where one of his teachers, Rita Dove, taught him the importance of the tale. He has written for radio, magazines and newspapers, but never television. He’s published both fiction and nonfiction in Great Britain and the US. He reads French passably and speaks enough Spanish to get from A to B and find the toilet. He has interviewed John Cleese, Peter Ustinov, Margaret Drabble, Kenneth Branagh and enough other famous people to make him a hopeless name dropper. His not-so-secret passions are history and trivia, and he has never lost a game of Trivial Pursuit — although he did come 4th one drunken Quiz Night at the Uxbridge in Notting Hill. He lives on the Pacific Ocean, although, not close enough to see, so he spends his days looking at a computer screen. It’s a wonderful life and he has only one regret: he can’t type faster.
The Rise Of The Media Whore
It’s pretty obvious that there’s nothing real about Reality TV. It’s as carefully crafted as its scripted cousin. The only difference is the actors are playing themselves. So be it. In the great scheme of things, the difference between Tori Spelling and Sansa Stark is minimal. (BTW, I have no philosophical bitch with Reality TV. I don’t necessarily watch it, but I think it’s a perfectly acceptable form of entertainment — certainly as valid as the Game Show, The Cop Show and The Sit-Com.) Unfortunately, Reality TV has one dreadful side effect — the media whore.
You’ll probably be shocked to know that the media whore was actually born on PBS, the squeaky clean Boy Scout of American broadcasting. (No, it wasn’t Big Bird!) In 1973, Public TV broadcast An American Family, a point-and-shoot chronicle of the Loud family — Bill, Pat and the kids. Highbrow television being what it is, the series was called a documentary. A rose by any other name…. Our society still had a modicum of dignity in those days, so it took a generation and the Europeans to push us over the edge of the Reality abyss. In the 90s, Dutch TV came up with Nummer 28 the inspiration (“plagiarism” is such a hard word) for MTV’s The Real World. From there, it was a slippery slope through Big Brother and American Idol to Paris Hilton, Phil Robertson and the High Priestess herself, Kim Kardashian.
The apologists dress these media whores up in all kinds of reasonable clothes, from the aforementioned documentary to straight comedy, to struggles with adversity and personal pain. Yeah, right! The truth is they are simply not content with Andy Warhol’s 15 minutes of fame. They don’t just like the camera, they lust after it. And they’re willing to do anything to satisfy their narcissism. They will sell themselves, their children, their dignity (Lance Loud invited the PBS cameras back to film his death.) and their very souls to get it. But the scary thing is — the frightening core of this contemporary phenomenon is — if they are the whores, we are the clients. We, the audience, are the Johns of their peek-a-boo prostitution. In fact, we built the brothel, and every time the Internet bends, breaks or beats Obama’s record, we add on another room.
As anyone in the media will tell you — it’s all about the numbers.
America 1 – FIFA 0
Last week, FIFA learned there’s really only one rule in the 21st century: don’t piss off the Americans. The world’s #1 bully is about to meet The Expendables, and as the man said, “There will be blood.” At this point the situation is beyond complicated, so here’s the Twitter version.
It’s common knowledge that FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) is one of the most corrupt organizations on the planet, rivalled only by the IOC and the Communist Party of China. And they’re arrogant about it. Their attitude has always been: “We’re FIFA. If you don’t like the way we do business, too bad. Go play badminton.” It’s a simple choice, so for decades the world has played futbol by FIFA’s rules, handed over those hefty brown envelopes and shut up about it. Even the Macho Man himself, Vladimir Putin, had to do some serious sucking up when Sepp Blatter and his boys came calling. In a nutshell, FIFA is to sports what Al Capone was to liquor distribution.
Enter the Americans, who decided in 2010 they’d like to host The World Cup again in 2022. Their main rival was Qatar. For those of you who are unfamiliar, America is a place with enough sports facilities and infrastructure to host an Interplanetary Quidditch Tournament next Wednesday, if they so desired. Qatar, on the other hand, is a roasted bit of desert. Fortunately for the Qataris though, their country is oil-rich as Croesus and located in an area of the world where baksheesh, a polite word for the hidden cost of doing business (bribery) is as common as sand castles. FIFA fell in love; Qatar won the bid. America called “Bullshit!” It didn’t matter, though, because — why? — FIFA, that’s why. So America picked up its balls, went home and quietly unleashed the FBI.
Five years later, the American legal system is kicking down FIFA doors, seizing FIFA records and papering FIFA walls with arrests and indictments. What goes around, comes around, Herr Blatter.
The incredible irony is America doesn’t give a rat’s ass for futbol. They think it’s a game played in the suburbs by soccer moms in minivans. Football — real football — is played by gigantic men in armour and doesn’t involve that much contact between the foot and the ball. Which brings us to the real reason America is about to slap the crap out of FIFA — somebody’s got to do it and no other country has the cojones.
Here’s the deal: everybody on this planet knows FIFA is as crooked as a dog’s hind leg. However, FIFA also controls
billions in advertising and merchandising revenue. No country in their right mind is going to put that kind of coin in jeopardy over a few measly millions in bribe money. D’uh! However, if the Americans want to get all Rambo about it — it’s easy to look the other way. Besides, if FIFA gets taken down a peg or two, so much the better. It’s a classic case of “Let’s you and him fight.”
And this fight is going to be biblical. FIFA’s been pushing people around for so long they’re really, really good at it. Meanwhile, America, like The Expendables, is showing its years. However, at the end of the day, Stallone, Stratham and the bros can still put the smackdown on anybody who gets in the way. So, FIFA is going to clean up its act because — why? — America, that’s why!
WD Fyfe 