#203 DeValue

It sometimes happens in our culture that enthusiasm gets the better of truth. Hype, that word we all have come to know and love, is the short form of the word hyperbole, whose mathematical cousin, hyperbola, describes a curve that shoots on to infinity. Linguistically, the definition of the word is somewhat underhyped in the dictionary as “over-exaggeration.” Yawn.
In any event, we get used to people hyping stuff to the point where most of us take just about everything these days with a grain of salt. Those of us who prefer to think on a low sodium diet simply discount all hype for good measure. When we hear a car ad or a loan ad and the announcer says “no interest”, we know they mean no interest for the one guy in the world whose credit is so good he doesn’t need credit. The rest of us pay 22%. Or, when we see a printed ad from a bankcard company that proclaims 0% introductory interest—that’s zero one-hundredths of zero for you math geniuses out there—we know that if nothing else the mail will somehow delay our first payment, the 25% penalty interest in the fine print will kick in, and we’ll get a visit from a couple of wise guys named Guido.
So when we see someone on TV being too forceful in talking about anything, that’s the time our suspicion antenna should start twitching, and we should start engaging both the hype radar and the anti-BS spray. So, you know, irrespective of how I may feel about say, Bill O’Reilly, I get really really worried that he spends as much time as he does proclaiming that his show is “no spin” zone. So, I suppose, technically, is a black hole but it’s the trajectory of the debris being sucked in that you have to worry about. No spin, no interest, I sometimes worry we’re devaluing the concept of no.
So I was a little interested the other day when the Parents Against Bad Television, or some such organization, was hype-r-critical of TV. They listed the worst TV shows in terms of objectionable content. 14 of the top ten were Fox shows of course, but oddly, some of the other contenders were the various versions of CSI. Turns out their subject matter, which deals with murder, cannibalism, and even necrophilia, was a little too tainted in the perverse sexual arena for the Parents Against Whatever. Plus, all the CSI’s show dead bodies in a mostly nude state. Making more than one wag say the CSI stands for Corpses Stripped Indiscreetly. Camera angles and digital fuzzy spots hide the naughty bits, but it doesn’t take too much imagination to connect the dots. One of the parents was appalled. “I didn’t know there was sex in the show,” she wailed, “I just thought my kid was mostly interested in science.” At least he didn’t have no interest.
America, ya gotta love it.