It's been interesting to see advertisers bailing on Billo after the latest round of sexual harassment allegations. Seeing as his audience is a bunch of sexist regressive types, it's no surprise that ratings for his show are healthy, even as O'Reilly takes a vacation while the shitstorm rages.
If I had to guess O'Reilly's vacation destination, I would suspect that he would relive his glory days by visiting the Falklands war zone (hey, he could have contracted cirrhosis of the liver from those fine Argentine wines). My real motivation for joking about O'Reilly traveling to Las Malvinas is that it's a perfect excuse to post the video of one of my all-time favorite anti-war, anti-corporate media, and anti-government manipulation songs, the New Model Army's blistering Spirit of the Falklands:
The natives are restless tonight, sir
Cooped up on estates with no hope in sight
They need some kind of distraction
We can give them that
'Cause they'd kill if they only had something to kill for
They'd die if they only had something to die for
They'd cheer if they only had something to cheer for
We can give them that
Oh, yeah, Billo gave them that... with any luck, his career of giving them that will soon be over.
The culture of Fox Mushroom Farm is a microcosm of the sexism and racism the channel broadcasts, it seems. In addition to O'Reilly's multiple sexual harassment settlements there are continuing claims that upper management and top talent had maintained an on-going culture of cover-up, gaslighting, and gender and racial discrimination. Our people would call it a shambles--their people were calling it a workplace (I find it helpful to think of it as a cult-like atmosphere.) What especially bothers me is that even in habitually troubled industries (sports/entertainment come to mind) eventually the bad press and cost of defending even stars becomes too serious a liability, and a contract will be broken or a payout to settle the contract will get made just to not have to deal with the constant bullshit of a badly damaged personality. But with Bill-O, as with Ailes before him, the bullshit is perceived as...overhead? The price of doing business with the devil? It's bewildering to me what enormities of poor, abusive behavior people can inure themselves to.
ReplyDeleteHave you seen http://currentsinbiology.tumblr.com/
ReplyDeleteI just found it today.
The lesson of the Falklands war was an important one even today, although it never gets discussed with any regularity outside military discussions on tactical doctrine.
ReplyDeleteThe lesson is that even for a much more powerful force, fighting halfway around the world on the enemy's doorstep is always going to be a problem. The british were always going to win - in the sense of re-occupying the island - but the antiquated Argentine air force was able to give them fits while they were at it (check out some of the videos - they're harrowing). The British Harriers did remarkably well, and the Argentine pilots weren't very good, but it really wasn't until the sinking of the General Belgrano with the death of 323 Argentine sailors that the issue was truly decided.
This is important because of the challenges the US faces in projecting military power into Chinese waters - the disadvantages of having to operate so far from any home ground are extremely difficult to overcome...