The royal wedding this last week was the perfect display of what goes wrong when popular culture overlaps with news. It’s bad enough that we call that horrid network Fox “”news,”” but now an incredibly wealthy guy marries a woman and it’s news? For about a week the only thing news shows seemed to cover was what Kate would be wearing. Would it be Alexander McQueen or someone else?
Naturally, the suspense was killing us all. Meanwhile, arguably the deadliest natural disaster in the U.S., since Hurricane Katrina, was thrashing its way across Alabama and enjoying back seat coverage.
Never mind the numerous Americans displaced by the horrible tragedy in the south, a rich, royal British guy found himself a wife. Not only was the coverage sickening and downright annoying, it was utterly confusing.
Why in the world does anyone outside of Britain care? This sort of thing belongs on Entertainment Tonight, not any legitimate news channel. One shouldn’t wake up wondering what in the world is going on in Alabama, and hear a reporter breaking down the newlyweds’ first kiss. There are Americans hurting here, that’s a story we should care about. Moreover, have we completely lost sight of the devastation in Japan? People are still trying to pick up the pieces over there too. So where is that story?
It was made abundantly clear back in the late 1700s that the United States does not, and ought not, care about the British royal family. We told King George to shove it back then. Why do we care about their wedding now?
I could understand it being a big deal in Britain, at least from a cultural standpoint, but why do glitz, glam and extreme showings of extravagance, like a multi-million dollar wedding, get priority coverage over the real life suffering of fellow citizens?
Pop culture has always enjoyed the spotlight, because for some it is an escape from the overwhelming reality. Nonetheless, this has gone on for too long and has traveled too far. When Britain’s pop culture is spilling over into the United States, we’re really grasping at straws for entertainment.
It is actually quite shocking that this is entertainment to begin with, but, nonetheless, it’s entertainment. While it’s incredibly painful to call this news, as it is in the form of human interest, it is certainly not headline, take- precedence-over-American-causality news.
Entertainment and pop culture spillovers have distracted us, rather than soothed, from the truths and pressing matters of reality. At least there are some who can hold their heads high in regards to the natural disaster. The state, local and federal governments have made sure to address this matter promptly, unlike our past fumblings with Hurricane Katrina. At least the citizens of Alabama feel as if they are being paid attention they deserve from the government.
If only the rest of their fellow citizens would get on board. However, if the news media continue to bow down to drivel like this and parade it on the front pages, you can bet we’ll continue to forget those in agony.
— Storm Byrd is a political science sophomore. He can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu
