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| Rob's Soapbox | ||
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Congratulations!
You have finally landed on the one page on this entire site (and on the entire internet for that matter) that is purely without bullshit... my soapbox page. There are a lot of times during our show that, whether it's because of time constraints and other obligations, I don't always get to address some issues that I feel don't get the attention they deserve. There are even more times when I just don't feel like waiting until the show the next day to get some things off my chest. Thus, I have started the "Rob's Soapbox" page. If you have clicked on this page looking for someone to coddle your fragile sense of self-esteem, or tell you what you want to hear or to reinforce your outdated world view, then exit this page right now and go somewhere else. If you are in search of the last forum for reason and common sense left in the world, then sit back, relax, and enjoy. I make only one promise with this soapbox page... if you read long enough and often enough, you will eventually be offended. So here's my latest soapbox. Listen up, 'cause you just might learn something... |
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June 10th, 2007 RIGHT AGAIN; THE LIE OF DATELINE'S "TO CATCH A PREDATOR" The short answers to your myriad questions are; No, I don't ever get tired of being correct so often and Yes, I do actually enjoy being arrogant and smug about it. The enjoyment comes not from making others feel small but rather from a sense of pride in myself for (in this case), once again using my astute observation skills, understanding of the American culture and legal system, and my ability to see things long before anyone else, and harnessing them in one big, fat, 100% correct assertion over a year ago that has now been all proven to be 100% true, accurate, clairvoyant and correct. Not long ago NBC's semi-nightly news magazine show, "Dateline," was reeling in the ratings and still struggling to gain viewers after the loss of former host and NBC Nightly News Anchor Tom Brokaw. The show was dull, predictable and paled in comparison to and lacked all stature next to its stalwart competitor "60 minutes," which has been doing the format better than anyone for more than 30 years. I remind you (or inform you) of the backdrop of the genesis of this story because it's a wonderful lesson in not just television and/or entertainment; almost all ideas that are conceived because of desperation and panic are proven to be short sighted and often times make the problem you were trying to solve worse in the end. Such desperation spawned "To Catch A Predator," a hidden camera style "gotcha," reality TV//news magazine mix in which potential child molesters were lured to a specific house tricked out with hidden cameras and a creepy host hiding in a closet who would then confront the creep and provide evidence of dirty things said while chatting with what the creep thought was a 12 or 14 year old girl or boy or whatever. Before we get too far into this complete evisceration of Dateline allow me this point; it was great television. As entertainment ideas go, this one was, I admit, very good. It had plenty of "oh wow" moments, provided a lot of water cooler talk the following mornings at work ('Hey did you see dateline last night arrest a guy from homeland security for banging a kid?), and it had the essential element of not just good versus evil, but the ultimate evil. There is pretty much nothing America, as a societal whole, reveres more than its children, and as a result, very few scum fall lower on our collective totem pole than pedophiles. It was these elements that made the show so entertaining, yet so ultimately irresponsible, dishonest and perhaps before it's all over, completely and totally illegal. As I said when the series began, there were many potential problems with this idea from the start, none of which has to do with television entertainment, and all of which had to do with our paranoia, rule of law, bloodthirsty vengeance and complete and total gullibility as a culture. Some of the glaringly obvious things seem small, I know. For example, "Dateline," is a news show, not an entertainment/variety show. People are supposed to be able to rely on such programs to present a real, truthful, accurate account of events and/or at least both sides of any given story. When such stories change or have endings different from what the viewer believes to have happened, the show is incumbent to correct its own record, something Dateline has never done as I have been proven right over and over and over again. The larger issue that I said from the beginning of this monstrosity was that the show did nothing but play on the ill-founded media hyped fears of a nation, making so many of you feel like we were "fighting back" when the truth of the matter was that nothing was being done to stop, curb or solve the issue of child predators. So many of you would sit salivating in front of your TV waiting for host Chris Hansen to emerge from the pantry and catch the latest "sicko," just so you could wave your fist at the TV and triumphantly shout "HA! Take that weirdo! We've got another of you off the streets now and children are safer because of it," and then you would confidently stride off to bed and enjoy visions of sugar plumbs as you erroneously believed the world was a safer place. What a joke. More disturbingly, what a completely and total violation of your trust at the hands of Dateline, who knew all along that nothing was further from the truth. The facts are simple; child molestation and pedophilia are no worse than they were 10, 40, 400 years ago on this planet. We have documented the facts on this time and time again. The thing that has changed is our paranoia level and reporting of such crimes. It's pathetic and sickening. As a result our kids grow up in a world of fear where their parents are so afraid the kids are lucky if they aren't blithering drooling idiots by the time they're 15 years old. Oh well, it's only the future of our nation. None of it matters anyways because this nation runs now on emotion not fact logic and reason, and besides, it makes for great TV. As all of these alleged cretins were hauled in one by one by the almighty Dateline, ratings soared and their silly stings became a twice weekly affair. All the while I kept telling you what a lie the whole thing was. No one wanted to hear it because the truth is never as sexy as one's own desire. Far better, you thought, to live in a world of lies and believe that the sick people were actually rotting away in jails than out raping our kids or pursuing their "sick" thoughts (which was and is what's actually going on). The thread has finally been pulled and the truth is unraveling on the Dateline lie, proving that I was right all along. The show violated more than a handful of our laws, corrupted police departments and officers, and stopped/caught essentially no one along the way, just like I said from the outset. Pretty much every case against any of the jerks you saw on TV has been thrown out on its face by every judge that saw it for a ton of legitimate reasons, ranging from entrapment in some cases to the obvious "you can't arrest someone for their thoughts or intentions," fact. Thanks God this is still barely America and the idea that thinking something isn't a crime still holds true. A former Dateline Producer and Director has quit and gone public with all of the underhanded and potentially civil rights violating methods that were used to create these shows and more and more groups are coming forward calling for an end to this charade of a show. I don't believe for a minute that will happen, because the ratings are still high and unless someone actually legally forced NBC to quit violating peoples rights, ratings still win (and who in their right mind that ever runs for public office is going to go against the lynch mob mentality of America who wants to see pedophiles stopped even when they aren't really being stopped)? As the chat rooms indicate, it is time now for those of you who hate to admit when you're wrong or are too afraid to face reality to segue into what I call "cliché mode." Asinine, meaningless, ignorant phrases like "at least they tried," and "if they caught one it was worth it," will now become the order of the day with absolutely no thought given to the ramifications and parallels with histories of regimes like Nazi Germany given. Others of you will attack those of us who understand that without our laws, even those that protect the potentially gross, we are not a nation we are a gang. People will say things like "I guess you want our children to get raped," without acknowledging that Dateline did nothing to stop any such behavior and probably enhanced and encouraged it on a few levels by providing a handbook to these sickos on how not to get caught and how and why they must get more crafty if they ant to rape our kids. We are an arrogant, idiotic, ignorant society that is doomed to destroy ourselves at the feet of our own fear…and I can't wait to watch it all unfold…perhaps on TV.
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