Now that I’m all grown up, I have found a character reminiscent of Fraggle Rock, Sesame Street and the Muppet Show combined. This is a show where a character throws toys, illustrates points with various props, and assumes absurd voices to entertain the audience. The main character reminds me of the Swedish Chef from the Muppet Show, and that character is: Glenn Beck.
Although similar, there is one glaring difference between the Muppet Show and Beck; Beck isn’t as funny or nearly entertaining.
Don’t get me wrong… I respect Beck for speaking his mind and having an outlet for it. He is under fire right now and I don’t think he deserves all of it. He just expresses his feelings, beyond corporate control and is paying a toll for right now. I don’t like that fact that advertisers have so much control over what we hear and are exposed to. Who knows what Clorox would prefer we hear? I respect Beck for going against it.
However, the content and the methods of Beck put me into a frantic panic. I can’t believe that there is an audience that finds value to complex policy being broken down with Barbie dolls as illustration tools.
I drive several hours a day to work several days a week. I often listen to conservative talk as my morning coffee which makes the time fly. I listen to it because I like to see what “the other side” is saying, something that drives my poor wife nuts. Even though I don’t care for Limbaugh or Larson, I can deal with them. But when listening to Beck, I have to think of my wife, family and my future to keep myself from t-boning my car into a guardrail.
Give Beck a week of listening and one might sell all of their possessions, tell their friends and family goodbye, and move to a storage shed somewhere in Wyoming. While you’re selling your goods off, Beck will tell you a great place to keep your financial assets: gold.
You would think Beck was a miner as he peddles gold every 10 minutes. Even “Cash For Gold” heroes MC Hammer or the late Ed McMahon would blush watching Beck pleading for his listeners to buy gold. He justifies this as a safe place as our Country crumbles, forgetting the most simple of concepts. If the global economy crumbles, the value of gold will go down respectively. Can you imagine living in a shanty, washing clothes out of the sewage line, but wasting money on a gold necklace?
The most absurd and bizarre statement that Beck made that inspired me to write this post is his declaration of the Constitution as literally sacred. Make no mistake, my use of literally, wasn’t figuratively, but actually literally.
As a Christian and an American, I am offended. I don’t know if this was a cheap attempt to capture the conservative audience or a ratings ploy… either way it bothered me.
The Constitution, which has been amended for the better many times over, is considered sacred? The same document that had to be amended to abolish slavery, provide for the freedom of speech and expression, women’s suffrage etc. How can a document that has been amended so many times be sacred? Only a Muppet like Beck could make a statement like that. And who’s to say what God thinks of our Constitution? I value our Constitution and believe it should be defended… but sacred and blessed by God?
Among other problems and hypocrisies aligned with Beck are his criticism of Wall Street, yet the defense of executive bonuses like to AIG executive, his bashing of AmeriCorps as being indoctrination, and again, the most annoying, his constant peddling of gold.
I respect Beck like I do a crazy street performer. Proud of their act, no matter what any rational human being thinks. Yes, he is entertaining. Yes, he is a voice for many of those out there. And yes, he will buy your gold.
Listen to Beck when you get a chance and see what you will. As long as I live, I will stand by his side to defend his right to speech. The bonus for me though... is I get an adult version of the Swedish Chef every afternoon.
Good cooking,
Cam
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Cam, did you get a chance to actually watch the AmeriCorps bit Beck did on his show? If not, you should. I was insanely offended, having been a proud member and now alumni of AmeriCorps. On his show, he likened becoming an AmeriCorps member to enlisting in the Nazi regime and cheapened the very nature and purpose of the program itself. Did he talk about the hundreds of thousands of people that have been served by AmeriCorps members for decades in the midst of disasters and 9/11 and how often, our inner city schools, social service agencies and the very faith based organizations he loves and I'm sure promotes, rely on us to survive? No. Can he admit that AmeriCorps exists because the Church fails? Because people fail? Because gold is sought more than hope, more than love, more than sacrifice?
ReplyDeleteI particularly relate to your post having come from a family where conservative talk radio rules and I've heard more Limbaugh in my life than I care to admit. I understand how certain aspects of their messages pull on the heartstrings of conservative, republican, "well meaning" Christian folks but here's the downside I've seen, my parents now live in so much fear and I see them moving closer and closer to the edge of the cliffs of insanity from watching FOX News all day. I have other family members that once engrossed themselves in conservative talk radio yet are now reformed. They are still very conservative and some of the most prayer-full, compassionate, loving, sacrificing and risk taking Christians I know, but even they told me that they found themselves living in fear and doom as they listened to Beck and Limbaugh and FOX News.
Anyway, I thought I'd share. Hopefully, my parents will see the light and take a step back from the cliffs, from the talk, from the fear. Hopefully the peace they claim to embrace from their faith will be just that - peace.