I love America. Unfortunately, Americans are stupid as hell. Remember just last month when hundreds of people swore they all spotted a leprechaun hiding in a tree in Mobile, Alabama, on St. Patrick's Day? Precisely. I rest my case.
That alone goes to show that the general American public will believe nearly anything-especially when an entire group of people gets together and attests to the farfetched veracity of, oh, say, the existence of leprechauns.
But Americans, a mighty group-think-prone bunch as it is, are even more gullible when it comes to unquestioningly accepting the "news" communicated to them via the mass media. For whatever reason, a person sitting in front of a camera in an ugly, stuffy suit lends the mindless drivel that spews from her mouth an air of unquestionable legitimacy.
After about a month of following the national media coverage of the Duke lacrosse scandal, I must admit that I am wholly disgusted by the unfair and appallingly uninformed "news reports" that anchors, talking heads and legal journalists are quite happy to air as truth and fact. Frankly, I am tormented by the notion that Americans really do believe damn near everything they hear on TV.
Arguably, a lot of the fire in the Duke-Durham "community crisis" is being fueled by external sources of conflict that have little regard or concern for what kind of violent reactions their prejudicial opinions might unleash.
Wednesday night, for example, junior Stephen Miller, another Chronicle columnist, appeared on CNN with Nancy Grace, idiot extraordinaire. What ensued was the most maddening hour of television I have ever had to suffer through.
After half an hour of slanted "reporting," Grace finally introduced Miller and asked for his response to the indictments and arrests of sophomore Duke lacrosse players Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann. Miller responded, "Well, I think I speak for many students when I say that we're very, very concerned that two innocent people may have possibly..." [Grace interjects with: "Oh, good Lord!"] "... just had their lives ruined." Grace didn't even let Miller finish his very first sentence.
Honestly, why Grace even bothers inviting guests on her show is beyond me. The only thing she does is lambaste all views other than her own and tactlessly interrupt her guests with bouts of offensive name-calling. Grace is an embarrassment to the field of legal journalism and has single-handedly sullied the good name of lawyers everywhere. Hard to do, I know. But done it, she has.
After Grace's interruption, Miller did, much to my enjoyment, fire right back at her with things like "the truth" and "the facts." (Because everybody knows that "truth" and "facts" are Nancy Grace's worst enemies). Good for you, Stephen.
Given all the mounting evidence against the alleged victim's claims of sexual assault, is it so radical that the innocence of the accused be presumed until proven otherwise? Excellent witnesses, verifiable alibis, no DNA connection between the accuser and the accused-Nancy Grace, like it or not, must at least entertain the notion of the players' innocence and not silence guests who don't share her own unfounded opinions.
While I understand talking heads like Grace are journalists who are paid to broadcast their own opinions, I also understand the implicit dangers of letting an imbalanced opinion be presented to the public as concrete fact.
It's quite possible to be provocative without being inflammatory. So when did it become professionally acceptable to be intolerant, unfair and cruel? Why is it so hard to be reasonable, courteous and kind?
Truly there is nothing more important on this campus and in this country than well-informed and well-thought-out debate. And if I learned nothing else during my brief tenure at Duke, I certainly learned that.
As for my final acknowledgements, many thanks to my patient editors; my professors whose classes I frequently skipped so that I could write my column; my teammates, my friends and Andrew Shadoff in particular, for kindly humoring me all year long by editing dozens and dozens of my rough drafts. To everyone else, thank you for reading my thoughts-I had a lot of fun. I sincerely hope that in the amount of time I spent at Duke, I somehow managed to give at least a little something back to the people and to the place from which I gained so much.
Well, okay then. Good talk. I'll see you out there. Go Sox.
Boston Cote is a Trinity senior. This is her final column.
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