Everything I know and don’t know about Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce: Are we “amusing ourselves to death”?
The Daily Article
The Denison Forum
4.9 • 576 Ratings
🗓️ 6 October 2023
⏱️ 7 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When compared to news stories about violent crime, politics, and war, it’s easy to see why so many are infatuated with the Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce relationship. TV tends to cater to what we want as a culture, but we’re more anxious, depressed, and lonely than ever. In a world that’s often all about us, why is this?
Author: Jim Denison, PhD
Narrator: Chris Elkins
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Good day and welcome to the Daily Article podcast for Friday, October 6th, |
| 0:07.0 | 2023. I'm Chris Elkins, narrating today's article written by Denison Forum co-founder and CEO, |
| 0:13.5 | Dr. Jim Denison. Did Taylor Swift join Travis Kelsey for his birthday yesterday? Will she attend his |
| 0:20.3 | game this weekend? |
| 0:21.9 | Heinz has created a custom sauce in response to a viral photo of her at a recent Chiefs game. |
| 0:28.3 | Their friends say she is really enjoying getting to know, Travis, and that he is completely |
| 0:34.0 | smitten with her. |
| 0:35.0 | Now you know everything I know and don't know about the pop |
| 0:38.7 | cultural moment as the NFL describes the couple and its coverage of their reported romance. |
| 0:44.8 | Now consider these various headlines on this morning's Wall Street Journal website. Violent |
| 0:50.2 | Crime is surging in D.C. U.S. jets shoot down Turkish drone over Syria. GM has at least |
| 0:56.9 | 20 million vehicles with potentially dangerous airbag parts. Army plans major cuts to special |
| 1:03.8 | operation forces. China is becoming a no-go zone for executives. Which story would you rather think about today? In amusing ourselves to |
| 1:15.0 | death, public discourse in the age of show business, the American writer and educator, Neil Postman, |
| 1:21.3 | warned that television was transforming our engagement with the world from one in which we process |
| 1:26.3 | information actively to one in which |
| 1:28.4 | we experience entertainment passively. He argued that a particular medium can only communicate a |
| 1:34.1 | particular kind of idea. Print is essential for rational inquiry and argument, in his view, |
| 1:39.9 | while televised images are more useful for evoking emotions and entertaining viewers. |
| 1:45.0 | He pointed to television news as an example with its use of theme music, journalistic actors, |
| 1:50.0 | and highly produced images and videos. |
| 1:53.0 | The result for viewers is less that they are informed than they are entertained and thus susceptible |
... |
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