Between the "December to remember" Lexus ads and the 911 phone call allegedly from Aziz Yazdanpanah who purportedly shot his estranged family to death after they opened Christmas presents, I have had enough of local broadcasts. Yazdanpanah evidently was involved in a divorce and was having financial problems.
The Lexus ads are in such bad taste, does anyone realize that there is a recession on, it is difficult not to scream at the television.
That is always a good time to turn the set off.
The 911 phone call is also in bad taste. How is the tape news? It is practically unintelligible. It suggests violence but it consists of mumbling and whispers. It does nothing to inform the public. The tape does not explain anything. Airing the tape speaks of voyeurism and morbidity.
At first we were told that the call came over an "open line." That someone dialed 911 but said nothing. Now we are told that the tape has been enhanced and there is a voice on the phone saying "Help me" and "I am shooting people."
We can watch the local news and hear the tape and hear the Lexus ads in the same thirty minutes. They connect in the same news broadcast and commercials. The juxtaposition of these images and sounds cannot be healthy for viewers. They are disjointed with no context yet they hit us solidly within minutes. We must process the information and attempt to make some sense of these ideas without any explanation. We feel disillusioned and disconnected, straining to understand the happy car buyers and the victims of a shooting rampage.
There is no cohesive narrative other than these events which exist in fantasy and reality.
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