Two weeks ago, MTV took a break from its regular programming to present seventeen and a half hours of anti-hate crimes "programming." After the airing of a film about Matthew Shepard (the college student who was murdered simply because he was gay), the network aired probably the spookiest chunk of television to ever grace the airwaves. The more I watched, the more weirded-out I felt. For an entire night, the screen was filled with celebrity-narrated messages similar to this:
2/5/97 Wherever, California
Two gay men were leaving a bar when two men in a jeep allegedly threw a bottle at them and screamed, "Get out of here! We don't need your kind around here!" The two men in the jeep then reportedly drove back, got out of the jeep and allegedly beat the two gay men with baseball bats. It was rumored that the perpetrators were allegedly associated with the Ku Klux Klan.
Six to seven similarly horrific depictions of hate crimes (committed against practically every race, creed, religion, and sexual orientation) would follow before the narrator interrupted with the line, "Hate Crimes Begin with Discrimination." This series of messages was repeated over and over again for, as I said, seventeen and a half hours. And while this was a noble effort towards a noble cause acted upon with the best of intentions, I have to ask, why was it done by MTV? Don't those letters stand for "Music Television"? It's quite a leap for a network that started off playing videos.
For MTV to broadcast this material is to assume that they are a voice that should be listened to, and that they are credible. Well, I submit that on many levels, they're not.
Let's first examine that night's programming. Each and every incident had at least one use of the words "allegedly" or "reportedly" contained within it, some as many as three. In a purely journalistic sense this is not credible because, although the account may be true, it's not supported by actual evidence. Showing video footage (MTV used to be good at showing videos) from a handful of actual hate crimes would have been much more effective than reading seventeen and a half hours worth of mind-numbing "reported" hate crimes. I mean, come on, where's the shock value? Isn't that what MTV's about? It was so hypnotically repetitive that I felt like I was being programmed, like my television was a loudspeaker on the streets of, say, Nazi Germany. Scary stuff.
Also, many of the accounts dealt with people approaching members of a minority group, saying something horrible, and then leaving without doing anything else. While terrible, these actions are legal. You know, Free Speech. The same rights that protect us "smart" people protect those "dumb" people, as well. Yes, you still have the right to be a moron in the United States.
MTV's credibility can also be challenged by taking a look at its history. The same network that brought this thought-provoking evening of thought provocation has also brought you Beach MTV, Beavis and Butthead, Pauly Shore, Tom Green, MTV's Spring Break, and my personal favorite, Jackass, where star Johnny Knoxville likes to have poo splashed all over his body. While there isn't anything intrinsically wrong with these programs, they don't, necessarily, form the basis of a journalism powerhouse.
MTV News coverage usually consists of a thirty-second fluff piece to promote a new album. You might call it advertising.
MTV's "The Real World," furnishes roommates (gay, straight, black, white, oriental, Hispanic, Mormon, cowboy, etc.) with a luxury home and encourages them to fully (and violently) explore their differences through a series of squabbles and out-and-out fights for the sake of good ratings.
The network is also very fond of airing blatant, sexual images of women (mostly through videos) to attract viewers for their advertisers. And isn't this portrayal of women something that many groups are against because it promotes, among other things, rape, which, if I'm not mistaken, can fall into the category of a hate crime? Hmm, irony…
I hate crime. I hate hate crimes. I really hate it when the irresponsible among us prioritize crimes based on their own selfish needs. MTV's preference towards "politically hot" crimes like hate crimes ignores other, less marketable crimes like old fashioned serial killing, armed robbery, drug smuggling, child abuse, political corruption, and corporate crime, crimes that might not get the ratings, but sure do hurt just as much. Good ideas can take a terrible turn in the wrong hands. MTV needs to leave the activism to someone else, and stick to what it does best, being stupid.