Early today (as I’m writing), Air America Radio launched. Apparently, it was a day of mixed results, as I caught Jeanine Garafalo and Al Franken harping a bit on how cool they are to be starting this liberal network.
I’ll tell you in a nutshell why I think it won’t be very successful. But it may not be the reason you suspect!
Conservative radio is extremely popular. I was a devoted “Dittohead”, listening to Rush Limbaugh on a daily basis for years (whenever I could). Recently, I’ve enjoyed disagreeing with Michael Savage on my evening ride home. But I think liberal radio is going to run into a roadblock.
You see, conservatism is about upholding tradition, and traditional values. Conservatives wisely believe that tradition deserves respect because it is an established method of pursuing human discourse that has been proven to work. Perhaps, not work well, but work. Without compelling evidence, it’s unwise to alter tradition. And compelling evidence is hard to come by when trying something untested. We’re often forced into the position of conducting experiments on live populations, much to our detriment later.
But sometimes, these liberal experiments improve quality of life. The successes are few, but dramatic: Equal rights for women. Equal rights regardless of race. Abolition of slavery in the U.S. Establishment of the United Nations, rather than every nation for itself. Mostly good things, with some occasional difficult ramifications.
The problem with “liberal radio”, is that people tune into the radio to be entertained. They also tune in to talk radio for affirmation and information. Although liberal talk radio may be helpful in the information department, what about affirmation? The view of progressive liberals are all over the map. There are generally few “traditional values” to defend when you are liberal; instead, individual positions must be decided based on their merits and rationality. Of course, in reality there are many sheeple who just want their opinions handed to them; I’ve been one of them before, and it’s a hard habit to avoid.
Demagoguery is the part and parcel of conservative radio: appeal to the emotions of your listeners. Get them mad enough about something, and maybe they’ll do something they usually wouldn’t, like call into your show to complain.
So my question is: Can liberal radio be demagogic enough to be entertaining and retain listeners? Based on the little I heard today (due to technical problems with Real Audio that were largely corrected by the time I was able to tune in again tonight — it’s not syndicated in Utah. Duh.), it sure doesn’t seem that way. Instead of emotional tirades against progressive opionion, I heard interviews with popular figures and self-congratulatory chatting about how weird and fun it is to have a radio show. I didn’t hear any stirring monologues, but instead felt like I was listening to a radio version of a daytime television talk show. Yes, people got on one another’s cases, but about things irrelevant to me.
Obviously, there are going to be some growing pains, and I’m eager to see what happens once they’ve outgrown them. Conservative commentators are entrenched in the airspace, though, and I suspect that misunderstanding the medium will be a repeated theme throughout the next year.
I’m eager to hear more tomorrow to see if they shake off the newness a bit, get past the “let’s interview people to fill time” phase, and start working on being entertaining themselves. Since the network is syndicated over Real Audio as well as radio, unlike any conservative talk show I’ve seen, I can stream over the Internet and be able to listen at work. But I’m not entirely enthusiastic about the prospects of liberal talk radio. It just seems to be too little, too late for a medium dominated by conservatives disappointed with the liberal slant of other major media.
Note: this is not an April Fool’s joke. Someone else needs to cook one up 🙂