Misplaced Priorities

By now you've all heard the news – it's been impossible not to have heard it by now, really. Indeed, many of you are still talking about it, and undoubtedly still ponder its impact on your lives, on your futures, and on your ultimate understandings of the world.

No, I'm not talking about Bank Transfer Day; or the ongoing insurrection in Homs, Syria; or Europe's ongoing debt crisis and the possible demise of the Euro; or the ever-growing Occupy movement; or the hacking of Israeli defense and intelligence agency websites by hacker group Anonymous; or al-Shabab's grenade attacks in Nairobi, Kenya.

The mind-blowing, life-changing, earth-shattering news to which I allude is, of course, Kim Kardashian's divorce.

It's a touchy subject, I know – many of you are still reeling.

Here's the thing, though – and this is probably difficult to hear – but in the grand scheme of things, Kim Kardashian's divorce isn't exactly important. Or newsworthy. Or deserving of any more than, like, 30 seconds of discussion, tops.

Here's how every discussion regarding Kardashian should have gone, ideally:

"So, Kim Kardashian just filed for divorce."

"That's not surprising."

"No, it really isn't."

"Wait, why is she famous again?"

"You know, I'm not really sure."

"Huh."

[Awkward pause.]

Instead, though, this horrifically unimportant piece of "news" dominated public discourse for a solid two to three days. I was personally involved (peripherally, at least) in two major conversations regarding Kardashian's divorce and all of its potential ramifications.

Why?

Why is it that we, as Americans, are so profoundly captivated by trite crap like this?

I'm certainly guilty of it too – I definitely spend a disproportionate amount of time discussing videogames, funny YouTube videos, and my fantasy football lineups (though I would argue from my admittedly biased perspective that any one of these things is infinitely more important than Kardashian's marital status, especially anything pertaining to fantasy football).

Now, this isn't to say that other countries don't have their own escapist schlock meant only to distract – anyone who's seen Japanese game shows or Dutch reality TV can tell you as much. We Americans, however, take things to a whole other level in that our distractions from the news become news events themselves. Even the majority of our news programs, from fluffy human interests pieces to the partisan shouting matches on Fox "News," are meant to entertain.

And it is this Zeitgeist of constant distractions, I feel, that contributes to our national complacency more than anything else. People, when it comes down to it, would rather discuss Jersey Shore than political issues, and would rather shout about political issues than actually solve them. It's not that we, as a country, are unaware that our Social Security system is broken or that our budget is bloated or that our international power and prestige is waning – it's just that whenever public discourse is fixated on these issues for any appreciable amount of time, some new distraction comes along and derails whatever progress or hint of progress was made.

So come on, America, it's time to get your priorities in order. It's time to lay off the video games and the celebrity gossip and the reality TV, at least long enough to patch up our rickety infrastructure and dysfunctional financial institutions so that the next generation or two can have the luxury to banter about their own vapid, escapist drivel.

Think of your children, America, think of your children.

Email: eabenoit@buffalo.edu