More generally, I think it's a problem to everyone who thinks about democracy and popular culture, about how easily diverted popular attention can be by sensational news stories -- the "hot-button" issues -- and how difficult it often is to get people to focus on more complex issues, or even to consider the complexity that often underlies the hot-button topics.

We can all produce the short-list of hot-button topics. What do they all have in common? Well, for a start, sex and death, most often. Maybe money, sometimes. Maybe fame.

Is it elitist to dismiss these topics as merely sensational? After all, sex and death matter. Maybe there's something voyeuristic in the public fascination with, eg, the Simpson or the Bernardo trials; and yet in those stories there are embedded universal moral issues, universal human fears, the stuff of myth and legend. How can we not care about such stories?

And the implied point of your questions, skdadl:

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And where does thinking about and debating any of these issues in isolation take us? Any closer to a humane and creative reconception of democratic community and politics?

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namely, that thinking of these in isolation does not get us closer to this humane and creative reconception, is very well taken.

I've found reading about urban legends a very interesting approach to these questions. Urban legends are not necessarily false -- they may have substantial factual truth to them -- but they have much in common with the sensational stories we hear and read every day. Surprisingly often, these stories are urban legends, or variations thereon.

From the canonical definition:

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"An urban legend:

• appears mysteriously and spreads spontaneously in varying forms;
• contains elements of humor or horror (the horror often "punishes" someone who flouts society's conventions);
• makes good storytelling;
• does NOT have to be false, although most are. ULs often have a basis in fact, but it's their life after-the-fact (particularly in reference to the second and third points) that gives them particular interest.
  

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(This is the other essential UL site I know about).

So the study of urban legends, like that of sensational stories, is inherently political, to the extent the ULs have moral and therefore political content. (And as skdadl says, it often turns into a women's issue. Often enough, a UL involves a woman punished or humiliated in some way, typically for unconventional behaviour).

As for these stories being exploited by cynics, to distract or to anesthetize or to make ideological hay... just have a look at the "Rumours of War" section at www.snopes2.com, the second link above.

[ January 25, 2002: Message edited by: 'lance ]

Debating hot issues in isolation does nothing for the world. But sometimes, if one person's attention has been focussed on a topical problem long enough to take the mental (moral) step from the particular to the general, that person might take the next step - to action.

Heddy Fry-screwed up her facts but what she essentially said was correct. The media swarmed her.

Glen Clark-screwed up many things but couldn't get a deccent word from the press.

The picture of the 3 firefighters from the WTC that was to be made into a sculpture. When the artist decided to make it into a more "racially diverse" sculpture the outcry was deafening and the project was cancelled. (Personally I think they should have left it as all white males because with a couple of exceptions that's all they've hired. Also an exact duplicate of a sculpture from a photograph???-PATHETIC!!)

Ralph Klein. We all know what happened-he kicked butt at a homeless shelter and guess what?? he's depicted as a hero fighting his demons.

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A common theme to the "hot button" issues are an element of blame.

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Heddy Fry-screwed up her facts but what she essentially said was correct. The media swarmed her.

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A: Some people are racist in the city of XYZ. Therefore, the possibility of seeing burning crosses is not so remote.

B: Everyone in XYZ is racist. Therefore, the possibility of seeing burning crosses is not so remote.

A couple of months after Hedy Fry affair, a New Brunswick teenager has planted a burning cross in front of the house of a Black family. Surprise, surprise.

I see nothing scandalous about acknowledging that, since racism is alive and well, that particular expression of racism can happen again and is actually happening. Hedy Fry has lost all credibility not by saying that, but by inventing a "letter from the Prince George mayor" and apparently lying about how "he contacted her and told her about burning crosses in P.G."

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What bullshit -- do you really think that in Prince George everyone is racist, out there burning crosses on their front lawns! Utter tripe!

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Racism, for example has been discussed - a lot! - under various headings, most commonly, a quote in the news. It's easy to stick labels on persons or places - or to reject labels. I don't think we could ever keep our eyes on the ball long enough to understand racism, why it exists, or how it works.

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But those hypocrites also exist along Commercial Drive, sipping their lattes in boho garb....

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Those hypocrites also exist in these forums-trying to portray themselves as leftist enlightened people all the while spewing right wing dribble.

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It's easy to stick labels on persons or places - or to reject labels. I don't think we could ever keep our eyes on the ball long enough to understand racism, why it exists, or how it works.

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Maybe it's true that some topics get hot-buttoned quickly and regularly because, for some reason, people feel an urgent need to blame and punish someone, anyone, as soon as certain issues arise.

When I say "hot-buttoned," I mean the phone-in show or tabloid treatment that we can all predict for certain news stories as soon as we first hear of them. All callers must be 100 per cent Yes or 100 per cent No, or they are just too wimpy to live -- dreaded "moral relativists," probably ...

That problems need fixing, that's one thing. That someone (and often, by implication, a whole raft of fellow travellers) must be found instantly guilty, pilloried, punished -- that seems to me at least some of the time another.

I don't deny that I in my own small corner regularly want to see someone (usually someone powerful) held accountable for many things. But regularly we get more heated than that: we want denunciations; we want punishment. And we want it faster, hotter, on some turfs than on others.

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But those hypocrites also exist along Commercial Drive, sipping their lattes in boho garb....

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No doubt there are some racists along Commercial Drive but they'd be in the minority and if they were around for long they'd be challenged on their views. No so in the Hinterlands-racism is a form of bonding with many of the people there and it mostly goes unchallenged. The racists also hold on to much of the power in some of these small towns and cities and make life miserable for anyone who's not a Conservanazi.

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Hey G-Girl -- how do you define "Hinterland"? Any part of B.C. that isn't downtown Vancouver (preferably Commercial Drive?) Racism isn't a function of geographic location, to the best of my knowledge (if so, you're on to a PhD thesis, perhaps). It is linked to education and other socio-economic factors. I've lived in the Interior of B.C., and contrary to what Ms. Hedy Fry asserts, there are no more racists outside of Vancouver than within Vancouver. I'll bet a few years ago I'd find way more skin-head racists within Greater Vancouver, on a per-capita basis, than in, say, Revelstoke.

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What is the impulse to punish? I understand why many people might need to be restrained -- but why punished? Who seeks to punish, and why?

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Very hard questions. I can do no better than suppose that to many people, the moral order is somehow inherently insecure and threatened -- thus a panicky impulse to punishment, seemingly disproportionate because exactly proportionate to the person's, or group's, sense of insecurity.

Or perhaps, this sense of insecurity, even if present, isn't to the point, and the belief is that a moral order simply can't function without punishment-- either pour encourager les autres, or because punishment is demanded in some absolute, deontological sense, quite independent of deterrence.

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Hey G-Girl -- how do you define "Hinterland"? Any part of B.C. that isn't downtown Vancouver (preferably Commercial Drive?)

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Hey Twilight

Nope I wouldn't define Hinterland as anywhere besides Commercial Drive. You were the one that brought up the Drive. I won't be defending the racists in the Greater Vancouver area-I know there's plenty of them-there's also plenty of the "polite racists" there-the ones who don't make blatantly racist comments but only hire white people, never challenge blatant racism when they hear it and are continually angry about the advances marginalized people have made.

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I've lived in the Interior of B.C., and contrary to what Ms. Hedy Fry asserts, there are no more racists outside of Vancouver than within Vancouver.

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I doubt you can ever accurately measure that. I've lived a substantial part of my life in both the Lower Mainland and the Interior I've noticed a far greater ratio of racists in the rural parts of BC than I noticed in Vancouver. Rural BC is almost entirely Alliance federally with some ridings voting over 70% Alliance. The Alliance just lost Joe Peschisolido because he was disgusted over the handling of the racist comments by Roy Bailey.

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But it's a major jump to say that all those folks are racists.

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'lance made a heck of a good start on why we need to punish. Here is another aspect:
Every time there is a fire or major accident, we do a whole big inquest (inquisition) on how it happened and how it could have been prevented... read: whom to blame. The fallacy is in the assumption that if somebody gets blamed (and punished) it won't happen again. False sense of security. Illusion of control. No attempt at understanding that we sometimes act stupidly because we're only human, or accepting that we can't ever be 100% safe.