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Coming after Oprah: Cultural Fallout in the Age of the TV Talk Show

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The disturbing anomie of "trash TV"
and its connection to
multi-billion dollar corporate media
consolidation are given a brilliantly-argued
treatment in this concisely-written book.
The authors have produced a clarion call-to-arms
warning us of the dangers of
coagulating media moguldom.

While occasionally marred by
ideological partisanship, the authors' description of the
interconnected web of toxic TV talk shows
and the desolate value-vacuum of a society ravaged
by a culture war is dead-accurate.

Worth the price of admission alone
is the chapter on the rules of the trash talk
show game wherein millionaire "hosts"
act as tabloid ringmasters, flogging
pathetic, often desperate "guests"
into a confessional frenzy.

The diagnosis is clear, but what
is the cure? Abt and Mustazza quixotically call for
government re-regulation, licensure of media
professionals and taxation.
But the sickness outlined here goes beyond
any political solutions.

All told, a classic illustration of
Marshall McLuhan's prophetic vision of the media
as extensions of the human sensorium
and the way new media effect changes
that are never value-neutral