King, Larry

Image by Preston Kemp via Flickr

Larry King (1933-) was a popular nighttime CNN interviewer on Larry King Live, who, at his peak, arguably became something of the world’s first TV Father-Confessor.

Born in Brooklyn, New York as the son of a bar owner, when King was nine years old his father died and his mother supported him and his younger brother through welfare. Perhaps the proverbial school of hard knocks contributed to King’s ability to ask tough questions while appearing to remain non-judgmental.

In his latter years at CNN he was criticized for not doing enough research prior to his interviews. And some said that he was too passive, representing an old school of journalism that no longer applies to the 21st century. Admirers, however, saw King as letting interviewees speak for themselves. Instead of seeing him as overly passive, they saw him as neutral and non-judgmental.

King embraced the latter view, saying that he “only asked the questions,” as if to imply that the type of questioned asked (and the tone in which they were asked) didn’t send out some kind of message in itself. Critics would say that they did. Admirers would say that King left things as open-ended as possible.

Regardless of the reasons for his leaving CNN, his legacy remains, and Piers Morgan, the new host appearing on King’s old timeslot, has a pretty tough act to follow.

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Loki

Star Trek: The Original Series episode Let That Be Your Last Battlefield © 1969 Paramount Pictures, produced by Gene Roddenberry. Click on photo for fair use rationale via Wikipedia

In Norse myth Loki is the son of two giants and confounded the gods with various tricks until, after bringing about the death of Balder, was fastened to a rock. On the day of Ragnarok Loki will break free and lead the giants into a terrible war against the gods.

The American scholar Bergen Evans sees Loki as an evil god in Norse myth with parallels to the Old Testament Satan as depicted in the Book of Job. Others see Loki more as a trickster and as a reversibly transsexual shapeshifter.

Loki (or Lokai) is also a TV character in the original 1969 Star Trek episode, “Let That Be Your Last Battlefield,” a classic episode dealing with the inanity of racism. Loki is a non-human who’s half white and half black. Meanwhile, another non-human character, Bele, is also half white and half black but in the reverse symmetry to Loki,

Like Lokai, Bele is half black and half white, with the color divided by a line through the exact center of his face. However, the sides of Bele’s black and white skin are reversed from those of Lokai, a difference which seems inconsequential to the Enterprise crew but of great importance to Bele, Lokai, and, apparently, their civilization. The difference is pointed out by Bele to a perplexed Captain Kirk who asks what is the difference between them, to which he replies, “Isn’t it obvious? Lokai is white on the right side. All his people are white on the right side.”¹

As mentioned in other Think Free entires, part of Star Trek’s popularity arguably rests on its liberal use, reinterpretation and reimagining of mythological characters and their names. Possibly this elicits a kind of numinous resonance within viewers, perhaps even if they don’t consciously know about the mythology in question. As C. G. Jung and Joseph Campbell suggest, mythic ideas and sounds may resonate within the viewer’s subconscious or unconscious mind.

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¹ See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_That_Be_Your_Last_Battlefield

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Athleticism

Athleticism In 1973 a Canadian not-for-profit private company called Participaction ran TV messages, similar in style to commercial ads, calling viewers to get physical exercise.

One segment claimed the average 30-year-old Canadian was in similar physical condition to the average 60-year-old Swede.

The ad had significant impact across Canada while years later it was suggested that

This was pure fiction. No one had any real evidence for this assertion other than international fitness comparisons that put the Swedish population well ahead of Canada and everyone else.

Source » “Bring Back the 60-year old Swede!”

TV viewers in Canada continue to watch newer ads, such as Body Break (1989-), which advocate an active lifestyle.

Michel Foucault and other sociologists argue that discourses about the body often hide behind their innocuous and benevolent exterior a marked political agenda–the legitimization of a social system that claims to ‘scientifically’ improve society.

From this perspective, scientific and medical discourses focusing on personal health tend to deflect public attention from pressing environmental matters–such as toxic waste.

The same has been said with regard to aspects of discourse about crime and mental illness. The emphasis on personal remedies arguably eclipses the need to address greater societal maladies.

This seems especially so with minority groups and the economic poor. “Decadent rap music” and “drugs,” for example, are often singled out as factors contributing to higher crime rates and mental illness among youths within visible minority groups. But often overlooked is systemic racism and the significant stressors encountered by so-called “have-nots” living in societies marked by sharp economic disparity.

A New Testament view of athleticism, often ignored by Christians, presents another extreme perspective that differs from contemporary wisdom:

For bodily discipline is only of little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things, since it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come (1 Timothy 4:8).

» Poststructuralism, Scientism

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