Oh, you think *that's* bad?!?

Tamara made an amusing rant about how the local Knoxville rag felt the need to post on the front page an ongoing story about teens at a party having alcohol. Some jeering might have occured.

The editor got wind of it, and responded that this is what the people are interested in.

And it's true that this time of year is a rather pertinent time to discuss teen drinking. If you've not seen any yet, brace yourselves for the late-May/early-June series of stories that will follow the seemingly inevitable, unfortunately ubiquitous, alcohol-related teen fatalities, most of which feature the Salt Of The Earth kids who Had Their Whole Lives Ahead Of Them, and who Had A Real Bright Future. Shoot, talk about your "Sun Rises!" headline. But they'll be there, and they'll be legitimate news, too. I've bought papers just to read such stories.

But my wife cautioned me to stop yelling at the television lest I wake up the children one night, as I was getting ready for work. I want to say it was our local Fox affiliate (but I may be wrong) which ran, toward the end of its regular news broadcast, a segment, which ran for every bit of two minutes, on "Neuticles."

These are artificial testicles for neutered dogs and cats and bulls and horses. Why make them? Why, because they give the poor boy back his confidence, and make him feel better about himself after he's been physically altered by being neutered. The story featured a relatively legthy interview/voiceover with an owner, while showing footage of his bull terrier. . . complete with zoom-in footage of the canine's scrotum.

My hand to Gawd, I'm telling the truth.

I'm not talking about one of those quick, almost subliminal flashes of a view; I'm talking lingering, changing perspective views, to give the viewer a look at the surgical scar, as well. Talk about your "well I really hadn't expected to see that over my evening coffee" moments.

Apparently, the war in Iraq wasn't worth spending time on. Nobody saved anyone's life. There were no life-saving medical discoveries. No insights into the war on terror. Nothing else that could pre-empt a story on the amazing efficacy of ovoid chunks of variously firm silicone in restoring Fido's life vigor. That two minutes was NEWS, by golly! If a 30 minute broadcast only gets 24 minutes of content due to commercials, we were watching 8.5% of it drain sickeningly down the drain, as this schlock. I will spare you the photos or the direct video.

Mom was a journalist with a large regional newspaper, and apparently her questions about the difference between the definition of what's "news" and what's "entertainment" were passed on to me, somewhat.

Just because people are interested doesn't make it newsworthy.

News hound.