The orator is a product of Taiwan's fast-food TV style. Before and after the presidential election, orators displayed their magic on talk shows. They aroused emotions, hot words adding fuel to bitter controversies dividing the nation.
Taiwan is a complex society, facing challenges like the information explosion, the blue-green political split, the struggle between bulls and bears on the stock market and wide-ranging changes in many areas of life. People need guidance, and it is in response to this need that orators have become popular.
Those who examine the talk-show phenomenon will find that these media personalities share some characteristics. They have a sharp and poisonous tongue, gall and a thick skin. They can succeed on any TV station, earning lots of money, even becoming influential in the political arena.
An orator knows just about everything there is to know. Normal people have a speciality, and they have to begin with the basics before going on to more specialized knowledge. An orator, however, knows everything, an illusion maintained by always staying one step ahead. There is nothing on which they will not pass judgment. They display their limitless talent to its best advantage on talk shows, where people routinely talk big without having to prove their arguments or take responsibility for their words.
Twisted logic is another part of their style. One reason they have become so influential is that they dare to draw conclusions others would not.
For example, examine the statement that "the number of votes for [Chinese Nationalist Party Chairman] Lien Chan (連戰) and [People First Party Chairman] James Soong (宋楚瑜) together with the number of invalid votes exceed the number of votes
for President Chen Shui-bian (
Orators also tend to frequently use the phrase "reasonable doubt" to qualify their conclusions. But depending on their ideological agendas and the number of talk shows they appear on, this sometimes looks more like "unreasonable doubt," just as they tend to determine that a crime was committed before looking for any evidence one was committed. The more unreasonable their doubts are, the more they create baseless accusations and rumors.
People expect too much of orators, and this explains their fame and their unneccessary exaggerations. The late French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu
said talk shows should invite
knowledgeable people who are unknown to the public, but that people in general are incapable of thinking under stress. TV requires speed, and programs therefore only host these "fast thinkers." These people are only capable of providing preconceived ideas acceptable to
everyone, a sort of predigested thinking.
It is this emphasis on fast-food culture that has kept Taiwan from having a serious debate program such as the US' Nightline or Firing Line. In Taiwan, the faces of the same few orators keep appearing across the media, participating in closed forums that offer a parody of true debate. In other "debates," program hosts decide who should speak while orators of every hue maintain a calm and formal demeanor. In either case, there is no exchange of views that would give audiences have a chance to make rational decisions based on facts.
Will Taiwan allow these orators to continue to throw their weight about? This question should figure prominently in post-election media reform.
Lu Shih-xiang is chief executive officer of the Foundation for the Advancement of Media Excellence.
Translated by Perry Svensson
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