NPR -getting harder to listen to opinion shows

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The discussion centers around frustrations with NPR's opinion shows, particularly the Diane Rehm Show, where callers often present ill-informed or nonsensical views on various topics. Critics express concern over the lack of pushback from guests against these callers, which they believe diminishes the quality of discourse. Specific examples include callers making absurd suggestions about home oil refineries, questioning the existence of plastic in the ocean, and dismissing the internet as a fad. The host's handling of these callers is criticized, with some arguing that her age and condition may affect her performance. The conversation also touches on the broader implications of opinion shows, suggesting they can mislead audiences into equating opinions with factual news. Overall, there is a call for higher standards in public discourse and a desire for hosts to challenge misinformation more directly.
FlexGunship
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Oh my science... I literally can't turn NPR on anymore during lunch. The opinion shows have turned to pure garage. Usually the Diane Rehm Show is on when I go to lunch, and it's never her guests that are the problem, it's her and the absurd callers. Worse still, the guest on the show almost NEVER calls anyone to task for being such an idiot.

I sometimes make a Google+ post (or Buzz) about something particularly stupid I hear, so here are a few real winners:

Topic: Rising Cost of Oil - A caller asks: "one of the reasons why oil is so expensive is becasue they build such huge refineries. If we all just had a small refinery at home then we could purchase the crude ourselves and make gasoline without the middle man. Why aren't these home refineries available?"

There's so much wrong with this. The economy of scale drives DOWN the cost of products. Furthermore, do you know how difficult it is to refine crude into gasoline?! The byproducts alone would kill you in a week if an explosion doesn't get you sooner.

Topic: Plastic in the Pacific Ocean - A caller says: "I've been as much as 50 miles off the coast of Cape Cod and I've never seen a big patch of plastic in the ocean."

Okay, wrong ocean... and he never mentioned a "patch of plastic." I can just imagine the caller standing in his kitchen with a smug look on his face and his hands on his hips.

Topic: Plastic in the Pacific Ocean - A caller asks if we're going to have to start filtering our drinking water because there's so much plastic in the Pacific Ocean.

I actually turned off the radio at this point. Have you been known to drink a lot of sea water? Even fresh water goes through an incredible amount of filtering and treatment before it gets to you. Desalination plants don't even generate drinking water, do they? And if they do, I'm sure it's CLEAN! It's not like the filtering process is ONLY going to leave chunks of plastic in your water. There's sewage in the ocean and you're worried about plastic?

Topic: Reducing Emission in Cars - A caller suggests we go back to the "simpler engines" of the 60s because he doesn't remember there ever being emissions problems with his Dodge Dart. The cause of all the problems must be the electronics they put in new cars.

No comment.

Topic: Air Travel Safety - A caller calls for no other reason to scold everyone for flying as a form of travel... in defiance of her god. She goes on to claim that 9/11 was punishment for human flight before she is disconnected.

Meh... maybe. I've heard crazier...

Topic: The Internet (and specifically infrastructure) - A caller suggests that the internet is just a fad and that once enough people get ripped off by having their credit card numbers stolen it'll go away. "There's no reason to worry about internet infrastructure, we won't need it in 20 years."

What do you say to a person in such strong denial? I imagine she lived in a cabin in the woods and still believes the telephone is a fad.Anyone else listen to this stuff? It's been getting progressively worse and worse.
 
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That's pretty bad.
 
Evo said:
That's pretty bad.

The two worst things about it are (1) the guest on the show never just says "oh, that's a really stupid thing you just said," and (2) these people can probably vote.
 
FlexGunship said:
The two worst things about it are (1) the guest on the show never just says "oh, that's a really stupid thing you just said," and (2) these people can probably vote.
#2 Is what really scares me.
 
FlexGunship said:
Topic: The Internet (and specifically infrastructure) - A caller suggests that the internet is just a fad and that once enough people get ripped off by having their credit card numbers stolen it'll go away. "There's no reason to worry about internet infrastructure, we won't need it in 20 years."

How can a radio show host respond to that without telling the person that they are wrong, and still maintain an ounce of credibility?
 
Evo said:
#2 Is what really scares me.

If you get a chance, listen to the Diane Rehm show tomorrow. Here, in NH, it's on from 11 of the clock to noon of the clock.

Today, Diane had something to say about glass... I haven't the faintest idea what it was. Her guest was raising concerns about plastic in the ocean, and she says: "What about glass?" That was her entire question... her guest was caught a little off guard and went on to say that glass is more expensive than plastic, and it creates dangerous fragments if it's dropped, it's made from silicon (technically silicon dioxide)... basically just looking for anything to say about it.

dacruick said:
How can a radio show host respond to that without telling the person that they are wrong, and still maintain an ounce of credibility?

To be fair, Diane Rehm is older than the star that went supernova and created the atomic copper from which wires today are made on the recently (from her perspective) cooled Earth.

Diane Rehm is old, is what I'm getting at. Her guest on the other hand certainly should have slapped that caller down. For sure.
 
FlexGunship said:
the guest on the show never just says "oh, that's a really stupid thing you just said,

I was once listening to an interview of singer Monica Mancini, who is composer Henry Mancini's daughter. She was asked, "One thing I just got to know - in Moon River, what on Earth is a huckleberry friend?" She replied, "I think you'll have to ask Johnny Mercer's daughter that."

(For those of you born after 1975, Johnny Mercer was the lyricist)
 
I don't quite know why NPR is trying to emulate right wing talk radio. Right wing talk radio makes right wingers look real dumb. All that NPR has proven here is that left wing talk radio makes left wingers look just as dumb as their right wing counterparts. Nobody seems to have grasped the simple rule that giving a million people a voice doesn't add necessarily add one iota to the quality of the dialog.

They should have just asked us at PF to do the math for them. It's real simple math:

1,000,000 × 0 = __________
 
At least you can still get fair news from NPR during the news hours. I don't listen to DR anymore, but I used to. She used to be good... she wouldn't let her callers or her guests get away with anything. But I presume she's better at non-scientific studies. She should stick to policies and governmental issues rather than anything too technical. Typically, there's never enough time in any news show to go over what needs to be said in order to make an accurate statement about anything scientific.
 
  • #10
I like this show: http://www.npr.org/2011/11/01/141803766/interrupting-violence-with-the-message-dont-shoot

I heard it this afternoon while driving home from the mountains. "In Cincinnati, for example, there are about 60 defined gang groups with about 1,500 members. [The people] representing less than half a percentage point of the city's population are associated with 75 percent of all of Cincinnati's killings," he says. "And no matter where you go, that's the fact."

So, if just ten percent of the entire population stood up against them, the gangs would be outnumbered 20:1. If you're interested, you ought to read what they did to combat the problem.

It proved effective.
 
  • #11
D H said:
I don't quite know why NPR is trying to emulate right wing talk radio. Right wing talk radio makes right wingers look real dumb. All that NPR has proven here is that left wing talk radio makes left wingers look just as dumb as their right wing counterparts. Nobody seems to have grasped the simple rule that giving a million people a voice doesn't add necessarily add one iota to the quality of the dialog.

They should have just asked us at PF to do the math for them. It's real simple math:

1,000,000 × 0 = __________
I tend not to listen to talk radio shows simply because not the brightest folks call in with an opinion, and it seems the same people call in regular to share their lack of wisdom, as well as their inability to think critically, if they can think at all.

I did however call into a talk show on the regional public radio station when the same guy called into the show after having called in earlier that morning for a shorter call in spot. Since I had not called in before, I was one of those selected for a slot to discuss the topic. So I spent my time correcting the BS (misinformation and misrepresentation) that he had been spewing. The host of the show then proceeded to ask me question, more like an interview. He invited me to participate in a debate, but apparently changed his mind thereafter, since he didn't follow up with me.
 
  • #12
Oh, here's another gem that I found from a year ago:

Topic: Making Nuclear Power Safer -A caller informs both Diane and her guest that he gets his electricity "from the wall" and he doesn't see why that's not good enough for everyone else. I don't remember it perfectly, but I also have a note here that says he become confrontational when questioned a bit further.

Yeah, so... that might be one of the reasons why so many people seem to protest every kind of power plant (even wind, lately).
 
  • #13
Wall power is my favorite kind of power too... and its clean!
 
  • #14
Mororvia said:
Wall power is my favorite kind of power too... and its clean!
Yeah, I've used wall power all of my life.
 
  • #15
I use pure, organically grown wall-power.
 
  • #16
I so loathe and detest Diane Rehm that it makes me cringe when I surf through her show accidentally. I find it astounding that you can listen to HER much less to her moronic guests.
 
  • #17
phinds said:
I so loathe and detest Diane Rehm that it makes me cringe when I surf through her show accidentally. I find it astounding that you can listen to HER much less to her moronic guests.
Why is she on? Can't people start a write in campaign to raise the bar and lower the boom on her?
 
  • #18
I've often thought about calling in and stating (truthfully) that I would contribute a couple of hundred dollars if they would fire her, but I never have.
 
  • #19
Someone needs to record a bunch of stupid callers so they can be played for students in my class to show how stupid people are.
 
  • #20
Evo said:
Why is she on? Can't people start a write in campaign to raise the bar and lower the boom on her?

The people who call into her show are also probably the same people who actually spend time writing their politicians about the content on the radio channel their taxes pay for. That is why I am thinking she is being "polite" to said people.
 
  • #21
phinds said:
I've often thought about calling in and stating (truthfully) that I would contribute a couple of hundred dollars if they would fire her, but I never have.

I did that with Carl Brady (the NHPR fundraiser guy), because every time he said the phone number, which started 1-888- his voice would get SUPER nasally on the eights (think plugging your nose and yelling). It was so bad that I called in an said I would donate if they told him to speak in a more normal tone.

I don't know if I had any effect, but he doesn't do it anymore.

Pengwuino said:
Someone needs to record a bunch of stupid callers so they can be played for students in my class to show how stupid people are.

You don't have to record them, just listen to ANY show. You don't have to plan it or anything.
 
  • #22
TheStatutoryApe said:
The people who call into her show are also probably the same people who actually spend time writing their politicians about the content on the radio channel their taxes pay for. That is why I am thinking she is being "polite" to said people.

Have you ever LISTENED to her? You COULD be right, but I think she's polite to them just 'cause she's an idiot.
 
  • #23
Most of the people hosting these radio shows are morons, IMO. They are filling air-time to keep their jobs, and they are less concerned with accuracy and good content than with controversy and banter. Look at Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer. Can anybody stand to watch the "idiocy on parade" that they and their producers serve up?
 
  • #24
turbo said:
Most of the people hosting these radio shows are morons, IMO. They are filling air-time to keep their jobs, and they are less concerned with accuracy and good content than with controversy and banter. Look at Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer. Can anybody stand to watch the "idiocy on parade" that they and their producers serve up?

I think NPR opinion shows (and Fox opinion shows) are more dangerous because people seem to mentally equate them with news. In fact, most gripes with "Fox News" are really with the million opinion shows they run each day. The same is true of NPR. NPR is the best news reporting agency in the U.S. in my opinion, but their opinion shows make them look like crazy left-wing terrorists.

Today she's doing a show on Greece's upcoming austerity referendum, and something about someone who wrote a memoir.
 
  • #25
turbo said:
Most of the people hosting these radio shows are morons, IMO. They are filling air-time to keep their jobs, and they are less concerned with accuracy and good content than with controversy and banter. Look at Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer. Can anybody stand to watch the "idiocy on parade" that they and their producers serve up?

Although I agree w/ you about those two, I have not found any problem with any of the other hosts on NPR and I've only have to grit my teeth a LITTLE bit with the hosts on POTUS, none on the BBC or CNN, so as a rule, I disagree w/ you.
 
  • #26
phinds said:
Although I agree w/ you about those two, I have not found any problem with any of the other hosts on NPR and I've only have to grit my teeth a LITTLE bit with the hosts on POTUS, none on the BBC or CNN, so as a rule, I disagree w/ you.
I wish we could clone Bill Moyers. He was never one to play the "moderator" and invite a right-wing flack and a left-wing flack onto his show and let them duke it out, like Gwen Ifill and other lightweights. By the time guests came to his tapings, he had more insight into the potential results of their positions than the guests themselves had. I found that quite refreshing, and would watch programming like that all day, if it was available.
 
  • #27
turbo said:
I wish we could clone Bill Moyers. He was never one to play the "moderator" and invite a right-wing flack and a left-wing flack onto his show and let them duke it out, like Gwen Ifill and other lightweights. By the time guests came to his tapings, he had more insight into the potential results of their positions than the guests themselves had. I found that quite refreshing, and would watch programming like that all day, if it was available.

No argument there.
 
  • #28
FlexGunship said:
I think NPR opinion shows (and Fox opinion shows) are more dangerous because people seem to mentally equate them with news. In fact, most gripes with "Fox News" are really with the million opinion shows they run each day. The same is true of NPR. NPR is the best news reporting agency in the U.S. in my opinion, but their opinion shows make them look like crazy left-wing terrorists.

Today she's doing a show on Greece's upcoming austerity referendum, and something about someone who wrote a memoir.

So you think Megan Kelly is out to lunch?
 
  • #29
Mororvia said:
Wall power is my favorite kind of power too... and its clean!

Evo said:
Yeah, I've used wall power all of my life.

Pengwuino said:
I use pure, organically grown wall-power.
Wall power is not sustainable! You Americans and your big walls. What if everyone wanted a wall? Wake up sheeple!
 
  • #30
mheslep said:
Wall power is not sustainable! You Americans and your big walls. What if everyone wanted a wall? Wake up sheeple!

Do you know how big the CEO of Lutron's house is?! You're just feeding his pockets every time you install a wall outlet. Forget big oil... down with big wall outlet!
 
  • #31
I think that the show and the callers have been misrepresented.

But see for yourself; here is the transcript of what the OP is calling "idiotic."
DR show said:
JOHN
11:40:38
I've been sailing the Pacific Ocean for the past 20-some years, back and forth between China, the Islands and California. And a number of us out there have always heard about this garbage patch out in the middle of the Pacific, but none of us have ever seen it. And we've pretty much gone up and down every latitude due to different weather conditions, but we've never seen this garbage patch.
MOORE
11:41:03
What's the height of your deck off the water?
JOHN
11:41:08
Oh, probably 100 feet.
MOORE
11:41:10
Yeah, well, see I'm six feet off the water. And so I see these little things floating by, but when we talk about a garbage patch, we're not expecting you to see things touching each other. We're not expecting you to see a mat of trash on the ocean. What we're talking about is maybe one piece per square meter and, at that, maybe the size of a quarter or smaller or a little larger. That's predominately what's out there.
MOORE
11:41:37
So you get out up 100 feet off the water, it's really tough to see this stuff, but, yeah, I mean, you're not saying …
JOHN
11:41:42
Well, I'll been through the Mediterranean and it's really obvious. You know, you go through the Straits of Gibraltar and that is really bad there, but …
MOORE
11:41:51
Yeah.
JOHN
11:41:51
… in the middle of the Pacific, it's relatively clean. I mean, you see some flotsam and jetsam now and then, but nothing that you'd call a garbage patch.
MOORE
11:42:00
Yeah, well, that's a very good point. You don't need a gyre to create a mess in the Mediterranean because you've just got a tiny little outlet. So, yeah, anything that gets thrown into the Med is going to get stuck there. And you've got an older civilization, you know. Asia just came on board with embracing the consumer lifestyle in the last decade. So they're just starting to generate more of this stuff.

REHM
11:53:58
What about glass? What about glass? What happens to glass?
MOORE
11:54:02
Glass breaks. It has sharp shards. People drop stuff and it causes a big problem, but glass is remarkably inert when it comes to food contact. So it's a wonderful way to deliver beverages.
REHM
11:54:15
But what happens to it when it gets into the ocean, if you reverted to glass?
MOORE
11:54:21
Well, it's certainly not going to biodegrade. What's going to happen is it's going to become part of the Earth's crust, which is from whence it came. Silicon is a very major part of the Earth's crust. Glass is made from sand and it's not a pollutant, as such. It's quite inert. So it's not a big problem.

I think someone has grossly misrepresented what he heard.

But maybe I am wrong.
See the whole transcript and please point out to me the idiots.
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2...l-outlook-plastic-pollution-oceans/transcript
 
  • #32
Chi Meson said:
I think that the show and the callers have been misrepresented.

I suspect that transcript has been cleaned up appreciably. That's much more intelligible than the conversation I heard on the radio.
 
  • #33
Flex,

Your description of what was said does not even fit into the same ballpark as what was on the transcript. There's "clean-up," and then there's "change completely."

And I just listened to the recording of that show. The transcript is precise.
 
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  • #34
Where else but NPR's Science Friday could you hear a discussion of Phys. Rev. Lett. 107, 191101 (2011)?

Here it is: http://www.sciencefriday.com/program/archives/201111043 .
 
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  • #35
Thanks, DH.

We won't find that for a long time (infinity!) on the commercial networks.
 
  • #37
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  • #38
kings7 said:
What do you mean by 'out to lunch'? I think I know, but it's not an idiom that's used with any frequency in my part of the world.

Out to lunch means her BRAIN is out to lunch (as opposed to being in her head where it might do some good).
 
  • #39
you guys are hating on Diane Rehm because she has spasmodic dysphonia. that's why she sounds like a woman with one foot in the grave. this is really about peoples' willingness to tolerate those with disabilities. if you're that impatient, change the channel.
 
  • #40
Proton Soup said:
you guys are hating on Diane Rehm because she has spasmodic dysphonia. that's why she sounds like a woman with one foot in the grave. this is really about peoples' willingness to tolerate those with disabilities. if you're that impatient, change the channel.

Woah, I don't think so at all. In fact, I think it kind of takes a lot of courage to continue doing what she does in light of a condition that must be frustrating (or, more rarely, embarrassing). I was simply talking about the content... specifically, the fact that sometimes there are very ignorant callers which are treated seriously.

Chi Meson has already provided a counterpoint. He seems to be of the opinion that I've intentionally embarked on a crusade to misrepresent what I heard on the radio, however, and the bare minimum we can say that SOME people (me, specifically) find SOME callers obnoxious and ignorant. I'm entitled to my viewpoint, and even if the transcript doesn't give Chi the same impression I got, my impression is still an impression that SOME audience members get. Fact.

I also cited a specific case where Diane, herself, asked a question that I considered to be WAY off topic which led to a discussion that contributed nothing to the show.

I hope our Mesonic friend will grant me some freedom to hold my opinion on this issue; the transcript does NOT strike me as an accurate representation of the way those two portions of the show went. The guest on the show was making serious points about the biodegradability and re-usability of plastic when asked about glass. Regardless of how the transcript reads, the man was taken aback, had to pause a long time, and them stumbled through a checklist of 5th-grade facts about glass.

Maybe my impatience and displeasure comes SPECIFICALLY from the fact that the guests are often of such high academic caliber that no lay person could be expected to contribute significantly to a conversation with them on their topic. Furthermore, every caller seems to have some personal agenda... I know it's an opinion show, but I also know that some opinion shows are pretty great, not because I agree with them, but because the content and discussion holds high integrity.

If you routinely listen to Diane Rehm (and for the last four years I have listened on my lunch break) you will notice the same things that I do: ignorant callers and a sometimes-lost host.
 
  • #41
FlexGunship said:
If you routinely listen to Diane Rehm (and for the last four years I have listened on my lunch break)...

Why would you DO that to yourself? Can you not find something better on some other channel during your lunch break?
 
  • #43
Chi Meson said:
Flex,

I made no assumptions about your intent. Grant me the same.

And not only the transcript, but the recording disagrees with your recollection of this particular show.

Why doesn't everyone take a listen? Go here and click "Listen."
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2011-11-01/environmental-outlook-plastic-pollution-oceans

i've listened, and i don't see what the issue is, either. maybe the post-production that goes into most NPR shows (where stutters and pauses are edited out to give the appearance of amazing speakers with instant perfect recall) has set some unreasonable expectations.

and flex, i don't see that anyone is denying your right to an opinion. i think maybe you're being a little irrational and projecting something onto the conversation that others aren't perceiving.
 
  • #44
phinds said:
Why would you DO that to yourself? Can you not find something better on some other channel during your lunch break?

Specifically because I disagree with a lot of what is on the show. If you can't stand to listen to the opposition, then you're not being fair. I've made a honest attempt to listen for a long time, this thread is about my thinning patience.

Chi Meson said:
Flex,

I made no assumptions about your intent. Grant me the same.

And not only the transcript, but the recording disagrees with your recollection of this particular show.

Well, I'm willing to be wrong, but that's still an isolated incident compared to something that I feel is a growing trend. I listened to the show from the introduction of the guest until the incident above. The guest was intelligent and knowledgeable, although he suffered from the same exact condition as every other guest: because-this-is-my-problem-it-is-clearly-the-most-serious-and-most-important-problem-of-all-problems syndrome.

And I apologize for being confrontational. I was NOT intentionally misrepresenting how I felt during the show, but I accept that memories are sometimes changed through reinforcement... however, I remember turning off the radio and accepting silence as a preferable alternative.

Proton Soup said:
i've listened, and i don't see what the issue is, either. maybe the post-production that goes into most NPR shows (where stutters and pauses are edited out to give the appearance of amazing speakers with instant perfect recall) has set some unreasonable expectations.

and flex, i don't see that anyone is denying your right to an opinion. i think maybe you're being a little irrational and projecting something onto the conversation that others aren't perceiving.

Maybe. I listen to the show every day at lunch. It used to be an intellectual exercise (like watching ghost hunting shows); "if you can't figure out why they're wrong, then you have no reason to hold your position above theirs."

That being said, my enjoyment of the kind of inner-discourse-dialogue I invent in my head has been growing smaller and smaller. From host-induced non-sequiturs to blatantly ignorant callers, the show has become harder to listen to. As NHPR is fond of saying during their fund-raisers, I used to have "driveway moments" where I wouldn't get out of the car so I could hear the end of Diane's show.

Now I don't. Now I can barely stand to listen to the entire show.

Maybe it's a change in my attitude, but it is really getting harder to listen to opinion shows on NPR. I don't consider myself stupid or intolerant (I'm listening to a show with a political slant I specifically disagree with... that's got to count as open-minded), there must be other people who feel the same way.
 
  • #45
FlexGunship said:
Specifically because I disagree with a lot of what is on the show. If you can't stand to listen to the opposition, then you're not being fair. I've made a honest attempt to listen for a long time, this thread is about my thinning patience.
.

Although I agree w/ you completely, I don't consider her "the opposition" so see no need to subject myself to her. I DO, for exactly the reason you state, subject myself to Fox News and MSNBC. I don't exactly think of MSNBC as "the opposition" in their point of view (for me, that's Fox), but the utterly rabid way they express it, I find really awful.
 
  • #46
OKay, at lunch today I listened to the show about bats which was good. I have no real complaints. It was handled well, the callers were good, and Diane had only one question that seemed a bit silly. I made a point to take a quick note on my cellphone when I heard it.

They were discussing a fungus which seems to be killing bats during their hibernation. There is a loose link (the evidence was barely discussed) between humans going caving and the spread of this fungus. Diane asked the following question:

DR: "Do you think the bats will ever integrate the fungus into their genome [...]?"
Guest: "Uh... I don't think that will happen, but..."

Now, we can assume she meant, "could bats evolve to resist the spread of the fungus?" That would be a fantastic question and one of her two guests would likely have something to say about it. But that question never got asked, and neither guest provided an answer from an evolutionary biological standpoint. Maybe they weren't equipped, but no one even said: "I don't know if the gene pool in these bat communities is diverse enough for that to happen."

I know I'm nit-picking. But it seemed like a relevant example that will show itself in the transcript just fine. As always, read the pacing and topic flow leading up to the question to judge if it was appropriate.
 
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