the universe!

(Joshua Masayoshi Huff)

Anyone that knows me knows that I hold author Chuck Klosterman in a fairly high regard. However, as of late, it's getting difficult.

I became acquainted with Mr. Klosterman's work primarily through his collections of vignettes--I didn't realize that most of the pieces I enjoyed in Spin magazine were done by him until I re-read them in his collections.

Klosterman rides hyperbole in most of his pieces (as well as copious amounts of footnotes). He's taken to writing for Esquire magazine, primarily because Spin was bought out by Blender, the music arm of Maxim. Klosterman's articles started out fine enough, but lately he's been harping on about how much he hates Europe. He took on a visiting professor's role at a German university and has just been writing about how much he misses America/hates Europe/hates soccer.

His most common complaint? "Europe is not America". No, Chuck, it isn't.

In the September issue of Esquire, Klosterman waxed poetic on what it means to follow America while not being in America--largely, he said that it doesn't matter, because most of us are so far removed from America anyway.

Klosterman writes "the mass media is the single most detrimental entity within the United States right now. It's having the exact opposite effect of its theoretically intended one--it's making people less informed and less complete".

Wow. I find this disgusting. Is the media biased? Yes. Is it perfect? No. But what other means have we got? I don't think it makes people any less informed than they would be without it. I mean, how else would we learn about what's going on anywhere in the world? Telepathically?

And it makes our lives less complete? If you're looking at the news to make your life complete, you've got bigger problems, Chuck.