Which is most responsible for degenerating American culture?

[BurtWorm]

Poll question: Which is most responsible for degenerating American culture?

[Endangered Specie]

1. why, Clinton getting head... of course

Oh, and no forced prayer.
;)

[BurtWorm]

2. Damn! I knew I forgot something!

:o

[KatieCouric2008]

7. I believe it is a combination of two of them...

The incessant move toward profit is possibly the most evil - which causes people to only think of one thing - wealth. The Republican party holds this up to be one of America's greatest "rights" - and politically allows people to act selfishly to get the most wealth, while the overall condition of the country as a whole goes south.

[BurtWorm]

8. Ms. Couric, I am honored to have inspired your first post at DU.

And a damn fine one it is, too. :toast:

[maxudargo]

3. I chose entropy

just because I think that's an interesting thought. But "profit motive," although the more banal answer, is no doubt the correct one.

[judge_smales]

4. .

Who says it's degenerating?

[BurtWorm]

9. If it's not degenerating, is it improving?

Or staying the same?

[robbedvoter]

5. Can't believe "the profit motive" BS leads. propagands is not for profit

Disney wasn't worried F911 will lose money. Donahue, Spin Room, the 1 h version of Crossfire were ratings bonanzas. OTOH. NY Post, Moonie Times and I am sure Faux news are HEAVILY SUBSIDIZED
The pubs may be selling you "free market" but your money is not good where it counts.

[wuushew]

18. Are you sure?

The Disney Corporation currently runs two multi-billion dollar amusement parks in states controlled by Republican governors. Even a small change in tax policy would far off set the modest profit of F911.

MSNBC like most news conglomerates is heavily invested in defense and energy. The modest NPV from show ratings is small potatoes next to the money from *'s military crusade in the middle east.

[Protagoras]

6. The profit motive is closest

but I think it really overlooks the unique combination of corporatism and consumerism that we have acting to mold our culture. People at the top have always wanted MORE Profit...but that hasn't always allowed them to exercise the kind of leverage that TV and Corporatism now do over America.

[DrWeird]

10. Are you the one that had that weird "entropy" thread

a couple of days ago?

[BurtWorm]

12. Nay, 'tweren't I.

I was in much better shape two days ago and wasn't even thinking about entropy. ;)

[LaPera]

11. CORPORATE GREED!

Insatiable lust for money, they will support any lies and dictatorship as long as they can manipulate unions, reject workers health care, keep wages lower & lower, no responsibility for worker safety, send jobs overseas, get tax breaks, receive tax subsidies, pay no taxes, unregulated and full exploitation of our environment, no forcible pollution clean-up.

[FloridaCrat]

13. Great pictures LaPera

Thank you !!!

[Warpy]

14. Fundies on Texas school boards

Texas is the state that vets school books for most of the country, since it's the second biggest school district and, unlike the biggest, buys en masse for every district in the state. That's why school books have been so watered down and history so sanitized to fit the jingoistic, simplistic fundy image for decades. That's why the schools have been so severely dumbed down.

I know a person who writes high school level history and psychology texts who has had to rewrite whole chapters because some Texas fundy objectd to the truth.

If Texas won't secede, I think we need to throw them out.

[Walt Starr]

15. Christian Television Networks, hands down

They have driven the evil of the profit motive to new heights while propping up the Republican Party.

[Protagoras]

16. Revised. Ignorance and Apathy in a tie.

People's inability to see, or care beyond the immediate. That's what ALL of the above get to prey upon.

[indigobusiness]

17. Profit motive, Bottom-line is God, Company Store system, Materialism...

All different faces of the Beast that devours the American soul.

Most people are so indoctrinated into the 'money is sacred' ethos, that they can't get past it. Even if they try.

[CanSocDem]

19. Profit trumps 'quality'...

...in a consumer society. I would also blame the church for fostering the materialism that fuels consumerism.

I think that when everything is For Sale, the quality declines.

Robert Pirsig said it best in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

[democratreformed]

20. I have to agree with what seems to be the most popular on here: greed

Money, money, money

[Lydia Leftcoast]

21. Note how mass entertainment has gotten steadily cruder and dumber

over the years?

Owners of movie studios and broadcasting outlets used to have a sense of responsibility about providing media that were both entertaining and intelligent. (Not 100%, of course, but can you imagine network television putting on Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts or Playhouse 90 these days? When was the last major studio movie comedy written for intelligent adults, not horny 15-year-olds?)

Somewhere along the line, someone decided that it was more profitable to dumb down the American people with the excuse that it's "what people want." Hey, I don't recall any street marches demanding wrestling or poker on every channel. I don't remember any streams of letters to the editor demanding stupider comedies.