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"Truthiness": A Vote For Word of the Decade
Tuesday night, Steven Colbert announced "I fixed Canada in 77 days!" No, Colbert is not Canada's new Prime Minister (that goes to conservative Steven Harper). Colbert's announcement was just another example of "truthiness", perhaps the biggest catchphrase of ALL time (okay, that's a stretch).
And that's the point. Stretch those truths!!!
When Steven Colbert first used the word Truthiness in his new show "The Colbert Report", it quickly became a catch-phrase. What a smart word...it reflects our times today. The American Dialect Society named "truthiness" as its word of 2005 (meaning "truthy, not facty", or, in other words, statements that have some fact in there despite some obvious fibs, satire or outright lies).
Seriously, "truthiness" should become THE descriptive term of the '00s, aughts, nils, or whatever you call this first decade of the new millennium.
The '30s had terms like "Radio", "The Great Depression", "Soup lines", "Fascism" and "Highway" (simplier days back then).
The '40s: "World War II", "The Great Generation" and "Post-war recovery" (fierce, fighting days).
The '50s: "Television", "Communism", "Suburbs", "Korean War", "Rosa Parks", "Integration", "Soviets", "Cold War", "Payola" and "Rock & Roll".
The '60s: "Transistor radio", "Revolution", "Johnny Carson", "The Beatles", "Civil Rights", "Baby Boom", "Color TV", "Invest in plastics", "Vietnam", "Great Society", "Psychedelic"" "Hippies" and "Space Age".
The '70s: "FM Radio", "Free love", "Terrorism", "Hijackings", "Me Generation", "Watergate" "Impeachment" and "I am not a crook", "Women's Lib", "Gas lines", "Inflation", "Saturday Night Live", "Farrah", "Polyester", "The Fonz" and "Disco". Oh, and "Airplane!"
The '80s: "Cable TV", "Trickle-down economics", "Greed is good", "Personal computers" (PC vs Mac), "Cocaine", "I Want My MTV", "Bad Saturday Night Live", "VCRs and video tapes", "Windows", "You looook marvelous", Iran-Contra, Madonna, "Double-digit mortgage rates" and "Video games". And more cocaine.
The '90s: "Nintendo/Gameboy", "Tabloid entertainment", "Corporate media", "Grunge", "Pixar", "Letterman vs Leno", "I feel your pain", "Better Saturday Night Live", "Pokemon", "Generation X", "The Internet", "email", "e-anything", "AOL", "Chat rooms", "Synergy", "Convergence" and "Dot Com Boom".
So what do we have so far in the '00s?
"Satellite radio", "On demand", "Irony/Satire", "The Matrix", "iPod/iTunes", "Broadband", "HD", "New Millennium", "MySpaces", "Google", "Blogging", "Blackberry/Palm/Treo" and "9/11" are all big media trends. "Gameboy" is still big but "PSP" has more buzz. "Harry Potter" has been a massive global phenomenon. And ringtones are hot. And fortunately, Britney Spears mania has died off.
If there is a theme in media and society, it just might be Truthiness.
Examples of "truthiness" in the '00s:
The "dot com bust" (there were no new business rules...a bad idea is still a bad idea...but the digital age showed the good ideas remain strong; and Dow Jones and NASDAQ have both recovered)
"Compassionate conservatism" (is that what we saw from our government days after Katrina hit New Orleans and along the Gulf Coast?, forgeting to care about actual Americans)
"Mission Accomplished" (really?)
"Jason Blair with the NY Times" (factual story about made-up stories)
"There are WMDs in Iraq" (again, really?)
"We're going to get scandal out of the White House and bring back professionalism" (cough, cough, I'm choking)
"Fox News talking head shoutfests" ('nuff said)
"Rush Limbaugh's statement that all drug abusers should go to jail" (when he, of course, has his own problems with abuse)
"Enron/WorldCom, etc" (hey, let's cook the books, no one will notice!)
"Reality shows" (come on, do you truly think those shows are real?)
"Scripted reality shows" (okay, maybe a little more truthy...but NOT reality!)
"Non-fiction memoirs detailing bad things and how to redeem yourself" (see Oprah taking on James Frey in posting below)
"Anorexic teen stars" ("I have no weight problem")
"Ashley Simpson's failed lip-syncing performance on Saturday Night Live" (SNL has gotten worse again, hasn't it)
ALL of it...TRUTHINESS!
So, as Steven Colbert might say..."Come on, America, when it comes to voting on Truthiness as Word of the Decade, that's right, it time for the Colbert Report".
--Chris Kennedy
To read on how Stephen Colbert (remember, he's American) takes credit for 'fixing' Canada: read here
posted by Unknown @ Saturday, January 28, 2006,
