By Maria Edirisinghe
Remember when the local paperboy would deliver newspapers right to your doorstep? What a waste of time! I mean, c’mon, we had to walk all the way from the comfort of our safe, air-conditioned homes into the chilling abyss known as “outside” just to read about other people.
Thanks to today’s technology, however, we get news right at our fingertips in seconds! With incredibly dependable, trustworthy, and virtuous news sources like TikTok, CNN, and Buzzfeed News, we’ll never have to take those strenuous five-second hikes to the front door again.
Not to mention, villainous newspaper companies used to waste even more of our precious time by making us use our sensitive, delicate eyes to scan black ink on paper—much like the Renaissance times. We might as well have been dipping our feathered pens in ink by dimly lit candlelight to translate Shakespeare’s “art thou” this and “thy art” that nonsense.
Thankfully, in the modern era, instead of subjecting ourselves to the lethal task of actually reading, we watch 10 to 15-second clips of internet strangers summarizing all global and domestic news. Of course, we can’t forget the unrelated, arbitrary advertisements for other time-savers like Uber Eats and DoorDash scattered between breaking news—often (logically) running longer than the news itself. With such handy capitalism in place, I stay up to date with both the latest developments of nuclear weapons and the newest Armani fragrances. But, hey, what’s “breaking news” if you can’t break the news up into segments that are virtually incomprehensible by themselves?
To help us save even more time, these informative clips already come with opinions. In 2011, Fox News anchor—Stuart Varney—enlightened that “poor” families are not really impoverished at all! In fact, he highlighted that a staggering 99.6% of them are blessed enough to have none other than the most luxurious, elite household item: a refrigerator. Being poor is a mindset, so change your perspective; you can’t spell poverty without “POV!”
Moreover, thanks to apps that take “cookies” (AKA my personal information), the type of news I see is frequently decided for me! After all, who am I to say whether Taylor Swift dating an NFL player or foreign interventions by Western powers is more important? Such targeted marketing grants me time to participate in other, more productive activities like using my newly found beliefs to argue with “kanyewestlover911” in a random comment section. But, then again, nothing says true American news like outright indoctrination.
Still, I frequently feel as though we aren’t saving enough time. Those 10 to 15-second clips are 10 to 15 seconds of my whole life gone forever! Honestly, wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could save even more time by having no news at all? Think about it: If no one knows current issues, there’s nothing to argue over. In a world without news, we’ll all live clueless lives in harmony. I hope the Nobel Foundation calls to award me a prize soon…I think I just figured out world peace.
Welcome to The Shield’s annual satire section. Writers use satire to improve a problem in society. Sometimes readers misunderstand the satire as they do not recognize the hyperbole, irony, rhetorical questions, sarcasm, and understatements. A great satirist will also address counter-arguments (the non-satirical solution) with great mockery and sarcasm. Readers may mistake the satirical solution for the actual solution that the writer proposes. The ideas in these satire stories do not necessarily represent the opinions of The Shield or Westmont. If one is confused about satire, please contact a friendly neighborhood English teacher.