The dumbing down of America

Out of all the people with serious repair questions: the only ones that get through are people who have a cat smell in their car they don’t know how to get rid of?



Get real.



All the 100’s of people with real technical car repair issues and questions are carefully weeded out, and only the most irrelevant, silliest, non-car repair calls are allowed through their censor board: that’s right: the censor board.



If you have a question which requires actual knowlege of the mechanical-electronic problems which modern cars have: you will never be allowed on the air to ask them a hard question.



There’s a car repair show in Montreal on CJAD AM radio at the same hour on Saturday: 10-11 AM: hosted by a woman no less: She takes real car repair questions and answers them because she knows more than these two put together. She doesn’t weed out the difficult questions. If you really want your repair questions answered: phone her.



The cartalk show is now a tired, old jaded formula, and has followed the basic culture of the dumbing down of america with dumber and dumber questions being the norm.



I’m inspired to write a book.

One example of “dumbing down” is going too a radio show for your technical information. Are you not smart enough to read and understand the various educational sources that will inform you how your car works or are you a “victim” of the “dumbing down” of reading comprehension skills?

The CarTalk radio show is for entertainment, always has been.

The point is… the cartalk show is a censored hoax; a racket: they do not let anyone on the show that is not:

upwardly mobile, is getting up in the world, has rich parents and has never worked hard a day in their life, is always mindlessly happy-upbeat, has a silly-funny, irrelevant question about some kind of ‘sound’ they hear, doesn’t have the brains to go to a garage to have the sound checked out, is too cheap and too lazy to go to a garage to have their problem checked out, has to be told what to do about it because they have no will of their own, or don’t have the ability to face the reality the there is a problem and it has to be addressed and fixed and need an authority figure to tell them what to do about it…

It’s a formula, and a hidden scam: their incoming calls are carefully screened. Out of all the thousands of calls: only a certain type of call is allowed on the air. This gives listeners the false impression that everyone in America is rich, dumb, cheap, and happy.

They are selling you the hoax of The American Dream: money is the answer to everything: become rich. Once you become rich: you can flaunt your affluence in public by being as lazy and as dumb, and as cheap as possible. The lazier and dumber you are: the happier you are. Ignorance is bliss. This is the formula they are pushing. Become so rich that you can afford to pay experts to fix all your problems for you… but at the same time you are supposed to become so cheap, you don’t want to pay anyone one cent to have anything fixed, so phone these guys, and be in a state of denial until an expert tells you what to do.

Unfortunately: the reality is that ignorance is not bliss: what you don’t know can kill you: the gulf oil spill is not something you can be happy about. The loss of homes, and the growing loss of jobs is not funny. The cartalk show is an escape fantasy. This is why Walt Disney became rich.

…and your real point is?

You have way too much time on your hands. Maybe you could take your critical energies and point them at something important.

Or are you just mad b/c you haven’t been able to get on the show? And who really cares?

Not being a professinal mechanic is not a sign of dumbness.

If you want your show to be for entertainmant purposes only: don’t tell people they can phone in and ask you questions of a technical nature. Tell them they are only allowed to phone in with entertaining stories bout their pet parakeets.

Since when has any car manufacturer supplied car owners with all the “various educational sources that will inform you how your car works”?

Oh: I see: anyone who buys a car must spend 5 years studying that year-make-and model’s technical specifications before they buy it? So they will fully understand how their car ‘works’?

Talk about a thin set of excuses. Bugs bunny and Mickey Mouse is entertainment. Car repair is not bugs bunny.

Perhaps the Canadian show is time delayed allowing time for research and diagnosis ?
90 % of the questions asked here on this forum can NOT be answered on the spot. Diagnosis is needed, check this, prove that, yet people are attempting to get a quick free answer.

On Car Talk they’re leaving out those who will be esentially wasting time because they rally, really need to be in a shop and cannot get an answer over anybody’s phone.

That’s exactly my point:

I do; and you don’t.

There is a huge cultural chasm btween people who care and people who don’t care about anything.

Your seeming idea is that the world is filled with 7 billion people who shouldn’t care about anything, and shouldn’t want to face reality and shouldn’t want to be educated about the hoaxes they are being sold on, and shouldnn’t care that the are being lied to and couldn’t care less about the gulf oil spill and the growing unemployment.

Your answer to all your life’s problems and questions seems to be to escape from them by not caring about anything.

Escaping from reality is not the answer. It doesn’t solve your problems.

Why should a car manufacture be required to supply you with the materials you need to become educated in how your car works? you have to buy the books, if you have a long learning curve it may take you 5 years to get through a chapter, kind of a side effect from all that dumbing down.

You can either educate yourself and tool up (all at your expense) or you can get paid for what you do best and pay someone to fix your car.

Now I figure two possibilities. One is that you are delusional. A second is that you are just a troll. I’ll go with #2.

“And who really cares?”

of course it is you who are deluding yourself

escaping from reality is a form of delusion

It takes critical skill to diagnose a mechanical-electronic car problem. Maybe the critical skills lacking in the cartalk show might be better pointed at how to solve the gulf oil crisis? Is that what you mean?

Oh, you mean that anyone who has any critical thinking skills should not even listen to cartalk: is that what you mean? We should go an use our critical skills elsewhere because nobody listening to cartalk has any critical thinking skills?

Maybe you’re right.

I agree with Cigroller, If the show is in Canada too it should be included, ie the dumbing down of North America, South America, then probably the world. Sure they could get into really technical solutions, how do I replace this sensor, with a 10 minute nuts and bolts walk through, and I would turn them off after 2 minutes instead of 10. I suppose they must screen the calls, as they do get into general problems but even remember using a spray bottle of water down the carb throat to clear carbon build up in an older vehicle to prevent preignition . So you think
"upwardly mobile, is getting up in the world, has rich parents and has never worked hard a day in their life, is always mindlessly happy-upbeat, has a silly-funny, irrelevant question about some kind of ‘sound’ they hear, doesn’t have the brains to go to a garage to have the sound checked out, is too cheap and too lazy to go to a garage to have their problem checked out, has to be told what to do about it because they have no will of their own, or don’t have the ability to face the reality the there is a problem and it has to be addressed and fixed and need an authority figure to tell them what to do about it… "
I enjoy the show, sorry you don’t, Post here for more specific questions and answers. That is why there is more than 1 radio station, sorry you feel so angry about a radio show that does help people.

nope: she’s whizz: and I mean smart. The calls aren’t screened. Try listening to her on CJAD over your computer: you can google the car repair show: just look up Montreal CJAD Am radio: She’s on the same as cartalk is.

Ever hear of comparison shopping? Pepsi and coke: do the Papsi challenge unless you try both you’ll never know which one is better. Better yet phone her if you have a car repair problem: she’ll answer your question fast. No waiting. Montreal is mostly French so the english talk tadio shows are short of callers: almost everyone gets through right away because 4/5ths of Montreal is French.

Here is the question: is this forum a censored monopoly, or is there room for a fair comparison? If this reply is censored and this reply is cut out: I will know that somebody is monitoring the forum and not allowing my views to be expressed: just like cartalk carefully weeds out and censors the people who call in.

Well, you seem to have an awfully high opinion of yourself. But I’ll come right out and say it: Anyone listening to Car Talk expecting scintillating intellectual conversations about car repair is a moron.

I don’t tune in to Sesame Street expecting discussions on theoretical physics, and I don’t tune in to a sitcom expecting thoughtful philosophical discussions about Plato vs Pirsig. And were I to run around on forums dedicated to those shows angrily expressing my displeasure that they weren’t talking about physics and philosophy, I’d be viewed in a very similar light to which you are being viewed right now.

Car Talk is a light-hearted entertainment show that happens to revolve around cars. That’s why we listen to it.

As to your censorship conspiracy theory, coming from a guy who used to work in radio, ALL radio show callers are screened for content and sanity.

I suspect that may be why you didn’t get through :wink:

I have a very easy solution for the extremely agitated OP:

If you don’t like the program, then don’t listen to it!

And, if you do not want other people to listen to T & R’s radio show, aren’t you attempting to act as a censor?

We all have certain issues that push our personal “hot buttons”, and it is clear that this entertainment-oriented program is one that pushes your buttons. Although I think that you could be spending your time on more worthwhile issues, it is your choice as to how you use/waste your time.

I plan on continuing to listen to the show for its entertainment value.
If you choose not to do that, then so be it–but please do not attempt to censor the radio-listening choices for other people.

turak2,

Boy do you have a monkey on your back! Car Talk is probably the most popular show in NPR, so Tom and Ray must be doing something right.

I believe the Car Talk lackeys choose the callers based on who they think will be the most entertaining, and again, based on their ratings, they must be doing it right.

If you don’t like the show, the solution is quite simple. Change the station or turn the radio off. If the type of entertainment they produce isn’t the type of entertainment you enjoy, why do you listen?

Oh, you mean that anyone who has any critical thinking skills should not even listen to cartalk

Maybe you should turn those critical thinking skills inward and ask yourself why you are so bitter. Lighten up. It’s called “entertainment” because it is supposed to be entertaining. If you don’t find it entertaining, it isn’t meant for someone like you.

I have critical thinking skills, but I like to think I don’t have to apply them to everything under the sun. You can have critical thinking skills and also have the wisdom to put them in check for the sake of enjoyment.

I never tried to call: I don’t have any mechanical car repair problems. My car works just fine, I take it regularly for a checkup. I suspect you are graspiong at straws.

You are far behind the times: the screening that goes on behind closed doors is far more sophisticated than when you were in radio.

You are as usual trying to bring up red herrings to deflect away from what I said: the show is a fraud: they don’t allow peope with genuine car repair problems of any technical nature on the air… or are you hard of comprehension? America is being dumbed down by design. Your mass media feeds you the lowest common denominator, and then pushes that low lower every day… If you had any perspective like oh, say 62 years: you might have a perspective on what used to be the norm, and what is the norm as far as cartalk goes, including your entire mass media culture.

Let’s see if I understand you correctly: the only way you can enjoy yourself is put a check on your critical skills? Is that the only way you can enjoy yourself?

I enjoy myself in the opposite way: when I play volleyball: I try to make as few mistakes as possible: and in fact: although you might not understand this: the less mistakes I make, the better I play, the more I enjoy playing volleyball. When I play guitar: I try to make as few mistakes as possible: the less mistakes I make, the better I play guitar, the more I enjoy playinig guitar. I enjoy watching football: because I used to play football: the less mistakes are made in the game: the more I enjoy it…

You certainly have a weird way of enjoying yourself.