The ur-reality of the CNN/YouTube debates
What do we mean when we call this the YouTube election?
On the one hand: YouTube as agora. Democracy metastasized through the Internet into the living rooms of housefraus and homebodies. The chance, albeit brief, to address the candidates with questions about "substantive issues." Predatory lending practices, better health care for veterans, the depreciation of the dollar. YouTube, the Katrina of civics, revealing the disenfranchised amidst the ruins.
On the other hand: YouTube as American Idol. Eighteen candidates vying for votes, and the YouTube polity as the studio audience. The ultimate consumer election, complete with audience participation, driven by 30-second sound bite questions (without follow-ups, mind you) that do little more than offer candidates the chance to repeat their positions.
Do you see the duality here? YouTube is at once a disintermediator for democracy and democracy's greatest show. There is something kitschy here, between YouTube's rompus room aesthetic and the modish flanks of Anderson Cooper's suit and charming ascot. And irony. Do we really need a YouTube to talk to each other? Or was that Obama advertisement from parkridge47 -- y'know, the 1984 spoof where the runner frees the worker drones from being hypnotized by the screen -- just a joke, just a cute message?
Of course it was. We don't want to smash the screens! We love the screens! We love the little messages we send to each other, the pattering of little comments. This is the YouTube election, sure. But given the depth of discourse, it's the Twitter Election, too.
