WSCR: Sometime's not listening is best way to speak up

I am a big time fan of sports radio.  I have been listening to WSCR  (The Score) since they went on the air back in 1992. besides the years I lived in Russia from December of 1992 to December of 1994 and South Carolina from 1995 to 1997   I have been a regular listener to sports radio in Chicago,  primarily WSCR as they did the WKRP theme thing and moved up and down the dial until finally landing on 670 where WMAQ had promised to make me rich when I was a kid.

As a Christian,  I try to watch what words I listen to and what things I say.  To that end, I could never get behind show titles like S&M in the morning (The  initials referring to show hosts Tom Shaer and Jim Memelo) nor could I participate in the signature segment on the show based on an Old Mike Ditka rant.  The segment has nothing to do with the c-list swear word for producing feces but has everything to do with tagging someone out when you find them off base.  Still,  I could never bring myself to call up and say a word on the radio that I wouldn't say in public.

My point in all this is to say that there were some goings on at WSCR that I didn't want to listen to and when they came on like the commercials for strip clubs, I just turned them off, sometimes for days and weeks at a time.  I did this because sometimes not listening is the beset way to speak up.

Over the years some of the hosts I really liked and some I did not much care for.  I liked all the Dan's (McNeil, Jiggets and later Bernstein) I was 50/50 on the Mikes, Loved Murphy, didn't care much for North.

I didn't care much for North's shtick.  The whole who needs High school, self made man thing never' really resonated me.  But it wasn't until September 12, 2001 that he really got under my skin.  As you may recall, September 11th 2001, was kind of a big deal,  and even the day after,  sports radio was not talking about sports.  When I got into my car after work that day, Secretary of State Colin Powell was making a speech about U.S. response to the tragedy.  Half way through the speech, North turns off the feed and starts discounting what Powell was saying and giving his own "insight" to what had to be done.  Now this was nearly 14 years ago, so I don't remember the particulars, but that was the last time I listened to Mike North.  I just had it with him.  Had it with how on one hand, he could brag about being a high school drop out and then on the other,  have enough hubris in the wake of a national tragedy, to  purport that he knew more about global politics than a decorated general and current secretary of state.

At the time, North was the face of the score, he was on 1/2 the commercials,  even when not in his time slot.  Anytime since 9-12-01 that his voice came on the score, I switched the channel. Now was I being petty or vindictive?  I don't think so.  This is the first time in nearly 14 years I am going public with it.  I only do so to illustrate a need to turn a score personality off again.

I mentioned earlier that I liked Dan Bernstein.  He is the host of the afternoon show at WSCR.  He and his partner Terry Boers also run the segment, I referred to earlier.  I remember when Bernstein was first starting at the score  covering things like the NBA draft.  Over the last 15 years Bernstein, has become as Lawrence Holmes said recently, the face of the score.  I have found Bernstein to be very insightful and analytical over his run at WSCR.  I have also found him at times boorish, sophomoric and ill tempered.  There are days that he shows a real disdain for the opinions and thoughts for the callers on his show.  Still in all, he hadn't done anything to make me pull the plug on him.  That is until this week.

In  1992  and even in 2001 Social media was essentially non existent.  So disdain for an on air personality came usually from what they said or from a column they would put in a newspaper or website.  Twitter , Facebook and the like have changed that in a big way.

Bernstein tweeted this week in a very unprofessional manner about a female journalist.  After publicly and correctly standing up for women this week who have been abused by men, Bernstein objectified women by using a crass word, to describe part if the female journalists anatomy.  So it's channel switching time for me again at WSCR.  Stopping listening to North was a personality thing.  I couldn't stand his personality.  For Bernstein it's simply a matter of not wanting to listen to someone who defends women and objectifies them within the course of a week. 

I will still listen to the White Sox and to Lawrence Holmes. as he is a class act and in my opinion should be the face of WSCR. But when Bernstein comes on the air to sell wine, or promote the tournament of bad, or just to do his show, I will have switched channels, because sometime not listening is the best way to speak up.

Six Word Saturday: Notre Dame Death Notice

My Six Words ... Ted Hesburgh's Legacy: Putting People First.

I come from a Notre Dame family.  My Dad went to Notre Dame; my older sister went there as well.  In fact, that's how they met. 

That joke is one of the first things I think of when I think of the University of Notre Dame.  When I think of Notre Dame, I think of people associated with their football, basketball and marching band programs. The name I associate to Notre Dame more than any other is that of former university president,  Rev. Theodore "Ted" Hesburgh.  Father Ted passed away late Thursday night in South Bend, Indiana, at the age of 97.

Hesburgh served as president of the University of Notre Dame from 1952 to 1987 and was a major national and religious figure.  If you were to google Hesburgh, pictures like the one below of him and Martin Luther King would pop up. You would  also see pictures of him standing with past and former U.S.  presidents from Eisenhower to Obama.  You would see pictures of him with popes.  But the picture that comes to my mind is of him and my grandfather in the 1950's when my Dad was an incoming freshman at Notre Dame.  It is a picture in my mind only, but as clear as any of the images I can pull off the web.

My grandparents were dropping off their oldest son at ND and father Hesburgh had met with some of the parents at a social.  He was introduced to my grandfather and the next day, he saw my grandfather again and remembered his name and other aspects of their conversation.  This is the picture in my mind, it may not be exactly how it went down almost sixty years ago, but all I know is my dad was very impressed that such an important man as Hesburgh would recall talking to his father.  

Ted Hesburgh was many things: one of the greatest educators of the 20th century, a civil rights champion, and a Congressional Gold Medal recipient, just to name a few.  However, his greatest achievements come from his ability to relate to ordinary people like my grandfather and be a model of leadership to ordinary people like my Dad.  

Hesburgh didn't always want to be president of a major university.  He had hoped to serve the Navy and his country as a chaplain on an aircraft carrier.  In 2013 at the age of 95, the Navy made Hesburgh  an honorary chaplain.  While we don't all get the opportunity to advise presidents and march with historical icons, but we do have the opportunity to serve ordinary people in any way we can.  In this way, we can make Father Hesburgh's greatest legacy our own.

For More Six Word Saturday click here

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Hat Pan Lifter

It's been a while since I posted a video on the blog. Wolfina and I thought this was funny. I hope you do too.

A Night to Shine - Post of the Week #1

Sometimes I get so busy in my life, that I don't check my blogroll for weeks at a time and miss the blogs that I follow. Now I follow these blogs because I enjoy their content. I have decided to try to take some time each week and read the content they provide. I will try Monday to reward one of those blogs with post of the week.
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The inaugural post of the week goes to one of my favorite blogs, Families Again. The winning post, A Night To Shine is a nice synopsis of the Night to Shine events that are sponsored by the Tim Tebow Foundation. It is a prom for Special Needs Children and Adults.  I found the post especially the three videos  depicting the events to be encouraging and inspiring.

Modern Times a 12 in 12 review

My Dad will turn 77 next month.   The movie I watched this month for the first time came out 2 years before he was born. There is often a tendency to think that anything that happened before you were born as hopelessly out of date. To think that nothing of cultural significance happened before you showed up. However, this is far from true. In 1936 when Modern Times



In 1936 when Modern Times opened in theaters it was already anachronistic. Modern Times, was a silent movie when the talkies had pretty much put that once flourishing industry out of business. Much like B&W movies were still being made in the 50's and 60's when most of the films were in color, there were still a handful of silent movies made in the middle 30's when Modern Times came out. Technically Modern Times (depicted below in lego format) is not technically a silent film. There is talking but not by any of the characters in "real life" only through the loud speaker, record player, or other "modern" inventions of the time. Chaplin also sings in one of the final numbers.



The rest of the movie is typical of the prototypical 1920 silent movies with music played over the action and dialogue cards. For example, here is a clip from the beginning of the film ...





One of the things I found most interesting about this movie is that even 80 years ago some things (like silent movies) that once had mass appeal were becoming obsolete and other things (like a modernized dehumanized work force) were tolerated but not liked or really accepted. There are many good reviews of the film that makes these points very skillfully, I recommend this review from Decent Films. 

I also found the 1936 review from Variety to be most informative.  The last line of the review, although written for "modern" audiences 80 years ago,  has a tinge of prophecy to it.

"Film has been two years in actual work and Chaplin should today find as wide a world-wide market as in yesteryears."

I found the movie to be very accessible even to modern audiences. That is one of the reasons why critics and filmgoers alike still enjoy this film. My watch again likelihood is 90 to 100%.