Sunday, June 1, 2008
Yakety Yak -- Do Talk Back
Remember the Coasters' song Yakety Yak (don't talk back)? It went like:
Take out the papers and the trash
Or you don't get no spendin' cash
If you don't scrub that kitchen floor
You ain't gonna rock and roll no more
Yakety yak (don't talk back)
The song advised a teenager not to talk back when told what to do. Well, we don't seem to have this problem in Israel. Everyone talks back, Yakety Yak -- and it almost does not matter if they live in Israel, have a stake in what is going on here, or even know the finer details. It seems like the freedom of speech and the huge amount of press makes every voice relevant. In reality this is not the case. Not every voice out there is relevant or even makes sense. Actually, most of what we hear is what we call 'Yakety Yak' - a bunch of dribbling nonsense that is confusing, sometimes humiliating, and in general gives us Israelis a bad image. In reality the Yakety Yaking is just that. People talking and getting their opinions out without real dialog or thought about how people in the outside world are going to perceive it. There is also a strange phenomena that we see here in Israel, the total misunderstanding off reality based on a single opinion. We all know that sometimes one voice can change public opinion, both for good and for bad. This certainly seem to be happening here.
There is a well known fact in media that some stories are not true but they are still perceived as real fact. In the US presidential candidates are very careful to answer every false story. They know how quickly public opinion can be set in the wrong position. Sometimes once public precept ion is set in a certain way it is too late or too hard to change it. Sometimes even if the public knows of how a story was not true they still form an opinion, which for the most part is not true. So what? you say, well we like to put out two cents (or agorot) worth. We think that by simply telling people what it is really like here in Israel (Tel Aviv) and what people are really talking and thinking about, Israel will not be so misunderstood. This is specially to politics, security, culture, and religion. So... let's get started with the Yackin'!
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