Election 2.0: Style Over Substance?
Posted by anastasia on 07-20-2007
With the YouTube debates are coming up on CNN Monday, I think it's worth asking whether or not Web 2.0 or social media or whatever you want to call it are actually engaging more young people in this election. Steve Bryant (who was a moderator at this week's Mashup) wrote an interesting piece debunking the myths of YouTube politics. TIME magazine posted the weirdest YouTube questions being asked and MySpace sent around the latest Obama Girl knock off singing about Hillary (this is really getting old - and just seems like a way for these singers to try to get discovered).
The optimist in me wants to believe that the ability for more people to participate in politics through blogs and videos has been transformational. This technology has introduced humor into the mix — I've written about this before, and made it much harder for candidates to avoid being caught off guard (yes, in some ways their campaign managers are working overtime to control the message, but there is always someone with a cell phone camera, somewhere, who will record the inevitable gaff). But Steve raises a really important point in his piece:
The candidates — or their campaign managers — are increasingly equating conflating "personal" with "pop," as if the highest form of communication is flattering you with media. The Sopranos spoof. The Celine Dion song. The Barack Obama ringtones. Pandering. Just pandering to a polity with constant media that says nothing and gets more nothing said.
The challenge for reaching young people (who aren't paying attention to the news), but who might befriend Obama because it's cool or send around this new Hillary tribute from MySpace, is finding a way to combine humor, pop and substance. The Daily Show does an amazing job at this, but it still only reaches around 13 percent of 18-25 year olds. What other examples or resources are out there that engage young people in this way? Is there a non-partisan organization that is producing information detailing where each candidate stands on issues that's a) accessible and easy to read, b) designed in a way that attracts young people and c) is portable so you can print it, download it to your phone or .pda and take it with you to the polls?
July 20th, 2007 at 11:09 am
RE: Hott4Hill featuring Taryn Southern lyric:
"I can't sit still,
Until I see Hill up on Capitol Hill."
Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) is already on Capitol Hill. That is where Congress meets.
July 21st, 2007 at 3:59 am
Excellent post. Unfortunately, I think this concept of making politics accessible comes at the expense of some of the substantive discussion about the issues, and that problem in politics extends to all audiences, of all ages. Politics has been co-opted by the marketers (and I say this as a marketer and a recovering political operative) and the political process has suffered as a result. But there is hope.
A few quick thoughts:
1) Young(er) people may not pay attention to the news, but they are aware of what is happening in the world. I talked to an executive at NBC news who explained to me that, when asked, young(er) audiences explain that if news is important, it will find its way to them… as opposed to the old model where we all had to go searching for the news.
2) Substance rules. A big part of the reason that young audiences, any audience really, tunes out a lot of the political discussion is because, well, there isn't much of a discussion going on. I would guess that with all the hoopla around the Presidential election, most people can name at least one or two of the major Democratic candidates (GoOpers may not be as fortunate), but beyond their personality, they aren't talking about much, so there isn't much to pay attention to, so I am not surprised that there isn't more interest of awareness. Talk about issues that are important to them, and do it in a substantive way, and you will get people to pay more attention.
3) Finally… I think there is too much dictating what issues are important. I have been working with the Alliance for Climate Protection (www.climateprotect.org) in the early stages of a 3-5 year campaign to help people learn more about the cilmate crisis and take action in their life to address it. After much discussion, we felt that the website (which is obviously just one tiny piece of the overall effort) had to err on the side of exploration and not try and force a single activity or message about what people can do to get involved. It's an experiment, but early results show that the audiences who visit the site spend a lot of time, consume a lot of (very substantive) content, and bring their friends into the mix as well. We had the benefit of Live Earth to help raise awareness, but the substance married with the audience having control over how they want to get involved, is working out so far.
Thanks for the post.
July 21st, 2007 at 5:21 am
You can always check out this article for examples of how to engage young people as well:
http://potw.news.yahoo.com/