The Pseudoreality of Late-Night TV

When I went to bed late last night (ok, early this morning), the death count in south Asia was estimated at 16,000. When I woke up this morning (ok, this afternoon), the paper said 20,000. Then CNN told me that, no, it's closer to 33,000. Later, the local news said 44,000. And at 11:15 pm, the BBC said it was an estimated 60,000 dead in at least nine countries around the Indian Ocean.

ABC News has had the best coverage so far, including some downright fucking chilling first-hand accounts. But the BBC has had the most devastating video, including a couple carrying their dead, mud-covered infant twins aimlessly through the streets.

You know all this, of course, what I'm getting at is how disturbing it is to watch Late Night and the Late Late Show blithely forge ahead, oblivious. Now, I can understand carrying on with the comedy when a tragedy happens, because of laughter being the best medicine and all that shit. But after Sept. 11, 2001, both these shows set aside a respectful amount of time to talk about it. And I remember staying up late, watching Late Night with David Letterman in 1989, when Dan Rather broke in to tell me that Saddam Hussein had invaded Kuwait. Then it went back to Dave and he was pretending to be a monkey, and I thought, "This just seems wrong." In 2001, 3000 people were missing in Manhatten, and American television just stopped. As I type this, days after the quake and tsunamis killed at least 60,000 people in Asia, Conan O'Brien is rubbing a live chinchilla on his face.

Draw your own conclusions.