Whether gawking at a car crash, replaying Failblog videos, or siphoning up salacious gossip, we humans love vicarious trouble with a capital T. The drive is pretty deep in us to learn all about the risks around us, so that we can build stories around them, and then assess our own situation and others' actions, and ultimately act to keep ourselves and our kin safe from real troubles.
At the same time, this spectating can be an immoral or at least guilt-deserving activity. The same instinct that encourages us to learn about risk so we can avoid trouble also makes us needlessly slow traffic, escalate others' risk by egging them on, spread acquaintances' shame, take perverse pleasure in others' pain.
In spite of my chagrin in staring at the twisted wreck, I'm finding the 2012 GOP primary to be way too compelling to let me look away.
Just two-and-a-half states in, has already proved to be the focus-grabbing equivalent of 10-car pileup, guy-gets-clotheslined-and-knocked-over video, and whispers-of-blossoming-romance all rolled into one compellingly addictive bundle.
The GOP primary has too many elements that feed the drive to engage, including:
1. It's a horse race.
2. Overconfident protagonists have been exposed as fools.
3. The intra-party mudslinging, especially when super-powered by super-PACs like Newt Gingrich's, couldn't be happening to a more deserving bunch. (And actually, some good progressive memes have been put forth!)
4. The influence that the Occupy movement has had on the dialog is awesome to behold.
Have you found yourself sucked in (guiltily or otherwise)? What makes you watch? Are there real lessons to learn? Cautionary tales to internalize? Ways to use this learning to advance progressive goals and have an impact? Or is it just a bunch of often-horrifying real-life entertainment?