Rusty Saber: Old news still good news for returning Rusty Saber

Joe McAdoo is former chairman of the communication department at Drury University.

The last Rusty Saber, written in January before I left for six weeks on Maui, Hawaii, marked the 21st birthday of the column. This one is a belated kickoff for year 22. Six weeks without a column deadline was a new experience.

Typically my radar screen searches the environment for the next column topic. With no next column to write, I accumulated ideas with nothing to do with them. Here I am back home with a deadline and a notebook full of out-of-date topics.

An example of an oldie is the breakup of Hollywood's dynamic duo, Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck, who awhile back announced a definite termination of their on-again, off-again engagement. If I had written about this, I would have asked: "Does anyone on the planet care about the wedding plans of these two neurotics?" The answer then or now would probably be "No."

One bygone incident I can't pass up is the furor set off by the antics of Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake during the Super Bowl halftime show. Unless you spent the last month or so in a remote monastery, devoid of contact with the outside world, you know all about the halftime extravaganza put together by MTV. It featured, along with Jackson and Timberlake, such luminaries as P. Diddy, Nelly and Kid Rock. As the world knows, Timberlake pulled on Janet Jackson's top, which came off. For one brief, shining moment, her breast was exposed right there on live TV. The fallout (pun intended) has been so great that I am comfortable writing about an old topic that is still a hot one.

Everyone was irate. The National Football League was irate at CBS, the network that broadcast the game. CBS was irate at MTV, responsible for producing the show. Viewers were irate. We may never know if the action was contrived or accidental. It doesn't matter; calls have come from all sides for the cleaning up the content of television and radio, which had nothing to do with the Jackson defrocking.

CBS and MTV are both owned by media giant Viacom. CBS made the terse announcement that it was "highly unlikely" that MTV would be producing another Super Bowl halftime show. Why does the Super Bowl need a major entertainment extravaganza at halftime? Football fans are interested in the game, not halftime amusement. Besides, halftime allows for stretching the legs, going to the restrooms, and replenishing the beer and hot dog supplies. The same for the TV audience. You wouldn't expect a football game to be played at intermission of a concert. Why have a concert at a football game?

I watched the Super Bowl, but not the halftime show. I was clever enough to avoid it because I knew what to expect from MTV: An excess of incoherent, clamorous noise disguised as music, alleged dancing consisting of equally incoherent running and jumping around and plenty of crotch grabbing. It was this stuff not just the Jackson-Timberlake incident that caused all the turmoil. What did the powers that be at CBS and the NFL think they were going to get with MTV, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing "The Battle Hymn of the Republic"?

Granted, the Jackson incident was an added perquisite; otherwise, the rest is standard for pop music as defined by MTV. Boorish, ill-mannered behavior passing for entertainment is what CBS and the NFL asked for, and that's what they got. Anyone truly surprised must have been in that monastery for a long time.

I am reminded of an old aphorism from the days of Communism in the Soviet Union. A worker says of his relationship with the Communist government, "They pretend to pay me and I pretend to work." Likewise, today's pop music stars might say of their audiences, "I pretend to be an entertainer and they pretend to be entertained." If this sudden call for expunging uncouth behavior from TV and radio is successful, we will owe Jackson and Timberlake an enormous vote of thanks.