by Today is Howard Stern’s last day on regular radio. In a few weeks he will disappear on satellite radio where you will have to pay to hear him. Howard is being paid $500 million over the next five years to fade away and that’s an offer that would be hard for anyone to turn down. I miss the early days when Howard was cutting-edge funny and was the hero of the ordinary person struggling to make it from one day to the next.
Howard has become the hollow of himself and, for that reality; I mourn the loss of a great talent. My Aunt Idona turned me on to Howard Stern way back in 1984 or so during a visit with her at her home in Fort Monmouth, New Jersey.
I was a Nebraska boy who was born and bred in the humid dust bowl plains and visiting New Jersey during the summer was a great experience I will not forget. The land was lush. The weather was clear and clean. Howard Stern ruled the radio. Aunt Idona and I were traveling in her car when she asked me if I liked Howard Stern. I had no idea who she was talking about and she just said, “Listen.” She turned on the radio, WNBC, and I heard Howard Stern interviewing Ron Palillo from Welcome Back Cotter and Howard kept asking about Ron’s character named “Horshack” but Howard kept pronouncing it “Horse-Shak” and wondering aloud if Ron was well-hung and if that was really why his character was named “Horse-shack.”
The whole interview was handled in a giggling, self-effacing manner that was endearing and never gross. When I moved to New York City a few years later to attend graduate school at Columbia University, Howard Stern became the start of my day on WXRK and I found many shared laughs with him.
The fall from grace began when Howard did not fight to keep Billy West and Jackie “The Jokeman” Martling. The radio show began dying a morose and narcissistic death. Those of us who knew the brilliance of the early career Stern shows sat in amazement as we kept the faith while Howard and his crew continued their tumble from relatable suffering into the unfamiliar grotesque of raunch and gross-out homoeroticism. Artie Lange is a pale replacement for Jackie: Lange is Ed McMahon in a fat suit.
Benji Bronk plays for crude and shocking instead of Billy West’s intimate silliness. Howard claims moving to satellite — where you will pay $13 a month as a subscription fee after purchasing a $200 radio that can actually bring in the satellite feed — will “free” him to curse and do even more outrageous sexual things. He will offer “Tissue Time” where you can masturbate to a pornographic bedtime story. You can hear curse words instead of hearing bleeps. You can guess along with Stern how many pounds of poop a fat guy can excrete in a 24 hour period. I will pass. I will not be joining Howard on satellite. Hearing a bleep is funnier than hearing the actual curse word.
Howard should have learned the fact of that fine line when he wrote his books. He cursed on the pages of his books and it was alarming and discomforting to read the hard cursing in print. Howard is better skittering around the edges of sanctity instead of shoving us headlong into his awful. As we age we hope to mature our sensibilities and our humor. Stern’s humor isn’t maturing or even regressing into the funny of childhood.
He is instead tempting the worst in all of us by chewing away the fibers of class and grace that once bound us to him and when that violation of the humble occurs, the most vulnerable among us suffer and we all are made to pay for that degeneration of aesthetic and caring because more viciousness and greater hate are bled into the world under the guise of being “outrageously funny.”
People will sit for outrage on free radio but millions more will not stand to pay a subscription fee to feel worse about the world. There’s funny and there’s disgusting and disgusting is never funny. Howard Stern’s self-anointed title as “King of All Media” — like Michael Jackson’s self-crowned “King of Pop” moniker — is just as phony as this long list of failed Stern media projects:
– Fartman: The Movie
– Doomsday: The Animated TV show
– Kane
– Etiquette for Outlaws
– The syndicated E! show
– The ABC interview show
– Howard Stern’s Rock N Roll High School
– Howard Stern’s Porky’s
– Howard Stern: The High School Years That’s the short list or projects Howard pushed on us as listeners every day but none of them found the light of day as a released project.
Stern’s track record of success is growing dimmer and gloomier by the moment. Stern has been bleeding audience on free radio by the hundreds of thousands for years. That bleed-out will only grow greater on for-pay satellite radio: The King is dead and he isn’t wearing any clothes! Howard’s cutting-edge radio show lost its lifeblood when his marriage ended and he took up with a woman half his age. He became what he mocked and no one in his precious inner circle is able to point out the hypocrisy in his life.
When Howard Stern was married and yearning and living miserably in the midst of a loving family, we all laughed with him, because we could relate to his real human suffering and we sewed a shared funny thread with him every day in the fabric of the universal ordinariness of our shared station. Now that Howard has actively disavowed everything he claimed to cherish and believe in; we true fans of his original humor now realize it is time for us to turn off Howard Stern for good for the greatness of our humanity and let him wallow alone in his $500 million dollar sh*t pit.
Well-said David. You make several good points such as how things are usually funnier with the bleep than the actual swear word (unless it’s British comedy) and that he was more endearing when he was married.
I don’t happen to like Howard Stern but I appreciate what he does much like Marilyn Manson and Eminem. While I don’t really like listening to any of them I can agree they all are good at what they do which is mainly shock or piss people off.
I have one main reason I don’t like Stern, other than the obvious that he makes me sick to my stomach more than laugh, is what I heard on his show one morning while getting ready for class in college. Some mother called up saying her son, who had downs syndrome, loved his show but that Howard had made fun of people like him and it hurt his feelings. Howard asked the mother to put the child on the phone so he could apologize. What he did was apologize in a “retarded†kind of voice people use in a mocking way and I quickly shut him off in horror never to turn him on again.
While I appreciate why people like this kind of thing I just don’t personally enjoy it and feel somewhat pleased I don’t have to worry about accidentally hearing his show on the radio anymore.
Well-said David. You make several good points such as how things are usually funnier with the bleep than the actual swear word (unless it’s British comedy) and that he was more endearing when he was married.
I don’t happen to like Howard Stern but I appreciate what he does much like Marilyn Manson and Eminem. While I don’t really like listening to any of them I can agree they all are good at what they do which is mainly shock or piss people off.
I have one main reason I don’t like Stern, other than the obvious that he makes me sick to my stomach more than laugh, is what I heard on his show one morning while getting ready for class in college. Some mother called up saying her son, who had downs syndrome, loved his show but that Howard had made fun of people like him and it hurt his feelings. Howard asked the mother to put the child on the phone so he could apologize. What he did was apologize in a “retarded†kind of voice people use in a mocking way and I quickly shut him off in horror never to turn him on again.
While I appreciate why people like this kind of thing I just don’t personally enjoy it and feel somewhat pleased I don’t have to worry about accidentally hearing his show on the radio anymore.
Hi Robin!
I love your comment today! It is lengthy and filled with goodness! I have tried to keep the faith with Howard over the years but I found myself listening less and less over the last five years or so and the decline of interest is directly related to the crumbling of his marriage. Stern makes fun of Don Imus and his “sham marriage†to a younger woman but Stern has become Imus — at least Imus is aware of his duplicity — Stern still thinks he’s special and golden.
Stern has made a lot of money making fun of the disabled and your example is a shining, if shameful, one of many instances. He also treats women rather horribly on the whole and Janna never could stand having him on in our home so, like other men, I was forced to squeeze in a listen during the day when I was alone.
Howard was always best when he was riffing on the political issues of the day. All the mockery of women and the less fortunate never really worked for me but his take on public policy was always good for a real hard laugh.
Hi Robin!
I love your comment today! It is lengthy and filled with goodness! I have tried to keep the faith with Howard over the years but I found myself listening less and less over the last five years or so and the decline of interest is directly related to the crumbling of his marriage. Stern makes fun of Don Imus and his “sham marriage†to a younger woman but Stern has become Imus — at least Imus is aware of his duplicity — Stern still thinks he’s special and golden.
Stern has made a lot of money making fun of the disabled and your example is a shining, if shameful, one of many instances. He also treats women rather horribly on the whole and Janna never could stand having him on in our home so, like other men, I was forced to squeeze in a listen during the day when I was alone.
Howard was always best when he was riffing on the political issues of the day. All the mockery of women and the less fortunate never really worked for me but his take on public policy was always good for a real hard laugh.
I’m surprised a feminist clan never hunted him down. I’m glad my comment pleased you David, if one of your posts gives me something to write in detail about I will. As I do from time to time I may at some point even write a post about my views on the Stern type of entertainers.
I’m surprised a feminist clan never hunted him down. I’m glad my comment pleased you David, if one of your posts gives me something to write in detail about I will. As I do from time to time I may at some point even write a post about my views on the Stern type of entertainers.
I have XM radio which features the raunchy Opie and Anthony as part of their service. O&A are famous for getting in trouble after airing people having sex in a Catholic cathedral.
Since I’m paying for it as part of my subscription, I decided to tune it in one morning to see what the fuss was about.
They had a phone sex operator and some guy caller doing their thing on the air. It wasn’t sexy at all. It was actually pretty gross.
To make it worse, the people had bad southern accents.
A lot of my family is from Kentucky, so I have nothing against the accent, but the talk conjured up images of “Deliverance” rather than something sexy. The guy could have been saying “squeal like a pig.” It wasn’t sexy.
Instead of visions of beautiful Scarlett Johanson or Gabrielle Union, the reality made me think of a sad woman who is probably trying to earn some money to pay the rent in some run down hovel on the “bad” side of town. I didn’t even want to think of what the guy might look like.
I listened for about a minute, then flipped it off. I probably won’t go back to that channel.
There is something to be said about having swears bleeped out and having to use imagination. Victoria’s Secret is sexier than Hustler because things are left to the imagination. Even strippers leave their clothes on most of the time. They know the power of imagination, even when there is little left to the imagination.
Old time radio was powerful because it was theatre of the mind. Imagination is powerful. Too bad modern uncensored radio has no imagination, no brains, and no class.
I don’t mind an occasional swear. I don’t mind something sexy. But, sometimes it is better to leave certain things unsaid and implied. It’s classier that way. While it might not shock as much, it also doesn’t make the listener feel that he or she is swimming in a cess pool. I don’t want to feel like a perv when I listen to the radio.
When Howard Stern goes completely uncensored, it won’t be a pretty sight.
I have XM radio which features the raunchy Opie and Anthony as part of their service. O&A are famous for getting in trouble after airing people having sex in a Catholic cathedral.
Since I’m paying for it as part of my subscription, I decided to tune it in one morning to see what the fuss was about.
They had a phone sex operator and some guy caller doing their thing on the air. It wasn’t sexy at all. It was actually pretty gross.
To make it worse, the people had bad southern accents.
A lot of my family is from Kentucky, so I have nothing against the accent, but the talk conjured up images of “Deliverance” rather than something sexy. The guy could have been saying “squeal like a pig.” It wasn’t sexy.
Instead of visions of beautiful Scarlett Johanson or Gabrielle Union, the reality made me think of a sad woman who is probably trying to earn some money to pay the rent in some run down hovel on the “bad” side of town. I didn’t even want to think of what the guy might look like.
I listened for about a minute, then flipped it off. I probably won’t go back to that channel.
There is something to be said about having swears bleeped out and having to use imagination. Victoria’s Secret is sexier than Hustler because things are left to the imagination. Even strippers leave their clothes on most of the time. They know the power of imagination, even when there is little left to the imagination.
Old time radio was powerful because it was theatre of the mind. Imagination is powerful. Too bad modern uncensored radio has no imagination, no brains, and no class.
I don’t mind an occasional swear. I don’t mind something sexy. But, sometimes it is better to leave certain things unsaid and implied. It’s classier that way. While it might not shock as much, it also doesn’t make the listener feel that he or she is swimming in a cess pool. I don’t want to feel like a perv when I listen to the radio.
When Howard Stern goes completely uncensored, it won’t be a pretty sight.
Robin — I think the Feminists did hunt him down and then gave up because he was no longer worth the effort.
Chris — You are right on target on so many things. Imagination is dying:
http://urbansemiotic.com/2005/08/22/ruination-of-imagination/
and no one seems to care about bringing it back. We get cruder and cruder in our everyday lives one wonders if there will ever be a line to cross or if one day anything and everything will be fair game in the name of entertainment?
I never listened to O&A but your view aligns with several I have heard and respect.
Howard thinks he’s being “set free” by satellite, but it will chain him indefinitely and uncomfortably because once you drop the f-bomb… then what? Saying it a second time loses all its magic. You need to be creative instead of racy and that takes time and talent that may no longer choose to live within him.
I don’t like any of the shock jock crap! I’d rather plug in my iPod and listen to music! 😀
I don’t like any of the shock jock crap! I’d rather plug in my iPod and listen to music! 😀
I don’t like any of the shock jock crap! I’d rather plug in my iPod and listen to music! 😀
Excellent comment, Dave!
The trick will be to get liberals and moderates together to say ENOUGH before it’s too late for the next national election cycle and we should be okay.
News today of Bush’s secret order to spy on ordinary citizens without a court order will go a long way in making us all more purple and blue than blood red.
If our government thinks we can rule the world in space via a Star Wars type defense, what would ever make someone like Stern to think the FCC can’t “protect” us from satellite transmissions that undermine the moral fabric of America?
I agree the Supreme Court is supremely important in the preservation — or the destruction — of Free Speech but I feel it will be crushed rather soon.
Love the Mars line. Pricelessly funny!
Hahahahahahahahaha! 😆
Hahahahahahahahaha! 😆
Funny! Loving it, Dave, loving it!
:grin”
Thank God Howard Stern is off public radio. I can’t believe, that not one woman’s group has effectively protested and forced him off the air over the way he has abused, humiliated, and sexually demeaned and exploited women. Stern is the best example of America’s worst. The people who support and praise Stern are bio-genetic misfires, who have low self esteem, and have no respect for women or themselves. People can justify that the first amendment protects him, but the first amendment was not created and designed to be abused.
Thank God Howard Stern is off public radio. I can’t believe, that not one woman’s group has effectively protested and forced him off the air over the way he has abused, humiliated, and sexually demeaned and exploited women. Stern is the best example of America’s worst. The people who support and praise Stern are bio-genetic misfires, who have low self esteem, and have no respect for women or themselves. People can justify that the first amendment protects him, but the first amendment was not created and designed to be abused.
Thanks for the comment, Hartly. Your argument makes a lot of sense!
Hmm…Maybe I am the only one who likes Howard? I have Sirius radio, and it is one of the best investments I have ever made. I even bought stock in the company. I believe Sirius put Howard on because they know he has a strong and loyal fan-base. I am an electrical engineer going to school for my MBA, but I still enjoy some uneducated, say whatever you want radio now and then.
Hmm…Maybe I am the only one who likes Howard? I have Sirius radio, and it is one of the best investments I have ever made. I even bought stock in the company. I believe Sirius put Howard on because they know he has a strong and loyal fan-base. I am an electrical engineer going to school for my MBA, but I still enjoy some uneducated, say whatever you want radio now and then.
Hi Rob!
When did you first start listening to Howard? It seems like the old-timers like me miss his early days of brilliance that will never be recaptured again.
I think the reason Mel Karmazin — Howard’s old boss at Infinity and now big boss at Sirius — brought Howard to Sirius so he can begin charging for ad space on for-pay satellite radio. That will be an interesting experience to watch.
It’s funny I have 20 Sirius music channels I “rent” on my Samsung a900 for $6 a month — but I won’t buy the full subscription to have on a separate box.
How does Sirius work the subscription policy? Can you listen on a satellite radio AND your cellphone or would you need to purchase separate subscriptions? Can you buy a subscription to listen to Sirius via the web alone or do you have to have a box as well?
Well…I have Sirius in my car, so I don’t know how it works for Sprint, but heres how it works for me. I pay $12 a month for my reciever, and then if I want to add any more, it is $6 more per month. You need to have a subscription in order to listen via the web as well (just like I do at work everyday 😛 ). Hope I helped you out!
Well…I have Sirius in my car, so I don’t know how it works for Sprint, but heres how it works for me. I pay $12 a month for my reciever, and then if I want to add any more, it is $6 more per month. You need to have a subscription in order to listen via the web as well (just like I do at work everyday 😛 ). Hope I helped you out!
So, Rob, you can purchase web streaming from Sirius without having to buy a separate satellite radio, right?
I think its a disgrace that intelligent people as yourselves cant come to grips with the fact that the goverment is slowly eroding our rights and its not a “good” thing when they lean on any one entertainer or public official to further their agendas.Satellite came along and allows people to listen to radio as they wish as cable did for tv.this attack on pay services is a dumming down of society that will lull us into third world sevitude.If the information cant get to the masses then “nothing”ilegal is being perpetrated by the government.
This goes way beyond entertainment…radio has been and should remain a vehicle by which the masses can get the “stae of the union “and the world.
these are dangerous times and we must be vigilant and not allow our”dislikes”determine the availability of certain forms of media.
Sure howard has capitalized on this and isn’t that the basis of FREE SOCIETY based on capitalism.
I will tell you that Howard opened my eyes to politics when the only place i got my news was biased programs on “free” tv which had gotten that way due to their need for political support based on their owners at the time .all i can leave you with is a line from a cold war era sci-fi movie “the thing”…the qoute:”keep looking to the skies” because that is the future of information and the way it will be recieved by the masses.
I think its a disgrace that intelligent people as yourselves cant come to grips with the fact that the goverment is slowly eroding our rights and its not a “good” thing when they lean on any one entertainer or public official to further their agendas.Satellite came along and allows people to listen to radio as they wish as cable did for tv.this attack on pay services is a dumming down of society that will lull us into third world sevitude.If the information cant get to the masses then “nothing”ilegal is being perpetrated by the government.
This goes way beyond entertainment…radio has been and should remain a vehicle by which the masses can get the “stae of the union “and the world.
these are dangerous times and we must be vigilant and not allow our”dislikes”determine the availability of certain forms of media.
Sure howard has capitalized on this and isn’t that the basis of FREE SOCIETY based on capitalism.
I will tell you that Howard opened my eyes to politics when the only place i got my news was biased programs on “free” tv which had gotten that way due to their need for political support based on their owners at the time .all i can leave you with is a line from a cold war era sci-fi movie “the thing”…the qoute:”keep looking to the skies” because that is the future of information and the way it will be recieved by the masses.
Thanks for the comment, rich!
Thanks for the comment, rich!
Thanks for the comment, rich!
“Free” radio spends half their time on commercials, pushing you to buy stuff you don’t even really want, which can cost you way more than $13/mo. over time. And most of their programming is bland or nil.
The media has been harping on Howard’s “great” cost to subscribers. Newspapers headline, “End of free speech, Howard to charge $13/month!!!!” yet those same newspapers charge their subscribers more than that per month. And what about cable TV costs? Glass houses/stones..
Yahoo TV said 4.4 million people watched his farewell address last week on the internet. That’s twice as many people who watch Fox News’ top show. Say what you will about Stern, but he’s turning heads.
It is my hope that this Christmas season turns out to be a success for Sirius, though I have no personal stake in their fortunes. I think Howard will gain even more subscribers as his show evolves, through word of mouth. And he’ll be on all day, not just in the morning. Fans can go to bed at night listening to one of his 2 Sirius channels playing crazy stuff. David Lee Roth won’t be able to do that.
Sat radio already has uncensored stand-up comics. I don’t see how Stern is any worse.
“Free” radio spends half their time on commercials, pushing you to buy stuff you don’t even really want, which can cost you way more than $13/mo. over time. And most of their programming is bland or nil.
The media has been harping on Howard’s “great” cost to subscribers. Newspapers headline, “End of free speech, Howard to charge $13/month!!!!” yet those same newspapers charge their subscribers more than that per month. And what about cable TV costs? Glass houses/stones..
Yahoo TV said 4.4 million people watched his farewell address last week on the internet. That’s twice as many people who watch Fox News’ top show. Say what you will about Stern, but he’s turning heads.
It is my hope that this Christmas season turns out to be a success for Sirius, though I have no personal stake in their fortunes. I think Howard will gain even more subscribers as his show evolves, through word of mouth. And he’ll be on all day, not just in the morning. Fans can go to bed at night listening to one of his 2 Sirius channels playing crazy stuff. David Lee Roth won’t be able to do that.
Sat radio already has uncensored stand-up comics. I don’t see how Stern is any worse.
“Free” radio spends half their time on commercials, pushing you to buy stuff you don’t even really want, which can cost you way more than $13/mo. over time. And most of their programming is bland or nil.
The media has been harping on Howard’s “great” cost to subscribers. Newspapers headline, “End of free speech, Howard to charge $13/month!!!!” yet those same newspapers charge their subscribers more than that per month. And what about cable TV costs? Glass houses/stones..
Yahoo TV said 4.4 million people watched his farewell address last week on the internet. That’s twice as many people who watch Fox News’ top show. Say what you will about Stern, but he’s turning heads.
It is my hope that this Christmas season turns out to be a success for Sirius, though I have no personal stake in their fortunes. I think Howard will gain even more subscribers as his show evolves, through word of mouth. And he’ll be on all day, not just in the morning. Fans can go to bed at night listening to one of his 2 Sirius channels playing crazy stuff. David Lee Roth won’t be able to do that.
Sat radio already has uncensored stand-up comics. I don’t see how Stern is any worse.
Thanks for the well-reasoned argument, Mitch!
and we always know the lowest-common-denominator is where the money can be found.
I think what most of us miss is the old, funnier, Howard we grew to know and love.
If someone is just discovering Howard today, he may appeal to the worst in them
Howard made his bones in the industry, however, by having precisely the opposite philosophy.
Thanks for the well-reasoned argument, Mitch!
and we always know the lowest-common-denominator is where the money can be found.
I think what most of us miss is the old, funnier, Howard we grew to know and love.
If someone is just discovering Howard today, he may appeal to the worst in them
Howard made his bones in the industry, however, by having precisely the opposite philosophy.
Thanks for the well-reasoned argument, Mitch!
and we always know the lowest-common-denominator is where the money can be found.
I think what most of us miss is the old, funnier, Howard we grew to know and love.
If someone is just discovering Howard today, he may appeal to the worst in them
Howard made his bones in the industry, however, by having precisely the opposite philosophy.
Did you see the Washington Post the other day?
The WP proclaimed that Howard Stern’s move to Sirius is the reason why Opie and Anthony have been rehabilitated and brought back to some CBS’s terristrial radio stations.
Did you see the Washington Post the other day?
The WP proclaimed that Howard Stern’s move to Sirius is the reason why Opie and Anthony have been rehabilitated and brought back to some CBS’s terristrial radio stations.
Also, here’s an interesting article about how Sirius is paying Howard’s fees:
From Schaeffers Research:
Hi Chris!
Oh, yes, I watch the success of O&A and I wonder why Howard ever left in the first place. He has 10% of the listeners he used to have. That’s a huge slaying of his ego. The show suffers when Howard is wounded and pouting.
I’ve become a Jack FM guy during the day and an Imus In the Morning man during my early AM hours. Imus made the successful transition as a performer from middle age to older age — and that’s a trick Howard has yet to imitate.
Hi Chris!
Oh, yes, I watch the success of O&A and I wonder why Howard ever left in the first place. He has 10% of the listeners he used to have. That’s a huge slaying of his ego. The show suffers when Howard is wounded and pouting.
I’ve become a Jack FM guy during the day and an Imus In the Morning man during my early AM hours. Imus made the successful transition as a performer from middle age to older age — and that’s a trick Howard has yet to imitate.
Wow, apparently 4+ Million subscribers in six months doesn’t mean much. Apparently having twice the number of listeners that “hits” such as “Ellen” and “The View” have doesn’t mean much either. I have been a fan of Howard Stern since 1986 and I don’t think his show is any worse…different, but not worse. Unlike so many of his peers, he HAS changed with the times and changed the times rather than staying the same (Imus?) for the duration of his career.
To be frank, Stern’s act is now tiresome. He was interesting to listen too in the late eighties and early nineties because he was the cutting edge. He defied the FCC and put on a show that was risqué and entertained us with his freak show that consisted of lesbians, dwarves, retards and just plain idiots. To say he walked a tightrope during his days on public radio was an understatement. I relate the experience of listening to Stern’s broadcast to having sex before you got married. You KNEW you were doing something that was morally wrong but that’s what made the whole thing more exciting. When you finally got married and sex was no longer naughty, the excitement started to wane (Admit it, you KNOW I’m right).
This is pretty much what happened when Stern moved to Sirius and didn’t have to look over his shoulder to see the FCC Gestapo behind him. Now he could legally use any four letter word he likes and get as raunchy as he wants but now you just don’t care anymore. He didn’t realize that WAS the appeal when he played the renegade. Now he’s just an everyday shock jock and besides, everyone else is doing the same thing (Opie & Andy on the other satellite radio). Really, hasn’t he gone far enough on the fart jokes, and ridiculing retards, lesbians, and dwarfs? 80% of his show now seems to be taken up on ranting about some political issue (earth warming, Bush, you name it). He’s become the know-it-all Hollywood celebrity who thinks everyone should listen to HIS views because he knows more than you do. He’s become the same celebrity that used to repulsive him. The Stern of the eighties would be ashamed of what he transformed too on Sirius. He’d call himself a sell out.
I think the other issue to Stern losing his 12 million audience has to do with his age. The baby boomers are growing up and losing interest in potty humor. Generation X look at him as some old guy and their “thing” is South Park. Without question, if the South Park crew would ever decide to have to have their own radio broadcast, they would blow Stern right out of the water. CARTMAN RULES!
To be frank, Stern’s act is now tiresome. He was interesting to listen too in the late eighties and early nineties because he was the cutting edge. He defied the FCC and put on a show that was risqué and entertained us with his freak show that consisted of lesbians, dwarves, retards and just plain idiots. To say he walked a tightrope during his days on public radio was an understatement. I relate the experience of listening to Stern’s broadcast to having sex before you got married. You KNEW you were doing something that was morally wrong but that’s what made the whole thing more exciting. When you finally got married and sex was no longer naughty, the excitement started to wane (Admit it, you KNOW I’m right).
This is pretty much what happened when Stern moved to Sirius and didn’t have to look over his shoulder to see the FCC Gestapo behind him. Now he could legally use any four letter word he likes and get as raunchy as he wants but now you just don’t care anymore. He didn’t realize that WAS the appeal when he played the renegade. Now he’s just an everyday shock jock and besides, everyone else is doing the same thing (Opie & Andy on the other satellite radio). Really, hasn’t he gone far enough on the fart jokes, and ridiculing retards, lesbians, and dwarfs? 80% of his show now seems to be taken up on ranting about some political issue (earth warming, Bush, you name it). He’s become the know-it-all Hollywood celebrity who thinks everyone should listen to HIS views because he knows more than you do. He’s become the same celebrity that used to repulsive him. The Stern of the eighties would be ashamed of what he transformed too on Sirius. He’d call himself a sell out.
I think the other issue to Stern losing his 12 million audience has to do with his age. The baby boomers are growing up and losing interest in potty humor. Generation X look at him as some old guy and their “thing” is South Park. Without question, if the South Park crew would ever decide to have to have their own radio broadcast, they would blow Stern right out of the water. CARTMAN RULES!
To be frank, Stern’s act is now tiresome. He was interesting to listen too in the late eighties and early nineties because he was the cutting edge. He defied the FCC and put on a show that was risqué and entertained us with his freak show that consisted of lesbians, dwarves, retards and just plain idiots. To say he walked a tightrope during his days on public radio was an understatement. I relate the experience of listening to Stern’s broadcast to having sex before you got married. You KNEW you were doing something that was morally wrong but that’s what made the whole thing more exciting. When you finally got married and sex was no longer naughty, the excitement started to wane (Admit it, you KNOW I’m right).
This is pretty much what happened when Stern moved to Sirius and didn’t have to look over his shoulder to see the FCC Gestapo behind him. Now he could legally use any four letter word he likes and get as raunchy as he wants but now you just don’t care anymore. He didn’t realize that WAS the appeal when he played the renegade. Now he’s just an everyday shock jock and besides, everyone else is doing the same thing (Opie & Andy on the other satellite radio). Really, hasn’t he gone far enough on the fart jokes, and ridiculing retards, lesbians, and dwarfs? 80% of his show now seems to be taken up on ranting about some political issue (earth warming, Bush, you name it). He’s become the know-it-all Hollywood celebrity who thinks everyone should listen to HIS views because he knows more than you do. He’s become the same celebrity that used to repulsive him. The Stern of the eighties would be ashamed of what he transformed too on Sirius. He’d call himself a sell out.
I think the other issue to Stern losing his 12 million audience has to do with his age. The baby boomers are growing up and losing interest in potty humor. Generation X look at him as some old guy and their “thing” is South Park. Without question, if the South Park crew would ever decide to have to have their own radio broadcast, they would blow Stern right out of the water. CARTMAN RULES!
You make terrific sense, Dugan. I’m with you!
You make terrific sense, Dugan. I’m with you!
You make terrific sense, Dugan. I’m with you!