Showing posts with label applause. Show all posts
Showing posts with label applause. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Screaming audience aversion

When did women start screaming to indicate their enthusiasm?
Once upon a time there was a thing called "applause" - a clapping of the hands to convey delight or appreciation. Sometimes it came with added whistles.
Then the "whoop" arrived and audiences added whooping vocal sounds to applause.
Now they just scream.
If they are applauding with their hands, it is inaudible beneath the shrill of shrieks and screams.
It is a most terrible sound. It is a descent into inanity.
Is it clear how much I hate this development in the world of entertainment?
Or, how mystified I am about it?

The strident insistence of extended audience screaming has caused me simply to turn off television programs I otherwise may have watched, even enjoyed. Conan O'Brien, the offbeat late night presenter, actively encourages this animalistic nonsense from his audience, cueing the women to keep on and on with the screams as he basks in it its approbation.
On the NBC morning show, there are screamers waiting in the streets. The moment they see a camera light go on, they start with the screaming.
This mindless din accompanies more and more American television. Well, it accompanies anything that includes a live audience. God forbid they start injecting the canned screams to the recorded shows. Daresay it may come.
This phenomenon has acquired nauseating ubiquity. We have produced a whole generation of people who can only express themselves with primal high Cs.
And no one seems to complain, to ask them to try the old hand-clapping routine...

Am I the only person who is despairing of this?
It makes me want to scream!