Bryan W. Alaspa 1Oprah is leaving and Chicago mourns
November 21st 2009 20:50
With the announcement from the Great and Terrible Oprah that she would be stopping her existing show, which is taped here in Chicago, in 2011 and moving on with her own cable channel, the entire city of Chicago has been thrown into some kind of frenzy. Of course, no one seems to realize that Oprah herself does not actually live in Chicago these days. Sure, she may own property in and around the area and maybe even spends a little time here, but Oprah has been based out of Los Angeles for a long time now. Her show is really no more about Chicago than New York Mets baseball games are about Chicago.
Of course, the mindless throngs who are part of her cult think this is a tragedy. You would think that Oprah had been diagnosed with some terrible disease and had done some kind of Lou Gehrig-style good-bye on the baseball mound at Wrigley Field. She isn’t dying and she isn’t really leaving. She will simply resurrect her show on her self-centered cable network which is called the Oprah Winfrey Network or, more accurately, OWN. Because, when you are self-enamored enough and a big enough cult-leader you have to put your face and stamp on everything. She is already on each and every cover of her magazine and now she can be on every minute of her cable network, perhaps a tiny Oprah head in the corner, watching out over her audience.
I have become rather non-enamored with Oprah for some time now. She started out doing the same talk show crap that everyone else was doing. She also started at the same time Phil Donahue was doing his thing. In fact, Oprah probably couldn’t have done what she did had not Phil come first. Anyway, she was having the same contentious guests on that everyone else was having. She was having some success with it too. She seemed fresh and different. Then, however, she made a play that would launch her from a media celebrity into some self-styled goddess with her blind, deaf and easily-led flock munching away at her toes and willing to be lead anywhere as long as the great and powerful “O” was doing the leading.
Suddenly she began talking about her “Spirit.” Right away I noticed that her talk show had taken a strange pseudo-religious bent. She began telling her flock what they should read. Then she began making demands outside the studio, such as when a store was closing and she was denied entry she brought the manager of the store and whipped him verbally in front of her mooing flock until he bowed to her power. Never mind the fact that us mere mortals have to follow the rules of when stores close. Never mind the fact that the minimum-wage-making store employees probably just wanted to go home after a long day of dealing with annoying customers. All that mattered was that Oprah got to shop and anyone else be damned.
Then came the shows where Oprah, like some self-styled queen, in her flowing robes, created shows were she bestowed gifts upon her flock. She gave them beverages and glasses and books and cars. All that was missing was her standing in a town square tossing handfuls of bronze coins to the crowd with her face stamped on them to make her look more like the Roman Emperor Caligula.
So, she is leaving. I say, good-bye and thanks. I feel bad for the employees of Harpo Studios who will likely be losing their jobs. Then again Oprah probably has a huge severance package lined up for them.
Of course, the mindless throngs who are part of her cult think this is a tragedy. You would think that Oprah had been diagnosed with some terrible disease and had done some kind of Lou Gehrig-style good-bye on the baseball mound at Wrigley Field. She isn’t dying and she isn’t really leaving. She will simply resurrect her show on her self-centered cable network which is called the Oprah Winfrey Network or, more accurately, OWN. Because, when you are self-enamored enough and a big enough cult-leader you have to put your face and stamp on everything. She is already on each and every cover of her magazine and now she can be on every minute of her cable network, perhaps a tiny Oprah head in the corner, watching out over her audience.
I have become rather non-enamored with Oprah for some time now. She started out doing the same talk show crap that everyone else was doing. She also started at the same time Phil Donahue was doing his thing. In fact, Oprah probably couldn’t have done what she did had not Phil come first. Anyway, she was having the same contentious guests on that everyone else was having. She was having some success with it too. She seemed fresh and different. Then, however, she made a play that would launch her from a media celebrity into some self-styled goddess with her blind, deaf and easily-led flock munching away at her toes and willing to be lead anywhere as long as the great and powerful “O” was doing the leading.
Suddenly she began talking about her “Spirit.” Right away I noticed that her talk show had taken a strange pseudo-religious bent. She began telling her flock what they should read. Then she began making demands outside the studio, such as when a store was closing and she was denied entry she brought the manager of the store and whipped him verbally in front of her mooing flock until he bowed to her power. Never mind the fact that us mere mortals have to follow the rules of when stores close. Never mind the fact that the minimum-wage-making store employees probably just wanted to go home after a long day of dealing with annoying customers. All that mattered was that Oprah got to shop and anyone else be damned.
Then came the shows where Oprah, like some self-styled queen, in her flowing robes, created shows were she bestowed gifts upon her flock. She gave them beverages and glasses and books and cars. All that was missing was her standing in a town square tossing handfuls of bronze coins to the crowd with her face stamped on them to make her look more like the Roman Emperor Caligula.
So, she is leaving. I say, good-bye and thanks. I feel bad for the employees of Harpo Studios who will likely be losing their jobs. Then again Oprah probably has a huge severance package lined up for them.
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