Talk Radio callers

My initial answer to the question to the question:

"How does Bogosian portray the talk radio callers?"

is "with great disdain."

The difference between a work of drama and the every day reality of call in radio is in a drama, all of the callers need to advance the plot of that drama. The run-of-the-mill caller has no place in a drama. As a result, all of the callers in Talk Radio are greatly caricatured. They all server to illustrate how stupid the Champlain character's callers are and show how fed up he is with them and how he is smarter than them. The only caller who asks a sensible question, one of those identified only as "caller", asks

"why does an intelligent fellow like yourself spend so much energy hurting other people?"

is hung up on, leaving the question unanswered.



Even on the Dennis and Callahan show on WEEI, which I really don't like, the hosts treat the callers with more respect than the Champlain character in Talk Radio does. They do shout down people they strongly disagree with and ridicule people with ridiculous (in their view) points to make, but they also interact with most the callers, even the rest of those who don't share their off-the-deep-end right wing views.

A real talk radio program relies on some give and take. In this play, all of the callers are dimwits, and all are insulted by the host. There are certainly dimwit callers on real talk radio, and they are often insulted, belittled and hung up on by the hosts. This often happens on The Big Show (WEEI again, which constitutes almost all of my non-NPR talk show listening) However, there are also callers who bring up interesting points, challenge the hosts, or even agree with them in an entertaining way who are not abused by the hosts.