WRFH/Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM - Culture Corner: The VP Debate and the Internet's Reaction

Episode Date: October 23, 2024

This week, Skye discusses the 2024 Vice Presidential debate. She talks about what happened, how people online are reacting to it, and what that means culturally

Hello and welcome to Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM. This is Culture Corner and I'm your host, Skygram. Today I'm going to be talking about the funniest reactions and responses I've seen to the 2024 vice presidential debate between J.D. Vance and Tim Walls. Now, before I talk about some of those articles and reactions, I want to first touch on my thoughts about the actual debate, which was actually incredible. incredibly boring. And I don't say that as an insult. I actually say that to commend both of them for being very cordial and respectful to each other throughout this entire debate. I don't think we've

seen a political debate this boring since 2012, which is a very good sign, actually. I do think J.D. Vance decisively won. He put on a much stronger performance. He deferred to immigration and the economy whenever he could. He didn't seem too radical. He didn't seem too centrist. He seemed perfectly normal and reasonable. And I think that's what he was there to do. As for Tim Walls, I think on substance, he did fine. There were a couple of things that were definitely off color and a number of things that were questionable. But from the perspective of his base, I don't think this really changes anything. One thing that I could see legitimately hurting him is the amount of memes. and content that I saw on social media after the debate that were directly related to his facial expressions throughout the entire debate.

So essentially this meme has been created and it's just Tim Walls talking, looking incredibly scared, and JD Vance kind of side-eyeing the camera in like Jim Halpert fashion, if you've ever watched the office. So that's kind of gone viral on the internet. it does make him look weak. It does make him look scared. And since these images are going viral all over the internet, a lot of people are going to be seeing them. And a lot of people are really, really tired of feeling like

they have a president who doesn't know what he's doing and is scared and is weak. So I don't know how much those pictures of Tim Walz will conjure up that image of Joe Biden on the debate stage. But in as much as they do, it's probably not a good look for Tim Walz. There's one more thing I want to get to when it comes to the internet's response to this debate, which is this article from Politico magazine, which has to be one of the funniest articles that I've seen from the mainstream media in a long, long time. The headline reads,

A body language expert watched the Walls Vance debate. Here's what he noticed. And I kid you not, this is what is in the article. Quote, Vance is the first White House wannabe to wear facial hair in 80 years. Research indicates that voters see beards as more masculine. That can be positive to some, but to others, especially women, it can be negative, conveying aggression and opposition to feminist ideals. I truly cannot believe that that was an actual article that I actually read.

And obviously, I think this shows that they're scared and they're not confident that Kamala and walls are going to be able to push it over the edge. If anything, this just seems demeaning to female voters because it implies. that women only vote based on how they perceive their candidate to be, whether they perceive their candidate to be overly masculine or scary rather than voting based on policy. The women in my life vote based on the economy, on immigration, on a whole host of policy issues, and that goes for women on both sides. I don't know a single woman who is sincerely sitting there and thinking about their candidate's facial hair. This article also said, quote,

Eye popping can sometimes be a sign of surprise, but for walls, it simply revealed his emotional intensity. The dynamic and emphetic facial motion grabs the viewer's attention. For walls, it gave extra weight to his feelings and held our gaze. I mean, if holding the audience's gaze means becoming a meme on social media for all the wrong reasons, then sure, he did that. But it definitely did not show his quote-unquote passion. If anything, he looked scared and out of place. And as a regular person, I'm not an expert, but as a regular person, that's what myself and a lot of other regular normal people gathered from this debate.

And you can tell that by the way that social media is making a massive joke out of it. That's all I have for you today. You're listening to Culture Corner on Radio Free Hillsdale 101.7 FM.