The Blooper Facts

When the term "blooper factory" was first uttered, my mind began to race with the possibilities. I've always liked the word "blooper." To me, it's one of the rare words that sounds as funny as what it describes, like "platypus" or "fart." And a blooper factory would be a pretty sweet place to work. I can only think of two factories that would be better: a candy factory, particularly the part of the assembly line between the finished candy and the wrapping machines, and a monkey factory, which I feel is self-explanatory. (OK, short explanation: the factory not only makes monkeys, but is also staffed by monkeys!) Mass-producing and packaging bloopers sounds like it would be nearly as enjoyable as working in a monkey factory, and there'd probably be fewer feces tossed at you. Probably.

In a divine turn of luck, a television newscast is one of the best blooper factories that exists in our modern world. Not only are there men wearing coats and ties with no pants and women with too much makeup attempting to recite hastily-scripted lines with little-to-no preparation, but there's video cameras everywhere to capture the hilarity. In fact, statistics show that the average newscast produces enough bloopers each day to provide several minutes worth of laughter for children in third-world countries. And if anybody could use a good laugh, it's children in third-world countries.

To not take advantage of this natural resource would be akin to a Native American not using every part of the buffalo, or Malaysia not maxing the output of their monkey factories. We already produce the bloopers, so we might as well use them. Throwing them away just deprives the world of the staggering amount of stutters, Freudian slips, burp-faces, eyebrow wiggles, and poorly-timed laughs that our broadcast unintentionally produces every day.

And we can produce more! A few minor tactical changes could exponentially increase our blooper yield. First, we should never, ever turn our cameras or mikes off. Second, an anchor should attempt to distract or taunt their co-anchor whenever they are off-camera, preferably by dancing provocatively, making silly faces, or sneaking a small animal into the studio and releasing it during an especially serious story. Third, we should force our producers to write the scripts for the entire newscast in two minutes or less, instead devoting their precious time to the formulation of humorous tosses, puns and one-liners.

Eventually, using these tactics and more, we could create enough bloopers to do away with our traditional newscast altogether. KUJH can become The Daily Show of Douglas County, except with less actual news content. And maybe, just maybe, we can bring a smile to the face of some starving child in a third-world country that inexplicably has high-speed internet access. Because after all, if we're not producing a product designed solely for the entertainment of children and/or immature college guys sitting at home drinking crappy beer and watching YouTube, then what in the hell are we doing?

Oh, and our ratings would probably go up.

So let's get to work and make this Blooper Factory Fantasy a Blooper Reality. For the children.