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When your profession is in the media, you look at it very differently than most people do. I mean, everyone knows that the media (especially in the U.S.) is biased, and not exactly always forthcoming, but you start to listen to everything that they're saying and wonder if any of it is at all true. Once you're looking at so-called objective journalism this way, you start noticing that the media that seem to be purposely notobjective seem to make more sense, and actually be more honest. Whether it's subject matter or method of conveyance, doesn't seem to matter—three things pop into my head as I write this: the "narrative documentary" (think Nick Broomfield and Michael Moore), advertising and sex.  Of course, two of these things are often linked together in that age-old saying: "Sex sells." Could advertising and sex have two major things in common? Could both be used to boost sales while both being two of the most honest forms of media?With advertising, you know what you're getting and why. You know who is putting up the money for this product. There isn't really any reason to lie. It's paid for. It's biased. That's the point. I feel the same way about porn: there's no reason to lie. You're already talking about the taboo, and stepping over lines and boundaries just by working in the sex industry. Why lie? When I saw Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine, I was most reminded of the scene in The People vs. Larry Flynt, where Flynt has made a montage of images of naked women and people having sex juxtaposed with war. In 2003, we're still trying to figure out why America is fine with killing and not with love. In a time when America is lying, and being lied to, by their own federal officials more than any one else, is it really so odd to look to the so-called sleazy industries for honesty?  Even more important, when I saw Bowling for Columbine I was disgusted by the way our "objective, mainstream" press treated everything—from the fact that the Columbine shooters' parents worked at Lockheed Martin to the fact that we dropped more bombs on foreign nations that day than any other day that year (a year we weren't at war).Now, Moore falls into the category of narrative documentarian. He puts himself, and his opinion, right into the piece. An interesting tactic that only works with subjects that people get "up in arms" about (ha, ha), or is it a tactic that makes any subject super interesting? You could say that Moore has an agenda. Which is fine, but what makes it fine, is that he is the first to admit it. And this is a relatively new method of filmmaking. Why? Because we never needed it before. There lies the basis of honesty: if you're not lying about something than how can you not be being dishonest? That sounds strange but I guess it comes down to this: what are you hiding? Nothing? Then how can anything be wrong? To me, sex, advertising and the opinionated filmmaker who sticks his or her face and opinion in the movie are, shall we say, exposing themselves much more than most. And those who bare all surely wear no shame. 
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