In the film Network, noted television pundit Howard Beale (Peter Finch) notes the complete and utter apathy of America in the post-television age. He notes that "less than 3 percent of you people read books," "less than 15 percent of you read newspapers," and "the only truth you know is what you get over this tube." Beale himself, in this scene, where his own apathy towards the cynicism and lack of imagination of the American public is twisted and distorted into "edgy" political entertainment, notes the failings of the American public in a way that is found to be entertaining.
Taking place after his impromptu speech about asking America to be "mad as hell," his own claims about American forfeiture of one's rights to talk about what is really important is satirized by the fact that his own radical speeches are turned into a circus sideshow. He claims that people need to "go to" themselves in order to find any real truth, because the media pundits like himself do not have our best interests in mind. Instead of presenting reality, pundits present sensationalism in order to get more ratings, and that the television tells us what to do. Beale's solution is to "turn off your television sets. Turn them off now!" but he knows that they won't; the whole problem is that we are so glued to our TVs that we refuse to think about real problems, and his own protests have been sanitized in this scene to make his own protestations seem like a cruel joke.
