Jimmy Kimmel has developed an interesting gag called “Lie Witness News.” This is a structured version of Jay Leno’s “Jay Walking” combined with various man-on-the-street attempts done by comics locally and nationally. Making fools out of the public just seems too easy. This particular episode from April appears to make the nation’s youth seem like a massive horde of bullcrappers. Apparently it is getting harder to simply say, “I don’t know.” That said we must assume and hope that most of the clips were left on the cutting room floor.



  1. McCullough says:

    I hope I die before I get old…..

    My Generation

  2. Somebody_Else says:

    Dvorak is such an ageist. 🙂

  3. deegee says:

    Kimmel is great. One of the best late night shows.
    Lie Witness News and This Week in Unnecessary Censorship are hilarious. You can YouTube ’em.

    In Canada, Rick Mercer (Rick Mercer Report, and used to be in This Hour Has 22 Minutes) has also been doing this type of gag on his shows for years such as in his ‘Talking To Americans’ routine.
    Wikipedia it or YouTube it. RM also got Pres Bush with this one.

    These just go to show that there are gullible people everywhere.

  4. Sam says:

    These are millenial sheeple.

    Very much like the Eloi in H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine.

    Scary though, Wells thought it would take until 802,701 to achieve this level of society.

  5. melican says:

    Anyone who works in television production will be familiar with this, but it isn’t just about age. Many people will tell a reporter anything if they think it means they’ll get on television.

    • Gwad his own self says:

      Likewise, many a reporter will tell the public anything if they think it means they’ll stay on television.

  6. Uncle Patso says:

    All you have to do is tell the interviewees “Go along with the gag, okay?” and you can make 19/20 people look like idiots.

    If you can find them, go look at some of the things you wrote in high school before you cast stones. I have — it was humbling.

  7. bobbo, the pragmatic existential evangelical anti-theist says:

    Sadly Dvorak, you display the same error you complain of.

    While melican and Uncle Patso have some of it, IN THE MAIN: the show filters out the knowing responses.

    I do assume you KNOW this as well as I do, as well as everyone posting here “but” you were caught off guard and went with your initial gut response—just like the people shown in the clip, except you had more time….. lots more time.

    See how that works?

    I do wonder who is playing whom as the worst chumps? You with this post, Late Night TV with these biased/filtered “gags”, or the TeaF*ckingPublican party?

    Its all the same trick: lying to gain an audience.

    Silly Hoomans.

    • Hmeyers says:

      C’mon Bobbo … Gandalf and Obi-Wan are pissed at you. You’ve got the grey beard and the age under your belt, but they are growing impatient with the “wisdom” thing not blossoming in your case.

      Don’t make Yoda and Frodo come after you for these blog posts.

      Protip: When Yoda died in Return of the Jedi, he disappeared. But before he died, he ate a bowl of stew. So what happened to the stew he ate?

      • bobbo, the pragmatic existential evangelical anti-theist says:

        It turned to shit…… just as everything does?

        Ha, ha….. Thank You HMyers your tender mercies are recognized.

        Fun to recognize the humanity of those whom we contest against. Who does it honor….. except ourselves?

        Get it Pedro?/Loser/the Douches of various odiferous oozing ovaries/D himself?

        Yes criticism. What does it mean?

        ………………….and what is love?

  8. bobbo, the pragmatic existential evangelical anti-theist says:

    I posted this once before: I was in the very first row at a Magic Show and one act was a hypnotist. As he put one volunteer under, I heard him whisper “Please go along, I’m trying to earn a living here and the people will love you.” I always wondered how people were so easily hypnotized, and like most tricks…. it too was a lie.

    Amusing.

  9. jcj7161 says:

    fake

  10. noname says:

    It’s a result of American pathetic training from formal education, TV and now the internet. It’s hard to say which has more influence?

    Americans have been trained in unearned self esteem, image and entertainment is king, mimic or feign celebrity, go along to get along, don’t challenge authority, don’t rock the boat, don’t offend and voracious consumerism (buy more than you can afford)!

    Basically, most Americans can only hope to be wage slaves and not leaders.

    Luckily some countries can see through our American paper thin illogical ruse: Germany, France.

    • Hmeyers says:

      Kids have it tough, mostly because most of the adults trying to teach them overrate their skills.

      Which is why the kids thinks adults are morons.

      And then the cycle repeats.

      Not much different than Og’s kids making fun of him for not knowing what an atlatl was.

      Or Og not being down with that new-fangled device, the “wheel”.

      This has been going on since pre-history.

      And it’ll be “Ok”.

  11. DJ says:

    There are plenty of morons from our generation, too, John. Just look at the Tea Party and the comments on your own blog. If you’re looking for positive examples of the Millennials, I recommend the last half hour of “Zero Dark Thirty” and “Restrepo”

  12. Hmeyers says:

    Like the kids from John’s generation weren’t fainting and fawning over the Beatles.

    Or like they knew math or politics or algebra.

    Keep it real.

  13. NewformatSux says:

    The people on the video may very well be hired actors, or have the lines fed to them by their writers. Or perhaps the ‘wrong’ answers were filtered out in favor of the ones showing what the producers wanted to see. In a scientific study that would be considered fraud.

    • A couple of things. There is no budget for actors and few can be as genuine as people trying too hard. More likely is that MOST people had a clue and did not get used. You can get some crazy stuff from the streets.

      I can assure you I did not have to ask him to “play along.”

      • bobbo, the pragmatic existential evangelical anti-theist says:

        Thats a lie JC Dvorak. You get “everything” from the street. That is what it MEANS!!!!!

        You tickle my funny bone after watching an admirable flims on the toob tonight: “Black Book” about the close of the war in Holland in WW2. The main story is routine. Watch for and appreciate the minor threads. There lies the tragedy. (Mr Skin gives it….crap, I didn’t pay attention….. 50 tits but they all might be the same two)

        FILTERING MY CHILDREN!!!!!!!

        Rather like conflation. WATCH how your opinions are “pressured” to be one way or the other. Its not incidental==its omnipresent.

        Just look!

        Be AWARE!!! For Christ Sake====>why else be alive?

  14. orchidcup says:

    Unfortunately, I work with the public every day and this kind of ignorance and cluelessness is very common on the streets.

    The fluoride in the water must be working.

  15. Howard Beale says:

    ‘2 door cinema club’ THOSE BABES ROCK they opened for The Wet Sweaters at Summerfest in Milwaukee last year. I cried when they played The Bloody Mattress with the extended theremin solo.

    Its all in the editing it would be just as easy to make Canadians, Germans and French look foolish, just throw out the 10 kids who answered who? what? never heard of them and keep the 1 who wanted to look in the know, cool, or whatever spend an hour with this 10 to 1 ratio and you have your 5 or 6 for the bit

    its called comedy
    good stuff

  16. bobbo, the pragmatic existential evangelical anti-theist says:

    F*ck me. I sound like a nut case.

    Ha, ha.

    A little bit of everything in everything else.

    BE alive, BE aware, BE honest.

    I wish I could BE as happy as he looks:

    http://youtube.com/watch?v=TLTJ2ykad-k

  17. Comanche says:

    I call bullshit. They just tell them a play along, be interesting and you’ll be on TV.

  18. CrankyGeeksFan says:

    There are videos taken about 5 years after 9/11 in this “Jay Walking” -type interview.
    Five years after 9/11, many college students didn’t know what year the attacks occurred in .

  19. SPOCK says:

    john is on the pulse. the thing is i’m positive some
    of those kids are quite intelligent. it’s hilarious, but
    when it comes to the urban crowd, being caught up
    in the rarest obscurities of the arts (music, film, etc.)
    is the norm. and this clip nailed it, if you live in that
    world, it’s as though you are obligated to know such
    things. the genius band names cracked a little smile.

  20. kevin says:

    never saw the interviewers face in that clip. could it be that those questions were edited in over some legit questions? nah, everything on tv is real and totally honest. the last thing the mega media conglomerate would ever want to do is to lead astray. just listen to the people laughing during the skit, they are real.

  21. Sam says:

    Has to be staged, as another person said we don’t see the interviewers face and the sound isn’t right, I hear some sort of reverb that doesn’t match the outdoor setting.

  22. darki says:

    There are plenty of morons from our generation, too, John. Just look at the Tea Party and the comments on your own blog. If you’re looking for positive examples of the Millennials, I recommend the last half hour of “Zero Dark Thirty” and “Restrepo”


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