I recently reported for jury duty at the federal district court. As part of the selection process, the judge required potential jurors to write answers to a set of questions, providing both sides in the case a first look at the jury pool. One question caught my attention, if it didn’t surprise entirely. The court wanted to know whether I watched CSI, or one of the variations, the technical expertise displayed on the show making work harder for judges and attorneys, many jurors arriving with skewed expectations.
How deeply has the CSI mentality penetrated? There, playing on the television mounted at one end of the jury room, was an episode of, you guessed it, the show that inspired the question.
Actually, the influence has spread much further, even to the National Football League. Around our house, we call it “DNA time,” when the game is interrupted for instant replay, and the television folks in the booth and along the sideline examine and discuss every microscopic fiber of the moment in question. They offer their own “expert” judgment as they wait for the verdict from the officials. Over and over we look for the “indisputable” evidence.
Consider that turning point in the NFC Championship game over the weekend. Did the ball graze the knee or shin of the punt returner for the San Francisco 49ers? Viewers climbed aboard the replay machine and ventured practically into the ridges of player’s red socks, offering reminders of the magnified opening credits of Dexter, blood spatter specialist and the Robin Hood of serial killers.
Now, in this case, instant replay fulfilled its purpose, if awkwardly so, delivering the correct call at a decisive moment. What about earlier in the day, when Tom Brady of the New England Patriots appeared to score a touchdown on a quarterback keeper? The play moved quickly amid the big bodies, Brady’s head and shoulders plus ball landing in the end zone. Six points! Not so fast. The replay technicians zoomed close, and then closer. Alas, the discovery: His knee touched the ground an instant before the ball crossed the line.
OK, technically, the right call. Yet the initial decision of a touchdown was one of those that in earlier era would have been greeted with nodding heads. We could see it with our own eyes. Amid all the technology and mounting complexity, not to mention delays, games running beyond four hours, the first purpose of instant replay has been obscured. The point was to correct the glaringly awful call.
Instant replay has become something of a worst nightmare about bureaucracy, expanding, dominating, not necessarily achieving the right result. What is indisputable, anyway? Instant replay is like so many other things: If it cannot be practiced in moderation, then maybe it shouldn’t be practiced at all.
— MICHAEL DOUGLAS
Editorial page editor
