People have said that I am funny. True, not everyone responds to my particular sense of humor, but none-the-less, I have been called funny by a significant number of people. My pitfall is that because I make jokes so often, people find it hard to take me seriously or even believe that I can be serious. Truth be told, I am frequently serious, and I am always out to make a point whether it be to identify and mock certain social norms and the status quo or simply to comment on absurdities I have heard. Because I frequently do this in a humorous manner, i don't want others to think i don't take certain matters very seriously. From time to time in this blog, I may discuss a subject which I feel strongly in a non-humorous way. Today is one of those times. Please do not read this and expect to laugh, I do not consider it funny, nor will I attempt to make it funny:
A lot of people are talking about the mass killing at Virginia Tech this week. Truly all our hearts and prayers go out, not only to the victims families, but also to their friends, classmates, professors, and colleagues. My heart also goes out to every students across the country who has witnessed how the average Monday at any school, even one of the best in the nation, can become a horrific and life-alteringly trauma. The victims did not deserve this, their families did not deserve this, no one in the world deserves to have their life cut short like this, especially not people barely 20 years old who actively and innocently left home to pursue their education and their lively hood. This event was and continues to be an absolute tragedy which has brought tears, frustration, anger, fear, and outrage to the whole of this country.
But I am not going to talk about how saddened the nation is this week, nor will I talk about how outraged we all are that something like this can and does happen, nor will I discuss changing the second amendment of the United States Constitution, nor will I discuss the shooter's background or motives. There are plenty of other blogs that will do that. If that is what you are interested in, I am sure you can find one. I would like to explore something that the mainstream media will not discuss, and that is the mainstream media itself.
I think it is criminal, absolutely criminal how the media such as CNN, NBC News, ABC News, Fox, etc, etc jumped on this story. Yes, it is news. Yes it is a story. Yes it is one of the biggest news stories from the last decade if not more, and I encourage news organizations to cover it to the best of their ability in an unbiased and non-judgemental way, but the method that some of these organizations used were so inconsiderate and heartless that I found myself become as furious at them as I was about the event itself. For those of you who don't recall, the killings happened in the morning and mid afternoon on Monday April 16, 2007, keep in mind that not only was this the worst mass shooting in US History, but most of the victims were barely adults living hundreds of miles from home, and by early evening, the media had interviews and videos of witnesses and victims plastered all over the television and Internet. The one that sticks out in my mind was the interview with the girl who only survived by playing dead on the floor. So break it down logically. A girl who was sitting at her desk one minute as she does every other day of the week, was suddenly watching her classmates being shot and killed right in front of her by a brutal gunman, she collapsed to the ground and didn't move, and by sheer luck the gunman didn't notice she was still alive. Later she and only 3 or 4 of her classmates came out alive from what was a class of 25. This is a truly amazing story. This girl, Erin Sheehan, survived something so atrocious that most of us won't even let ourselves try to imagine it, and it is also the kind of thing that will undoubtedly haunt this girl for the rest of her life. She will surely suffer from severe post-traumatic stress syndrome. She will probably go through phases of depression at best, and will surely be in therapy for a long long time. But no one told CNN that. Sure enough less than 24 hours after it happened, some interviewer is pressing her for her story. Make sure not to leave details out: what did he look like? how did he do it? Were you friends with any of the victims? Could you just go ahead and re-live the whole morning for us cause we are in a ratings battle with FOX.
It is honestly appalling. These kids should not be on camera, especially that soon after the fact. They need time. They need to cry. They need to cope with what they just dealt with. They need cal home, they need to light candles, and say prayers, and hug their friends, and have vigils, and sign memorials. But mostly they need to go home to their families for a little while and be reminded that there really is some good in the world. What they don't need is a microphone in their faces while some interviewer prods them for information between make-up applications. I am truly disappointed in news organizations for the way they treated these students. You want to interview police officers, and doctors, and spokesmen, and politicians? Fine, they weren't in the classrooms, and it is part of their jobs to talk to the press, but leave the kids alone. I am really sick of news being a sport with only one rule: the one with the highest rating wins. Have some compassion, have some sense, have something that isn't desire to look the best no matter what the cost.
