This is a response to Josh's rant, please read his
thoughts first...click
here
I just read your rant on the Media screw up, of the West
Virginia Mine Accident. While I agree in part, with what you wrote, I
cannot sit by and let you place the blame entirely on the media. As I
am sure you are aware the media (in its current form) exists because of
our (the entire population’s) desire to have not-stop 24/7 coverage
of the world’s events. This is clearly evident by the success of
24 hour cable news networks such as Fox news, CNN, and others. The peoples’
demand for real-time coverage of local, national, and world news, is at
its highest it’s ever been in human history. Now I would never try
to justify purposely misleading the public, b/c of there demand for information,
but you must not discount the effect that it has on the people doing the
reporting.
The people that are doing these stories are in a tough situation; often
with there own personal success on the line for the stories they cover.
It’s a race between the networks at all stages of the coverage of
any particular story. This case will repeat it self in the future, based
on the publics demand to know, the competition of the news agencies and
particularly in this case, the authorities respect for the situation.
The false information that was releases was done so purposely by the authorities
at the time. They knew damn well that those guys were dead, and they did
what they thought was right by telling the press that “everything
was ok”, in hope of reaching the families first. The authorities
did not account for the speed of the reports or the fact that their every
move was being broadcast on national television.
So at the time the false information was being reported, the families
who relyed on information from the authorities, were being notified of
the truth. I agree the reporters should do everything in there power to
verify facts, but lets be honest here, what news do u read that is based
entirely on facts? You often state in you rant that the media should only
report “facts”. While I agree with that statement, it is just
not the reality of the world we are in. There is more personal/political
agendas shown as fact, then there ever is of true facts in the media.
Anyone who takes the media’s “word” as fact deserves
what they get. And your points on the various false reports released in
the recent past, only helps to prove that you should never take news as
fact. Now I feel bad for the families of this accident, but regardless
of the report, will suing or holding the media responsible for giving
out the same information the authorities gave to them, bring back these
miners? I am sick of this idea that if shit does not go your way in this
country the first thought it to sue. If someone must be held responsible
in this case, it has to be the people who told the media that everything
was just dandy.
There were no reporters crawling inside those crumbled shafts digging
for people, they stood on the sidelines like they always do, asking anyone
who was there what the deal was. If we would like to bash the media for
there “rush the story & ignore the real facts attitude”
then lets find an example when the media was the only one responsible,
like the Dan Rather incident. In that case, they simply did not do any
research to see if what they were reporting was true. I mean to not verify
an incriminating document (especially considering it was bashing the president)
of it authenticity and report it as fact, is very different from repeating
information given from authorities who are in control of a disaster area.
My final thoughts are that this was a horrible accident, and in an attempt
to do the right thing, the authorities actually did the wrong thing. I
expect in the future, the speed of the news will not be underestimated
as it was in this case.
|