In the wake of the Terri Schiavo media black hole, other news, such as the tragic shooting at Red Lake High School in Minnesota, has gotten little coverage. The stats on Google news this morning reveal 3400 stories about Schiavo, and only 1000 about the Red Lake shooting. Hell, I found more stories about memories of the Columbine shooting this morning than I did about Red Lake.
But hey, I suppose the faces of Native American students mourning those they lost just don't play as well as that horrific picture of Schiavo I've seen hundreds of times now, mouth open, eyes blank. With her death this morning, perhaps the media fervor will die down (no pun intended) this week and we can get back to the business of covering the rest of the world's suffering, rather than the suffering of this poor woman.
After all, what happened to Social Security? Oh, the push for reform is still going strong, though I'm not sure I'm familiar with this strange new definition of "reform" that really seems to mean "ruin, wreck, and bankrupt." Oh, there's news about the Red Lake shooting, but half of that is tied in with 'memories of Columbine,' which leaves me with a vaguely ill feeling. Can this tragedy - for that's what it is - not be unique and important in its own right?
Now, I realize this is a fine line... I don't want to see the news sources papered with the same story over and over, any story (*cough* Schiavo), but having lived in a town that experienced the crisis of a school shooting (Jonesboro, Arkansas, while I was in college... a parent of one of the victims was my co-worker, so I had a nice, close look), I will tell you that it devastates... everything. Granted, Jonesboro is a smaller city, so anything as pervasive as a school shooting is more likely to affect an entire community, but Red Lake is a smaller community.
Article comments
1 - LegendaryMonkey
Commenting on my own just to apologize... I somehow managed to miss the first two paragraphs of this when I originally posted. Now fixed.
2 - Eric Olsen
very fine points LM, all lives should count equally, but in the scrum of the media it just isn't so - thanks and welcome!
3 - Mark Schannon
Excellent thoughts. Some idle reactions:
We're becoming a "celebrity" society where what used to be news gets lost in the 5 minutes of fame.
The "pack mentality" of journalism is completely out of hand.
At the same time, there seems to be a leaden sameness to the news--on all fronts--as if even reporters don't care anymore.
We're losing out outrage factor--regarless of one's party affiliation, the rigged Bush "town meetings" with people being forcibly evicted should enrage us, but we just accept it. I'd be just as outraged if Ted Kennedy did it.
4 - NancyGail
Unfortunately, Terri Schiavo pushed all else to the mere mentions. The only thing anybody really focused on was when Johhny Cochran died.
5 - Z.Z.B.
School shootings like this are a symptom of a bigger problem in our school systems in general. We have co-opted the under acheivers to the point that they seek out their own social groups. The sad part is how blind educators and parents are becoming to this problem. This age group spends more and more of their time "learning" social interaction from anti mainstream social media of all types. The are usually the disenfranchised groups in the schools. The parents of these kids are often in a state of denial themselves that they have a child with a emotional / developmental problem.
My wife is an elementaty educator and believe me I hear plenty about parental disengagment from the child.
6 - LegendaryMonkey
Ooh, interesting comments... and thanks for the welcome, Eric. I'm making myself at home here.
Another Blogcritic, Al Barger, left a comment on this entry on my Sudden Nothing stating that Red Lake wasn't really a national story (I so disagree). I think that ties right in with what Z.Z.B. says - this SHOULD BE national news, because it IS a symptom of a larger problem in our school systems all across America. It's not unique to any type of community. It's not unique at all, and that's even more sad.
And Mark... you're right. We just can't rouse ourselves enough anymore, and I don't understand that, either. It seems like such a fundamental disconnect for me. Sure, if the economy was in great shape, or governmentally, things were going well, I could understand the lethargy that drives most of America, from the news readers/watchers to the journalists themselves to turn everything into a celebrity circus of voyeurism.
But things aren't okay. And where's the news on that? Gas prices aren't the only thing that's rising. We're sliding toward some major economic problems, and we're worried about something that the Supreme Court, at least, pretty clearly stamped as a non-issue. At least, a non-national issue, and one that they had no reason to address.
And in the meantime, in the shadow of Terri Schiavo, people are dying.
What a world.
7 - RJ
"Is it just that these school shootings have become so commonplace that it isn't a big deal anymore?"
Actually, I understand that violent deaths in schools have been declining in recent years, overall.
8 - RJ
The dead are dead. The still-living-but-soon-to-be-dead are still alive.
The media focused on Terri because it was a legal battle over life and death, so it was a "fluid" situation, with regular "important" updates.
9 - LegendaryMonkey
See, here is where I disagree, - not with what you're saying, but with the reference to a "legal battle." I didn't see it as a battle at all... because the courts kept saying, in effect, please stop. Stop bringing this to us. It's decided and done.
Yeah, I think I'm being nitpicky and semantic, but I just found the whole thing frustrating. Maybe if the Supreme Court had taken on the case, and officially said, "All you people sticking your noses into this? Yeah, stop that. Go away. This was a matter for a much lower court, it's decided, go away," then I'd have felt something.
Instead, I just felt a mild sense of disgust at being forced to look into the pain on both sides of this family, because it was constantly in my face.