April 20, 2007--Fanaticism LXXVIII--All The News That's Fit to Sell
At the risk of seeming insensitive or worse, can’t we move on from our national immersion in the massacre at Virginia Tech?
Everyone has been appropriately horrified, outraged, and grief-stricken. In truth, many have also been fascinated, not able to get enough of the media coverage that includes even dramatic audio of the actual shots being fired. The only thing better for those besotted by the gory details and the endless ruminations about what “caused” Cho to act this way or what the university should have done to protect its students and staff, the only thing more appealing to those who can’t seem to get enough of this would be for the coverage to shift from the news networks to the TV series CSI.
If we are patient this too shall come to pass. By while we’re waiting for that, we’ll have to make do with what the so-called news media are serving up. Thanks to the killer’s sending his “multi-media manifesto” to NBC there’s a lot to keep us titillated. Including the frankly hypocritical spatting about the “appropriateness” of airing the images and videos within the very same media that were eager to pick up the NBC feeds and print them (above the fold in the NY Times’ case) and air them.
My favorite thing about the other networks broadcasting the materials that NBC received is their literal outrage that NBC had the audacity to put its call letters on all the materials it released. So that when CBS or ABC or Fox of CNN broadcast them, embossed in vivid three-dimensions and full color in the upper left-hand corner was the NBC logo.
Paul Friedman, vice president of CBS News, showing faux-understanding about NBC’s plight, was quoted in the Times as having claimed that he “thought about calling NBC executives to suggest that they remove the logo to distance themselves from the material.” (Article linked below.) Spoken like a true heir to the legacy of Edward R. Murrow and custodian of what remains of the Tiffany Network’s journalistic traditions.
NBC contends that it thought long and hard about whether or not to put the pictures on the air and came to conclude that they had “news-value.” Steve Capus, who last week was busy clawing his way to the moral high-ground when firing Don Imus, archly shot back against his media colleague detractors, saying, “Every journalist is united [in agreeing that the images were newsworthy]. You can tell by their actions.” In fact, though NBC embargoed the distribution of the photos and videos until after 10:00 pm eastern time to give its own stations an “exclusive” until then, all of the other news organizations ignored it and some even broadcast the material before NBC could get them on the air!
And weren’t some of those images riveting? Especially the one the Times put on its front page which has become the logo for this tragedy—the one of Cho Seung-Hui glaring defiantly into the camera with his arms akimbo, guns blazing in both hands, cut-off shooter’s gloves, black vest, the whole gangster deal. How long before T shirts with that image show up in your neighborhood?
And, by the way, did the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams beat out ABC’s World News Tonight in the ratings? And how did Katie Couric do? I didn’t watch but I understand she did her show from Blacksburg, VA without makeup.
Everyone has been appropriately horrified, outraged, and grief-stricken. In truth, many have also been fascinated, not able to get enough of the media coverage that includes even dramatic audio of the actual shots being fired. The only thing better for those besotted by the gory details and the endless ruminations about what “caused” Cho to act this way or what the university should have done to protect its students and staff, the only thing more appealing to those who can’t seem to get enough of this would be for the coverage to shift from the news networks to the TV series CSI.
If we are patient this too shall come to pass. By while we’re waiting for that, we’ll have to make do with what the so-called news media are serving up. Thanks to the killer’s sending his “multi-media manifesto” to NBC there’s a lot to keep us titillated. Including the frankly hypocritical spatting about the “appropriateness” of airing the images and videos within the very same media that were eager to pick up the NBC feeds and print them (above the fold in the NY Times’ case) and air them.
My favorite thing about the other networks broadcasting the materials that NBC received is their literal outrage that NBC had the audacity to put its call letters on all the materials it released. So that when CBS or ABC or Fox of CNN broadcast them, embossed in vivid three-dimensions and full color in the upper left-hand corner was the NBC logo.
Paul Friedman, vice president of CBS News, showing faux-understanding about NBC’s plight, was quoted in the Times as having claimed that he “thought about calling NBC executives to suggest that they remove the logo to distance themselves from the material.” (Article linked below.) Spoken like a true heir to the legacy of Edward R. Murrow and custodian of what remains of the Tiffany Network’s journalistic traditions.
NBC contends that it thought long and hard about whether or not to put the pictures on the air and came to conclude that they had “news-value.” Steve Capus, who last week was busy clawing his way to the moral high-ground when firing Don Imus, archly shot back against his media colleague detractors, saying, “Every journalist is united [in agreeing that the images were newsworthy]. You can tell by their actions.” In fact, though NBC embargoed the distribution of the photos and videos until after 10:00 pm eastern time to give its own stations an “exclusive” until then, all of the other news organizations ignored it and some even broadcast the material before NBC could get them on the air!
And weren’t some of those images riveting? Especially the one the Times put on its front page which has become the logo for this tragedy—the one of Cho Seung-Hui glaring defiantly into the camera with his arms akimbo, guns blazing in both hands, cut-off shooter’s gloves, black vest, the whole gangster deal. How long before T shirts with that image show up in your neighborhood?
And, by the way, did the NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams beat out ABC’s World News Tonight in the ratings? And how did Katie Couric do? I didn’t watch but I understand she did her show from Blacksburg, VA without makeup.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
9:44 AM
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