The media, what can I say… I can say alot actually. The Sandy Hook School Massacre just shows how much the media salivates and practically ejaculates over the prospect of 24 hours news coverage of a tragedy. This awful event, perpetrated by a loon with too much access to guns and not enough access to meds, was 24 hours a day coverage on CNN, Faux News, MSNBC, Headline News, NBC News, ABC News, CBS News and every local affiliate, talk show, morning show, newspaper, blog, webpage, twitter, facebook and even office talk. As stated above, this was a tragedy and an awful event, but should it have been the only news for the 3 days that followed it? Commercials and advertisers think so. More ad revenue was made in the 3 days after Sandy Hook then the entire month prior. It’s all still about the ratings ladies and gentlemen…
The news (at least in a principle) is there to provide information on all things “newsworthy”, yet in situations like Sandy Hook, the Aurora Colorado shooting, Columbine, Virgina Tech and any other news orgasm event all you see is that thing. A tanker of deadly gas might have overturned in your neighborhood or the valley rapist might have claimed his 57th victim, but you would not hear about it on the news. Nope, they get tunnel visioned and there is only one news story, there exists nothing more until the next one.
Brett Favre was gunned down at a Shakeys by a guy from Chicago? That is ALL you will hear about for days. The massive transmitter atop Cable 54 is destroyed and Rupert Murdoch is finally revealed. All you will hear about (or not in that given situation). A crazy man holds Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage at gunpoint and forces them to have relations. All you will hear about. Aliens land in Times Square and declare Obama the lord of the universe? All you will hear about, although with that one, it might just be big enough that it deserves some real coverage and that is the only point where the media would seemingly chose to stick with something dumb as a story.
I worked in live TV news for a decade and I saw behavior that would make you think there is no humanity left, I saw the decision making process to kill anything that was not related to the EVENT happening, I saw real and credible stories shot down for not being as exciting (yes, in a case like Sandy Hook, that is the word producers will use) as the EVENT, I saw pure exploitation of victims, I saw unverified “facts” put on the air just so we could get them out before the competition did, I saw unethical tactics to get those unverified “facts”… you get the idea. Now, what I am saying here is nothing new, you all know this (well, you should at least) and I can’t really give specific examples with names and dates due to confidentially agreements I had to sign but lets just say, I saw all this and more. I will say though, that when Virgina Tech happened, my station was NUTS, when the shooters package to the media arrived and legal was going over what we could and could not air… it was a madhouse in that newsroom… all based on what MIGHT, MIGHT, be in that package. Other then 9/11, I never saw a news station go that insane…
Part of the reason that all of the above mentioned things happen is that in the media you have to be first, being correct is an afterthought, but if you are FIRST you get the ratings. You can be giving out completely wrong and/or even dangerously inaccurate information but as long as you got it out there FIRST, you win… you can always retract later… The multi-channel universe we have had since the 90’s coupled with the 24 hour newscycle plus the internet makes first the only option. If you take the time to get your facts straight and there are 3 competitors already on the air, no one is going to change the channel to yours. That is how the game is played unfortunately.
But this is not just that the media has this myopia when it comes to EVENT stories, it’s that you do to. Yeah you, the reader of this shit column and the viewer of all of this mediagasm, you are the reason they do it. You all watched the coverage of Sandy Hook for days, you flipped channels to see which station had the “best” coverage (by that I mean, which one sensationalized it the most), who was saying the most outrageous things and most of all who was FIRST with new “information”. You are to blame for this. They would not get caught in a frenzy if you were not there lapping it up. Ratings are the chum line, sure they are the sharks but so are you. What about me, didn’t I watch all this too? I did, and while making no excuses I run a current events radio program, it’s my JOB to stay abreast of what is happening and how the media handles itself. Does that alleviate me from my part in this, of course it does not, but at least I can justify it to myself even if it’s a bullshit justification.
There will always be those that are willing to sell out not just themselves, but all of those around them. Here is how you (we?) curb this media insanity when it comes to things like Sandy Hook or whatever the next national new EVENT will be, avert your eyes. Just don’t watch it, don’t read about it, don’t get involved. For one thing, that is one of the goals that the shooters like this have, they want the media coverage. Dead or alive, after this you know their name, their life story and they are famous. The media will spin this logic of their own culpability but stating that they only give the people what they want, that if people didn’t want coverage like this, then why do they watch… and I can’t really call them wrong for that. They nailed it, you people ask for it and they provide it, sure, they are like a drug pusher but would there be drug pushers if there was not a demand for it? So yes, you are all to blame for sensationalized news and the low state that is modern news. Less then 8 hours into the Sandy Hook MEDIA EVENT, I saw Mark Furman (MARK FUCKING FURMAN) on Faux News starting conspiracies about how the shooter (who I refuse to use the name of, I will deny him the infamy he desired) could not have done this on his own and there must have been others helping him. This was a point where the anchor lightly prodded Furman to go deeper… this is fear mongering on a level that straddles the line between unethical and outright evil. I actually think that they were attempting to imply (attempting to imply? Sure why not) that Sandy Hook was somehow Obama’s fault. They kept hinting at this conspiracy and at Obama’s gun laws. Sickening huh? Or how about CNN rushing up to the families of the victims (CHILDREN for the most part I might add) and asking them things like “how does it feel to have lost your son”? HOW THE FUCK DO YOU THINK IT FEELS YOU BAG OF USED UP SLANKMEAT? Every network was working overtime to get the most photos or video of crying families in shock in what is most likely the WORST moments of their lives… all for you people out there that DEMAND they do so. You people feed on misery and pain so therefor the media has no choice but to do the same, anything contrary to that would make you go elsewhere for old mama spike in the vein of the brain. There will always be someone that is willing to set aside morals and humanity for the sake of ratings or a larger market share, and in doing so they bring everyone down due to this being a competitors market. So yes, I do squarely lay the blame on YOU PEOPLE.
There I said it, now let the negative attacks on me commence…
