Just SHUT UP...(another rant)
Fair warning.....here comes a rant!
Hey 24-hour news media....JUST SHUT UP. STOP IT. Stop what? Stop making news...making headlines and making a mess of an already screwed up world.
Here is the deal. Your quest to be "first on the scene", "first to report" "first to troubleshoot" has some very very serious consequences. Consequences that have resulted in numerous deaths of Americans; here inside our own borders. And I hold you responsible for each and every one of them.
Are you lost? Let me give you a map...Paducah, Jonesboro AK, Littleton CO, Springfield OR, Conyers GA, Santee California, Red Lake MN, Bailey CO, Cazenovia WI, Las Vegas, NV, and Nickel Mines, PA....oh...and about 16 other cities..but these are the ones you like to focus on.
"Kids killing Kids".....what a great headline. Not. I know more about student shooters and adult shooters of students than I could or would ever know about my own son's classmates. My fault that I don't know those closest to my son? NO..it is your fault that I know too much about people named Kinkel, Roberts, Weise, Harris, Klebold, Johnson, Golden, and Carneal.
I know what they had for breakfast, I know what their psychological problems were, I know what their Grandfather's did for a living, and I know what color their underwear was "that fateful day". SHUT UP..I DON'T WANT TO KNOW.
You believe that you are reporting the news. You aren't. You are making news by reporting the news. How do I figure? I live in the midsouth. One of the first killings was near me. I can understand my local media carrying it as "news"...it was news for our State. But was it news for the other 200 Million Americans? Not to my way of thinking. Not without giving other people the idea that they could make a name for themselves and go "out in a blaze of glory just like ______, and live forever in infamy". (Klebold and Harris anyone?)
See...teenagers and some mentally unstable folks are definitely malleable. Teenagers truly have a "I am going to make a name for myself somehow" mentality. I was one. Luckily, I didn't have the news media telling me exactly how to do it. I was picked on.....my siblings will tell you...I lived then (and now jokingly) with the moniker Pig Fats (or PF for short). I was the fat girl. The fun fat girl, but the fat girl nonetheless. Yes I wished the teasing would stop. Yes I used jokes and other methods to negate the pain that the teasing caused. I, through the years, learned the coping skills necessary to say "I'm rubber and you're glue" and mean it internally. Now at almost 40...I am rubber....and I am secure in myself...I had that opportunity....because I didn't have the news media telling me that I didn't have to stand for it; the way out was personal growth, not through pistol justice.
Don't get me wrong. I am a news junkie...so I feed the 24-hour news machine. You can just look at my Google home page to see it. I like to know what is going on in the world....so that I can form an impression of my own. I don't need the news media to feed me EVERY detail though. Especially when they are creating national news and national tragedy (or even local news and local tragedy)....here is an example...
In Louisville KY, a news station (WHAS11) attempted to enter a high school to show how bad High School Security was. They sent in a young reporter who looked like a student, and had him enter a school clearly marked "No Trespassing" via a back door...he was let in by another student. He was stopped immediately by security, taken to the office to determine his business there, and to sign in. He then attempted to "sneak out of the office" and was detained by the principal...and subsequently arrested for tresspassing. The News Station is trying to have the arrest negated "for the sake of news"..and is now reporting "So if the news media can't check school security who will". Fast fact..it isn't your duty to check school security. It isn't your duty to prey on local schools in the wake of a school shooting. It isn't your duty to MAKE the news, simply report it (with whatever spin your Station Manager or Editor wishes to put on it).
Here is what I learned from your story...If I look young enough, I can enter any school, for any purpose...good or bad. Thanks, I probably wasn't the only one listening....
Hey media...how about a report like this... "Four children were killed today in Pennsylvania when a man entered their school and proceeded to open fire. Our thoughts are with the families of those who lost their lives". BOOM. End of story. That's it. My heart breaks for four families in Pennsylvania, and my thoughts are with them. But neither I, nor my teenager, nor any other person outside of the area where the shooting occurred, knows anything.... ANYTHING. No blaze of glory for the shooter, and a country mourns for four children. No name to be made...and a nation's love pouring out for four children within our borders.
Imagine with me blog readers, if Michael Carneal (ugh..I know his name) and his rampage in West Paducah Kentucky would have been reported as this...
"Three children were killed and four injured in Kentucky today, when a student opened fire at his school. Our thoughts are with their families during this time. In economic news...."
Would that have stopped......Kinkel, Roberts, Weise, Harris, Klebold, Johnson, Golden....and all of the other folks that I didn't name here? We don't know..because we didn't have that option. It could have stopped Harris and Kelbold....because they (gulp..yup..again, I know this from the media) by their own admission were looking for that blaze of glory. Would this style of reporting
stopped what went on over the past three weeks? Well......someone (I am done naming names) in Pennsylvania seemed to have learned a thing or two from someone in Colorado in the last week or so.....including the types of students he wanted, and what his "intentions" were....so.... perhaps.
So..I again say... Shut Up 24-Hour News media..you have created enough havoc through "just reporting".... My childrens lives just might depend on your silence.
Hey 24-hour news media....JUST SHUT UP. STOP IT. Stop what? Stop making news...making headlines and making a mess of an already screwed up world.
Here is the deal. Your quest to be "first on the scene", "first to report" "first to troubleshoot" has some very very serious consequences. Consequences that have resulted in numerous deaths of Americans; here inside our own borders. And I hold you responsible for each and every one of them.
Are you lost? Let me give you a map...Paducah, Jonesboro AK, Littleton CO, Springfield OR, Conyers GA, Santee California, Red Lake MN, Bailey CO, Cazenovia WI, Las Vegas, NV, and Nickel Mines, PA....oh...and about 16 other cities..but these are the ones you like to focus on.
"Kids killing Kids".....what a great headline. Not. I know more about student shooters and adult shooters of students than I could or would ever know about my own son's classmates. My fault that I don't know those closest to my son? NO..it is your fault that I know too much about people named Kinkel, Roberts, Weise, Harris, Klebold, Johnson, Golden, and Carneal.
I know what they had for breakfast, I know what their psychological problems were, I know what their Grandfather's did for a living, and I know what color their underwear was "that fateful day". SHUT UP..I DON'T WANT TO KNOW.
You believe that you are reporting the news. You aren't. You are making news by reporting the news. How do I figure? I live in the midsouth. One of the first killings was near me. I can understand my local media carrying it as "news"...it was news for our State. But was it news for the other 200 Million Americans? Not to my way of thinking. Not without giving other people the idea that they could make a name for themselves and go "out in a blaze of glory just like ______, and live forever in infamy". (Klebold and Harris anyone?)
See...teenagers and some mentally unstable folks are definitely malleable. Teenagers truly have a "I am going to make a name for myself somehow" mentality. I was one. Luckily, I didn't have the news media telling me exactly how to do it. I was picked on.....my siblings will tell you...I lived then (and now jokingly) with the moniker Pig Fats (or PF for short). I was the fat girl. The fun fat girl, but the fat girl nonetheless. Yes I wished the teasing would stop. Yes I used jokes and other methods to negate the pain that the teasing caused. I, through the years, learned the coping skills necessary to say "I'm rubber and you're glue" and mean it internally. Now at almost 40...I am rubber....and I am secure in myself...I had that opportunity....because I didn't have the news media telling me that I didn't have to stand for it; the way out was personal growth, not through pistol justice.
Don't get me wrong. I am a news junkie...so I feed the 24-hour news machine. You can just look at my Google home page to see it. I like to know what is going on in the world....so that I can form an impression of my own. I don't need the news media to feed me EVERY detail though. Especially when they are creating national news and national tragedy (or even local news and local tragedy)....here is an example...
In Louisville KY, a news station (WHAS11) attempted to enter a high school to show how bad High School Security was. They sent in a young reporter who looked like a student, and had him enter a school clearly marked "No Trespassing" via a back door...he was let in by another student. He was stopped immediately by security, taken to the office to determine his business there, and to sign in. He then attempted to "sneak out of the office" and was detained by the principal...and subsequently arrested for tresspassing. The News Station is trying to have the arrest negated "for the sake of news"..and is now reporting "So if the news media can't check school security who will". Fast fact..it isn't your duty to check school security. It isn't your duty to prey on local schools in the wake of a school shooting. It isn't your duty to MAKE the news, simply report it (with whatever spin your Station Manager or Editor wishes to put on it).
Here is what I learned from your story...If I look young enough, I can enter any school, for any purpose...good or bad. Thanks, I probably wasn't the only one listening....
Hey media...how about a report like this... "Four children were killed today in Pennsylvania when a man entered their school and proceeded to open fire. Our thoughts are with the families of those who lost their lives". BOOM. End of story. That's it. My heart breaks for four families in Pennsylvania, and my thoughts are with them. But neither I, nor my teenager, nor any other person outside of the area where the shooting occurred, knows anything.... ANYTHING. No blaze of glory for the shooter, and a country mourns for four children. No name to be made...and a nation's love pouring out for four children within our borders.
Imagine with me blog readers, if Michael Carneal (ugh..I know his name) and his rampage in West Paducah Kentucky would have been reported as this...
"Three children were killed and four injured in Kentucky today, when a student opened fire at his school. Our thoughts are with their families during this time. In economic news...."
Would that have stopped......Kinkel, Roberts, Weise, Harris, Klebold, Johnson, Golden....and all of the other folks that I didn't name here? We don't know..because we didn't have that option. It could have stopped Harris and Kelbold....because they (gulp..yup..again, I know this from the media) by their own admission were looking for that blaze of glory. Would this style of reporting
stopped what went on over the past three weeks? Well......someone (I am done naming names) in Pennsylvania seemed to have learned a thing or two from someone in Colorado in the last week or so.....including the types of students he wanted, and what his "intentions" were....so.... perhaps.
So..I again say... Shut Up 24-Hour News media..you have created enough havoc through "just reporting".... My childrens lives just might depend on your silence.
Comments
That said, I too agree that less attention is warranted. But unfortunately, lots of people watch these things. And our free market system encourages supply if there's demand. Again, it's a horrible system. Just less horrible than anything else out there.
As Americans, if it bleeds, it leads and the more blood the higher the interest. The 24 hour news cycle must have news and one way to do create fictitous news by Oprah/Dr Phil'ing everyting. ( How did they get to this point, who is to blame for the lack of..., how does the victim/perpetrator feel/who did wrong by them when they were young/how soon will they check into rehab)
People fill their lives with watching bad events because "it is news"! and it is on TV