There was a horrific double murder-- a child and his mother were stabbed, the kid almost decapitated. A 15 year old survived her beating to call 911.
No this isn’t another one of those “let’s lynch the animal!” type threads. Or maybe it is, only the animals are the newspeople on channel 11. They are filming a girl-- an on the street interview. Underneath the girl is the caption “Friend of family”
Newsguy: Did you hear about the attack on Poor Woman?
Youngish woman: OMG, what hospital is she in?
Newsguy: She died.
Youngish woman tries to hold it together for about a minute and then loses it, ending up crying hysterically. And then they showed it on TV for everybody to see.
What the fuck does making a young girl cry in front of millions of people have to do with gathering the news?
That’s the worst sort of pandering to the ratings. I’ve always hated the “how did you feel when it happened” questions. What the fuck do the reporters expect? Do they all hope that just once somebody will say “I was relieved. I’d been hoping the bastard would die for years?” Maybe. They certainly want to get tears on screen. Tragedy is great for ratings, right?
Biggirl, I’m lining up right behind you to start slapping! I hate it when reporters hold the cameras on people who are obviously hurting. I’ll change the channel when that happens. Or when they put pictures of people sobbing right on the front page where you can’t miss it. How hard-hearted do you have to be to have a job that requires making other people’s misery public?
I guess, being the up-and-coming young journalist that I’ve decided to be, that I’ll give this a shot:
Obviously there is a line. As a reporter/photographer/cameraman/editor/graphic designer/layout person, it’s always important to recognize where that line is. There are just a few problems – the line is different for every person, and it’s different for every situation. When tens of thousands of people are going to see the work that you’re doing, it’s tough to judge just how far to go.
Journalists of all kinds have to be continually and completely sensitive to all kinds of issues, including this one, every single day. And if we screw up, or offend someone, it isn’t like your fuckup at the bottle factory where you put the label on upside down, it’s out there in front of tens or hundreds of thousands of people. If it’s TV or radio, it’s probably recorded who knows how many times. If it’s print, there are thousands of copies all over town. Being factually incorrect AND being insensitive are both things which journalists do not take lightly.
Incidentally, the centerpiece of the current update of poynter.org is a column about how the media should deal with mascot nicknames. Sensitivity to its readership is something journalists take VERY seriously.
I don’t consider journalism to be any more of a “hard-hearted” job that “requires making other people’s misery public” any more than I consider a police officer to be an insensitive asshole who has to shoot people. It might happen during the course of the job, but it’s PART of the job, and no one enjoys it.
As a journalist, and perhaps this is snotty of me, I’ve always had a real problem with two kinds of reactions in a story: emotional reactions from grieving people on TV, and uninformed ‘man in the street’ opinions.
Of course, I’m a print journalist, so I’m supposed to be a snob, I guess.
It’s this kind of stuff that makes me wish they’d put Larry King out to pasture, already. That demented son-of-a-bitch always asks the most galling “How do you feel?” questions, I guess because he’s supposed to be folksy and not hard journalism – but he runs right over the tact line like it’s not there.
He does it every time someone’s been traumatized by something, and sometimes worries at it like a damned dog with a bone, but I think he reached his nadir a year or two ago when he asked a woman who was on the show as a victims’ advocate, who had herself, years before, been brutally attacked and raped. Larry King: “How did you feel when he was making love to you?”
Hello, his capacity to ask a question like that should indicate to his producers that it’s time to pull the fucking plug. Suffering Christ.
I wonder if the television reports would show the reaction when a grieving person, having been asked a nosy “how do you feel?” question, hauled off and slugged the reporter in the jaw, or kicked them in the crotch? “How does THAT feel, asshole?”
The two journalists who answered, you don’t think some serious line is crossed when someone, who does not have ANYTHING AT ALL to do with the story at hand is purposely emotionally hurt just so they can film her breaking down?
That was the part that really got me. “Hey you! Did you hear that your friend was just horribly killed? Now cry for the camera. Thanks!”
Maybe they’re hoping for something really callous like “I finally get the big room!” or “It’ll be a hell of a rummage sale!”.
Here’s an idea - budget half an hour for the nightly news. If it goes under do something more valuable to the community - like old Looney Tunes…or a test pattern.
My personal favourite journalistic fuckwittery has always been ‘How do you feel?’ but last night I saw a show that really did have it beat. They did a story on the CTV news last night about some serial killer who was desperate for attention, and what he did at his sentencing hearing to get attention. Through the whole story they were very stern about his just wanting attention and doing bad things to get it.
Without any apparent self-awareness enough to notice that their story was exactly the kind of attention he’s looking for.
One of the most awkward experiences I had as a news reporter was being told by my editor to go interview a family that had just lost everything but their car in a house fire. I mean everything. They got out alive but there was nothing left of their house and the stuff in it. I’m proud to say I didn’t ask the “how do you feel” question. I tried to stay focused on what their plans were, if they had a place to go, anyone to rely on (fortunately they had family in the area that would put them up) and generally avoided the emotional.
I would suggest that as the TV news audience continues to dumb down, your TV “journalism” is becoming more and more a Punch and Judy show staged for the edification of idiots.
Another vote for “Why the hell are you watching local network news in the first place?” Complaining about sensationalist crap on the local news is like complaining about bathing suits at a water park. If you don’t want to see it then stay away.