Serving Melodrama With A Side of Give Me A Fucking Break!

[anissaannalise]

Let me just start off by saying that I do think it's sad that 12 of the 13 miners in West Virginia perished before they could be rescued. And I'm willing to admit it's a tragedy. For their families. For their community. And possibly even for the state of West Virginia.

I was watching ABC World News last night & there was Lizzie Vargas doing her anchor desk thing. This makes me weep for the resurrection of Peter Jennings anyway, but that's only my minor point. Lizzie says that later in the evening there will be a special airing on ABC about the mining accident but she termed it "An American Tragedy" (which she'd done earlier in the broadcast) & then the logo for the show is up & there it is again. WTF?!

First of all, it was 12 people. Who did a highly dangerous job. Maybe they didn't get hazard pay, but they should have. Second, in the annals of history the following may legitimately be listed as "tragic" for the U.S.:

Pearl Harbor, September 11 & maybe even Hurricane Katrina.

Note massive death & destruction experienced in each case. These were events so over-arcing that not only did they capture the attention of those in the United States but also those around the world.

This brings me to my next point. I have deep disdain for the usage of "American Tragedy" because it furthers our completely egoist outlook on the world. We are the United States of America. Only. Surely Canada is still part of North America. And last I checked, Latin & South Americas still exist. Surely they do not feel this experience was a tragedy. It's just one more example of our assumption that the damned world revolves around us and everyone else can just go to hell.

And here's the last thing, a day or two before the WV mining story, there was a very similar happening in China. More than 13 people were trapped and they were working tirelessly to figure out how to get to them. Ironic how that story dispersed into the cosmic ether when the WV story broke. But maybe it's just me.

Comments

[sw-fangirl.livejournal.com]

Chica, I love how you rant, and then your mood is "cheerful". Funny shit.

However, I think what you have misunderestimated is how important the United States is in the grand scheme of things. We have sporks! We have the WWF! We invented Star Wars! What more evidence could you need? If it's not a tragedy, then people won't care about it!


*ps, that was a wee bit sarcastic*

[anissaannalise.livejournal.com]

*LOL*

Yeah, based on that body of global contribution we've earned the right to be right asses if we choose. Hell, we gave the world Britney & K-Fed & Bobby & Whitney, too.

;P

[akirad.livejournal.com]

If it's any consolation it's the same everywhere. Here in the UK you get a very UK-centric view of Bad Things, which only become Terrible Tragedies if someone from here is involved.

I think the thing with the mining accident (which got a lot of coverage here as well), was that there was an element of a "Good News Story" about it. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I thought there was anything good about it - it must have been awful for the families involved - but you could sense the media people thinking that there was a drama element they could drag out over several days. If all those poor people had been killed straight off in the initial incident, the media people would have dropped it from the front page after the first day.

Not that I think journalists are all parasites and low-lifes, but a lot of them are ;)

[anissaannalise.livejournal.com]

Well it's not, but thanks for trying. :) And you do make a good point about the media pimping the drama thing. It's just so insincere and self-serving that it makes me go almost insane. At best, it's news as chat and at the very worst it's pornographic & salacious. And I expect, ya' know, journalism to be above that, because what I really need is facts. ;)