COLUMN: Readers often ignore real issues through criticism of coverage
As tragedies inevitably befall our society, news organizations have their hands full providing coverage and information in a timely and consumable manner.
And as the mass media has swollen in recent years, following the advent of the Internet and social media, the news industry is now more competitive than ever before.
Readers have many more options to choose from than before, and as newspapers and websites struggle to distinguish themselves with eye-catching headlines and photographs, the public has developed a bloodlust for criticizing these outlets of public information.
Rather than reading into plane crashes and school shootings, hoping to learn from the past so as not to repeat it, readers now feel they can challenge the credibility and sensitivity of established news organizations.
As readers have clamored to debase the Chicago Sun Times headline “Fright 214,” from the paper’s cover story about the recent plane crash in San Francisco, it is clear that the tragedy has often become secondary for some in the over-empowered readership’s penchant to play reporter themselves.
Readers develop their own opinions, and with the unbalanced freedom of the Internet, can publicize their claims of racism and insensitivity in distraction from the causes and lessons to be learned from the tragic events.
This is the same public that indicted George Zimmerman through demonstration and vilifying posts, months before he even went to trial. As towering forensic evidence now builds in favor of Zimmerman’s self-defense claims, the public is exposed as hoping for the worst.
With more technological tools than in past decades, users now pollute what could be a machine of greater access and larger discussion on important issues and events.
The Internet should be a tool to bring forth a wider range of perspective, with instantaneous ease. But the uninformed masses have continued to deluge the Web with an unending stream of negativity.
When irresponsible Twitter feeds reported on the false death of Joe Paterno and unfounded Facebook posts named Adam Lanza’s brother Ryan as the Sandy Hook shooter, the Internet struggled and our prized vehicle of public information may come grinding to a halt.
It used to be a cliché to tell children to think before they speak; that demand has evolved, as even adults must Google before they post.
