News called on account of tragedy

Guest post by Edward Copeland

Yes, the events on the Virginia Tech campus are tragic and landmark, so it would be unseemly to focus on other news events (if there were any other events out there being covered) or to turn the incident into some kind of political take. Still, it's admittedly a worthier topic for wall-to-wall coverage than Anna Nicole or the Imus controversy. (Guess all it took was a lone gunman to end that "national conversation on race." I think Harry Shearer had the best line about that, asking if the national conversation was the one we started after Hurricane Katrina or the one we started after the O.J. Simpson verdict.)

Yes, I am a cynic, so even though the scope of this tragedy is mindboggling, the hyperbole of the media always gets to me. Every time one of these mass killings occur, they express shock at what has occurred. How many times do these sort of things have to happen for people to stop acting as if they've never seen it before? I'm such a cynic, I'm only shocked that with the repressed anger in this country and the availability of weaponry that it doesn't happen more frequently.

Still, as awful as yesterday's events were, do they really merit non-stop blather? I heard an anchor on one of the cable news channels ask some insta-expert wheeled out for the occasion what it meant that the shooting happened early in the day when most tend to happen in late afternoon. Gee, I don't know – does it mean the killer was an early riser? Then I heard another talking head saying that this will be one of those days where people will always remember where they were when they heard. Really? Pop quiz – how many out there can tell me where they were when the previous recordholder for massacres (the Luby restaurant slayings in Killeen, Texas) happened? Can you even guess at what month or year that happened, let alone the date?

Tragic as this event is, it's not 9/11 or JFK's assassination. (As if to prove the point about not remembering dates, David Gregory kept saying that today was the anniversary of the Columbine massace until someone finally corrected him that it happened on April 20, not April 17.)

Of course, now we will enter the next phase of coverage. I've already heard people blaming video games when there has been no evidence yet that the shooter even played video games. I guess guns don't kill people (or eliminating seven-day waiting periods and limits on the numbers of rounds that can be placed in a magazine), playing Grand Theft Auto or Doom does. I've never played either game, but they are huge sellers and these massacres are not everyday occurrences, but never let a tragedy stop people from pursuing their own agendas. I wish I could find it but I read a great mock piece about people in Verona seeking to ban Romeo and Juliet when two star-crossed teen lovers committed suicide. People always want to blame something outside instead of looking at the fact that some people are just not right. Video games, Shakespeare, movies, Judas Priest or anything else do not cause these things. Mark David Chapman sat down and read Catcher in the Rye after killing John Lennon. Should we ban it?

Whether it's bigotry or violence, people would rather try to solve a problem through bans and banishment than by actively tackling the root causes. Back when Dennis Miller was funny, he used to have a great routine about how if anything Judas Priest has to say is going to set your kid off, something was going to get them eventually, ending with the sentiment, "You can't save everyone — just try not to be living next door to them when they go off."

We also will now have to endure the endless parade of talking heads and people seeking to be professional victims, looking to find 15 minutes of fame within the pool of blood. MSNBC spoke to the stepfather of one of the Columbine victims who said he didn't realize his stepson was one of the dead until the following morning when he read it in the paper. Really? I find that hard to believe unless he lived in another town and the boy's mother had also not been notified for some reason, but let's trot him out anyway just like Elizabeth Smart's creepy father comes out every time a little girl is abducted. I've already seen about three separate interviews with two students who were in the German classroom but survived, though one was slightly wounded in the arm. Yet, the young man who was wounded was still appearing on every interview in a suit and a tie, even with his arm in a sling. Call me crazy, but if I've been shot, I'm not dressing up to talk about it.

I hope no one finds this post too cold-hearted or harsh. I do genuinely feel for the friends and families of those unfortunate souls caught in the madman's line of fire, but the media's insistence on turning into a national circus (and a formulaic one at that) cheapens the entire horrific event.