The tragedy that happened yesterday morning in Mangalore hit me this morning as I read the newspaper. The way the stories of death and survivors were narrated in the paper was far more impactful than what I saw sporadically yesterday on TV. Is that because we read the newspaper at our pace and choose stories on our own discretion, while the TV coverage was plainly an aural/emotional assault?
More than that question, given the relentless cribbing about TV coverage all over Twitter, I really wonder, how should news channel coverage be, about a tragedy…any tragedy?
My tweet posing the question got me some interesting responses.
navyad2005: @beastoftraal Media coverage should help people who are affected by it instead of showing the disaster with more details!
softykid: @beastoftraal follow the ethics and avoid showing/repeating clips of the tragic incident and dead bodies.
softykid: @beastoftraal report wat happened nd what is happening.dont go after survivors asking “kaisa lag raha hai aapko? ” dont come to a conclusion
myownniche: @beastoftraal Indian context is always a terrain of overflowing emotions. in movies, reality shows etc But in news, it’s a bit out of place
karthik_perumal: @beastoftraal the coverage shouldn’t try to fuckin win brownie points with the viewer with every fact.
amithchandhran: @beastoftraal: I have heard from some of my friends in journalism, that tragedies is the ‘money season’ for them. They sell footages etc 🙂
pokmaster: @beastoftraal did u saw the 7/11 coverage by CNN or BBC? That to the point it should be.
Now that we have so many opinions on how it should be, here are a few questions, from my side.
1. The coverage across channels yesterday was, in one word, relentless. And repetitive too. News reporters were constantly on the same story and the same scenes were shown all through the day and only changed when new clips were available occasionally. What was the objective behind that? Was it because they did not want to dilute the seriousness of the tragedy by broadcasting other, relatively happier news? Or was it simply competition – what if other channels were on the story all day and people tuned to those, instead of the one that switched stories?
2. There are obvious things that seem silly and insensitive – asking survivors how they feel, showing charred bodies without pixeling them out, showing dead people in extreme close-up – nobody disputes the horrendousness of such scenes. But, have you seen films lately? There are enough Bollywood, Hollywood and South Indian movies that show more dead bodies and decapitated bodies that will put any real tragedy to shame. So, is it insensitive for news channels only because they are free (as against films, which we choose to watch by paying money) and they are beamed in our living rooms which usually also has kids?
3. The obvious question again – if we do not like a news channel’s coverage or we deem it insensitive, why don’t we switch off the channel or the TV altogether? Is it not in our control to not watch that channel or that kind of a coverage? Beyond being insensitive, news channels are in a business – business of grabbing eyeballs and there are a hell of a lot of channels competing for our eyeballs. If films can grab eyeballs no matter what crap they show, why are news channels wrong? Just because they show real life as against staged violence in films?
4. Advertisements! While I tweeted about the tragedy yesterday morning, I was wondering if I should tweet something happy and neutral post that at all. I had some frivolous thing to share and was confused if it’d seem in bad taste. I have no idea. But, what about happy advertisements in between coverage of a tragedy like that? If you ask me, I’d perhaps assume that advertisements should not be aired during such coverage or they should perhaps be muted by the channels themselves – but I myself think those suggestions are not feasible and may even seem gimmicky. Today’s Times of India has a 6 page report on the tragedy and in between that, there are happy looking people smiling from posh apartments up for sale, in full half page. Is it similar to airing ads on TV during the coverage?
5. Journalistically, speculating the reason of the tragedy or blaming someone prematurely are plain dumb and goes against every kind of ethics – no questions about that. But, as a viewer, which channel will you watch when everybody is saying the same thing? Assume that 3 channels say that it was the pilot’s error, while a 4th says, the weather caused it – it adds a new twist to your chain of thought and whether it is true or not is beyond your comprehension and even the channel’s – it is basically a new speculation some ‘alleged-expert’ added in the fray and the channels were merely beaming to stand out of the clutter. Print publications have the luxury of time – they can cross-check facts before publishing the next day, even though their online versions would have the same trouble as the TV channels.
6. Most tweets were merely re-beaming what was being shown on TV. Someone even looked up deceased names on Twitter and found one dead person’s twitter ID and shared it for the benefit of others – it was RT’d to hell. Was that being done to offer condolences, which could have been done silently too? Or was it done to get noticed and gain RTs/followers? Isn’t that what channels are indulging in too?
7. Restraint is a given in such coverages – but if your channel is restrained, what should they exactly be doing with that news? Not show anything at all and show other news as if this never happened? Show it for 10 minutes and then move on to other news? Show only those that seem true (though it is very difficult to ascertain ‘truth’, in real time) and not repeat the same thing over and over? Will you, the reality TV loving viewer, watch that channel that offers restraint in coverage? Or will you switch to other channels to see if there’s ‘any update’, in any manner?
I’m not taking the side of news channels – it’s not that easy. But, before we crib about their style of reporting, I really wonder what we do on Twitter. And how different is that from what channels do. They do it to stand out in a competitive market while we perhaps do to be read, on Twitter.
In both cases, we are catering to an audience – using a tragedy. Some opinions are insensitive and some are plain silly. But all these are merely multiple points of view. TV news reporters look bleary eyed, intentionally or naturally, while reporting such news. Some even look teary-eyed, again, intentionally or naturally, for obvious reasons. We question those too – are they done to gain attention and eye balls and reduce news coverage to a ‘show’? What about opinions passed yesterday by us on Twitter? Bachchan saab was referring to the tragedy as a method of life’s checks and balances (whatever he meant!), while others were offering R.I.P’s. Just because we are the mango people (aam janta), we can cry, look teary eyed and offer RIPs, but on screen, the journalists can be questioned if they do too?
There are no easy answers here, in my opinion. Every person’s upbringing and exposure is bound to make him/her think differently over such TV coverages and we take sides quite fast these days.
The honest truth is that while we offered RIPs on twitter/Facebook and moved on to our Saturday morning household chores/shopping/matinee show of Kites (Oh hell!), the TV reporters, by nature of it being their job, were forced to stay on the same news, allegedly for our benefit. At least from that point of view, I feel bad for them – they may have become numb to such news, but any person with some heart left will surely feel miserable at the end of the day if he/she were to spend the entire day either talking about the tragedy or being on the tragedy spot looking for more clues. We were not there.