Monday, September 11, 2006
Joining the Flock: Commenting On 5 Years Back
It seems everyone on the Internet is posting thier memories, thier views, thier feelings about 9/11. It's cathartic, I suppose, to verbally express our personal experiences and read of others' in order to deal with what was (and still is) an earth-shattering tragedy; the single greatest human disaster of our generation.
I'm searching for words to accurately describe my mindset here, but I feel that everything that can possibly be said about this horrorshow has already been said.
On 9/11/01, I was in my sophomore year of college. I woke up to get ready for my morning classes and, as I almost always did, turned on CNN. And, within about 15 minutes of turning on the television, I watched as an airplane (turned out to be the second plane) crashed into the World Trade Center. I was a little shaken up.
Maybe that sounds a little insensitive, but what exactly are you supposed to say when you watch, on live TV, the instantaneous death of hundreds of people?
I went to class (honestly can't even remember which class it was) came out, went to have some lunch at the cafeteria and came out to the news that the Pentagon was hit and, more shockingly (to me, anyways), classes were cancelled for the rest of the day. I learned through talking with other people that the towers collapsed, and spent the rest of the day on the Internet, with CNN on in the background.
But you know what? As a student that was studying media at the time, those 5 or 6 months right after September 11th were some of the most exciting and refreshing , from a newsperson's point of view, in years. It is my opinion that the quality of broadcast news is very much a supply-and-demand business. If the majority of the people in the United States have a thirst for quality news about world events, if television watchers genuinely want in-depth analysis of national interests, then that is what is going to be provided to them. And that's exactly what happened after September 11th, 2001. The problem in America recently is that, more often than not, most of the television watching public does not want analysis. They don't want all the information available, they don't want to know. We, in America, want to be entertained above all else; and this, I believe, is one of the reasons that broadcast news has been in a steep downward spiral for years now. From the very ionvention of television until the late 1980's, broadcast news (and newspapers) were America's bastions of truth. We had no other methods of obtaining information about the state of the nation and, therefore, were limited to the amount of places to turn to for info. The Internet, as we know it, has single-handedly destroyed broadcast news while, at the same time, revolutionizing how we obtain news today. The people who genuinely want to be informed in America, I've found, turn to the Internet for thier information, for thier news. Television news, the newspapers, have been rendered all but obsolete to true newshounds in America.
That's not to say that I think broadcast news should be eliminated. Far from it. I just believe that there has to be, just as in the case of the Internet, a giant revolution in broadcast news very soon. 24 hour news channels, I think, need to be completely eliminated. I've never liked the idea that Americans need 24 hours of news every day, because that allows for harsh and instant judgement without getting all the facts. All these channels: CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, etc., the phrase you'll see as a graphic more often than not will be "BREAKING NEWS"; because that's what counts to them. Who gets to the scene first? Who's reporting on-the-spot? How fast can we get this story on the air, no matter how much information we actually have? I believe it takes time, time to gather facts and to develop a full news story. This, I feel, is the only way to truly make broadcast news watchable again.
I'm not sure how this 9/11 remembrance post got me involved into a rant about broadcast news, but there you go. I guess remembering such an incredible tragedy just brings out passions in people, and this is what I'm passionate about.
But how am I spending this September 11th, a full 5 years after the initial attacks? I'm spending it the way I've spent it the past 2 years:
I'm watching "Fahrenheit 9/11", and I'm getting outraged all over again.
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It seems everyone on the Internet is posting thier memories, thier views, thier feelings about 9/11. It's cathartic, I suppose, to verbally express our personal experiences and read of others' in order to deal with what was (and still is) an earth-shattering tragedy; the single greatest human disaster of our generation.
I'm searching for words to accurately describe my mindset here, but I feel that everything that can possibly be said about this horrorshow has already been said.
On 9/11/01, I was in my sophomore year of college. I woke up to get ready for my morning classes and, as I almost always did, turned on CNN. And, within about 15 minutes of turning on the television, I watched as an airplane (turned out to be the second plane) crashed into the World Trade Center. I was a little shaken up.
Maybe that sounds a little insensitive, but what exactly are you supposed to say when you watch, on live TV, the instantaneous death of hundreds of people?
I went to class (honestly can't even remember which class it was) came out, went to have some lunch at the cafeteria and came out to the news that the Pentagon was hit and, more shockingly (to me, anyways), classes were cancelled for the rest of the day. I learned through talking with other people that the towers collapsed, and spent the rest of the day on the Internet, with CNN on in the background.
But you know what? As a student that was studying media at the time, those 5 or 6 months right after September 11th were some of the most exciting and refreshing , from a newsperson's point of view, in years. It is my opinion that the quality of broadcast news is very much a supply-and-demand business. If the majority of the people in the United States have a thirst for quality news about world events, if television watchers genuinely want in-depth analysis of national interests, then that is what is going to be provided to them. And that's exactly what happened after September 11th, 2001. The problem in America recently is that, more often than not, most of the television watching public does not want analysis. They don't want all the information available, they don't want to know. We, in America, want to be entertained above all else; and this, I believe, is one of the reasons that broadcast news has been in a steep downward spiral for years now. From the very ionvention of television until the late 1980's, broadcast news (and newspapers) were America's bastions of truth. We had no other methods of obtaining information about the state of the nation and, therefore, were limited to the amount of places to turn to for info. The Internet, as we know it, has single-handedly destroyed broadcast news while, at the same time, revolutionizing how we obtain news today. The people who genuinely want to be informed in America, I've found, turn to the Internet for thier information, for thier news. Television news, the newspapers, have been rendered all but obsolete to true newshounds in America.
That's not to say that I think broadcast news should be eliminated. Far from it. I just believe that there has to be, just as in the case of the Internet, a giant revolution in broadcast news very soon. 24 hour news channels, I think, need to be completely eliminated. I've never liked the idea that Americans need 24 hours of news every day, because that allows for harsh and instant judgement without getting all the facts. All these channels: CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, etc., the phrase you'll see as a graphic more often than not will be "BREAKING NEWS"; because that's what counts to them. Who gets to the scene first? Who's reporting on-the-spot? How fast can we get this story on the air, no matter how much information we actually have? I believe it takes time, time to gather facts and to develop a full news story. This, I feel, is the only way to truly make broadcast news watchable again.
I'm not sure how this 9/11 remembrance post got me involved into a rant about broadcast news, but there you go. I guess remembering such an incredible tragedy just brings out passions in people, and this is what I'm passionate about.
But how am I spending this September 11th, a full 5 years after the initial attacks? I'm spending it the way I've spent it the past 2 years:
I'm watching "Fahrenheit 9/11", and I'm getting outraged all over again.
