Tragedy Porn

I'm trying very hard to avoid the media as much as possible this weekend. I did turn on 680 News long enough to confirm what I'd already known: somebody would say there was a "credible threat" of a terrorist attack tomorrow. Keep 'em scared, keep 'em scared.
It's very difficult to avoid the 9/11 memorials, tributes, and analyses. They're everywhere. Sports sections of the newspaper have feature articles on how the Yankees and Mets responded; the entertainment section of the Star has a big spread on how Hollywood celebrities were trapped in Toronto during the film festival (another thing that gets far too much coverage, in my view).

I'm not avoiding the media out of disrespect for the victims, or the world-changing event itself. It's just that my interest in tragedy as pornography rests comfortably to the left of zero.

That's what it is: tragedy porn. You've been able to wallow in it 24/7 in America for a couple of weeks now. Documentaries examining 9/11 from almost every conceivable angle. Still nothing forthcoming about all the confiscated video of the Pentagon attack. I don't subscribe to most of the numerous conspiracy theories surrounding the events of that day, but the Pentagon strike and the lack of footage for same does give me pause. And I do find it almost impossible to believe the United States government knew nothing about the attacks before they happened, given how many warnings they received.

One other thing is missing from the wall-to-wall coverage, at least from what I saw of it before I shut down--any mention of the other victims of 9/11. There's lots about the 3000 or so people killed on that day, maybe a brief nod to the 6700 or so coalition casualties since;  little and less about the Iraqis and Afghans we've killed. Those total over a million, and I believe most of them were innocent--what the military so charmingly calls "collateral damage".  Paraphrasing Stalin, a few thousand Western deaths is a tragedy, over a million is a statistic".

We persist in wondering why they hate us. Isn't it obvious?

Anyway: tragedy porn. You'll get the "money shot" of the towers collapsing dozens of times over the next day. You'll be told how "unspeakable" 9/11 is...while scores of people are invited to speak about it. "I can't bear to look...so you look! Look good and hard! See those bodies falling there?"

None of this is necessary. It won't promote healing. We all remember the searing images. What purpose will seeing them again serve, much less on every channel?

It's been said in several places online: if the media really cared, we'd see three minutes of silence from all radio and television outlets tomorrow at 8:46 a.m. EST. You can tune in yourself and let me know if  that's what we see. I'll remember 9/11 in my own way.