on May 5th, 2008Manmar: 4,000 Dead (humans) vs. Kentucky Derby: 1 Dead (horse)
I think we’ve got some weird sense of priorities in our western media. I’m not saying I’m perfect, but it’s things like this that burn me up. Over the weekend at the Kentucky Derby, a horse name Eight Belles was injured and needed to be euthanized. Also over the weekend, a cyclone hit Myanmar (also known as Burma) and at least 4,000 humans died as a result (with the toll rising as I write this).
Now, I ask you to do something. Look to the left at the photo of Yahoo news and tell me which news made the “featured” news and which one is buried in the small print?
, but I think this is a good reason folks in faraway places despise us. Are we more interested in reading about a horse that had to have the eternal sleeping juice, or should we, perhaps, give a bit more of our compassion to those nameless, faceless Myanmar citizens?
I don’t know if it’s a chick or egg type of syndrome in mainstream media and western culture. I mean, I could blame those of us who connect to the “real world” through media outlets for concentrating our concerns on the exploits of an injured horse over the cries of a devastated country most of us can honestly say we never heard of, or I could blame the media for continually shoving one story in front of us that seems to be a relative molehill next to a mountain.
Or, I could blame myself for sitting here, drinking my coffee while everyone else is “shaking things up.”