Earlier this month I was in Florida, where every night the local television news stations filled me in about the crimes of the day.
Break-ins, vandalism, car thefts, 7-11 stick-ups, domestic violence disputes, schoolyard skirmishes: Not a night passed without a laundry list of who-did-what-nasty-thing-to-whom over the past 24 hours.
But these headline-grabbers were seldom local fare. In fact, many took place over a large swath of South Florida territory. And while the incidents themselves weren't pleasant (what crime is?), they weren't exactly spectacular either. They weren't terrorist acts, organized crime shootouts, or anything especially gruesome. They didn't involve celebrities, politicians, serial killers, or anybody else whose misdeeds would make us raise our eyebrows.
So why do local stations routinely fill up their nightly half hours with reports of gritty but run-of-the-mill crimes? Does nothing else of importance or interest happen in local Florida towns? Are news desks so starved for news--or so unimaginative in their conception of news--that they need to report each night on yet another shoplifting arrest or road rage incident six towns away?
This may be nothing more than a case of nitwits at the news desk--cheap, amateurish journalism at work--proof that the ability to find a really interesting story (or to provide more insightful reporting) is indeed a talent. But whatever the explanation, the local networks' obsession with humanity's underbelly has negative consequences for all of us.
At a time when crime in America is down big time, many in the media still skew their reporting to suggest just the opposite. While the likelihood of being a crime victim is dramatically less than in previous decades, some network news stations would still have us think there's a felon on every corner. And no matter how many thousands of people go through each day without ever becoming a victim, local news is forever within earshot, drawing its nightly coverage from a handful of police blotter incidents and whispering to viewers, "Watch your back."
Is it any wonder so many people are anxious and fearful? Is it any wonder that so many see the world as a scary place? Is it surprising that so many are arming themselves?
I am not naive about crime and violence. There are indeed criminals in our midst. There are also mentally unbalanced individuals who'd do us harm because of who we are or how we look. We clearly can't afford to be oblivious to the possibility of danger.
But we also can't afford to let ourselves become perpetually frightened, cynical, or worse yet, immobilized by a nonstop litany of the landscape's dangers, delivered each night by chirpy news anchors reading off teleprompters, The journalism profession has to be better than this. As citizens we should insist on it. And if some news stations can't be counted on to avoid the sensational, it's up to us to see through their fear-mongering and let them know that their reporting is bad news.
