Tue, August 28, 2007
What Would the Baha Men Do?
If the weekly Average Mulder column were still around, I have a feeling we'd have covered this by now. I've been thinking about it for weeks, but just putting off writing about it. (I don't want to speak for Joe, of course. It's possible he entirely disagrees with me on this subject; but I doubt it.)
There seems to be a level of hysteria surrounding dogfighting which I wouldn't have predicted, even in our hysteria-prone climate. From what I understand – and I generally change the channel when this story comes on – former Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick was a financier and participant in a dogfighting ring. Vick bought dogs, and a place for them to fight. Dogs fought to the death, or injured each other, and Vick and his friends won money when their dogs prevailed. Apparently, he also killed or helped kill some dogs that were not performing adequately in the fighting ring. Obviously this is reprehensible behavior, and Vick should be both ashamed and punished. But it's been in the news for weeks now! Is there still a war on?
The reason I drag Arksie into this is a conversation with him that immediately sprung to mind when I saw the first five-minute block of wailing coverage about this issue on ESPN. I'm probably not remembering this conversation verbatim, but I'm sure I'll be corrected in the comments if I'm too far off. Somehow, we were on the subject of Operation Smile, the charitable organization which sends surgeons into impoverished countries to operate on kids with cleft palates for free, and then later publishes fundraising ads in EW with some very disturbing pictures. Obviously, it's impossible to question the generosity of these doctors, but we were remarking that it probably wouldn't be the first charity we'd donate to. Asked which one would top his list, Joe quickly and matter-of-factly answered Alzheimer's. It's just a question of priority.
A new smile can make a huge difference in a child's confidence and social life – and believe me, if I had a cleft palate or a sixth toe or a deviated septum, it would feel like a life-threatening condition to me. But stacked up against diseases that kill, it seems like more of a nuisance. In the same way, giving money to PETA seems to be something you do after AIDS and cancer have been cured. My same common-sense priority sensor was activated the day this Michael Vick story broke – and it's been on tilt ever since.
It reminds me of this man-in-the-street segment from the Onion's ingenious series: According to reports, many people in New Orleans are reluctant to evacuate because they don't want to leave their pets. What do you think?
"Kitties and doggies in trouble? Finally, something to put a human face on this tragedy."
Or the moment in American Psycho, when Christian Bale holds a kitten hostage at an ATM, then turns his gun on an old lady instead. The audience breathed a collective sigh of relief around us, and Joe and I just looked at each other, agog. People's priorities are way out of whack.
Don't get me wrong: I hate people. Given the chance to protect a dozen loved ones first, I would gladly press the button on a hypothetical device that would immediately vaporize a random third of the planet's population. (Oh yeah, there's a list; but the good news is, if you're reading this you're probably on it.) But if you've got a gun to a person's head and one to a pit bull's head, I'm going to choose the pit bull to die every time (unless the person is Jay Leno). I'm not saying we should randomly kill animals. I'm not condoning dogfighting. I'm only suggesting that maybe this story has been a tad overreported.
© onebee · all rights reserved
"KOTC" — Tue, 8/28/07 11:06am
This story is waaay over reported and the latest talking points are pointed at the issue of racism. To quote one of the so called tv journalists "The whole culture is against well-to-do black athletes, Vick is being unfairly treated because he is black & because he is rich." He went on to say "Nothing happened to John Elway when he refused to show up at the superbowl because his fee wasn't met..." WHAT?!?! Ooooo, drives me a bit crazy.
Beemeister, you also mention "isn't there a war going on?" The press is driving me crazy here also. Headline; "two soldiers killed in Iraq today". It seems that its always headline news (and I agree that it is important news), but how many loved ones died because of drunk driver during the same time period? I guess they don't matter, and killing thousands of people each year this way is not news worthy. Unless, of course, its related to Britany, Paris, etc.
Bee Boy — Tue, 8/28/07 12:00pm
You have a great point on the drunk driving thing. I was particularly galled by a few pundits who asserted that Paris Hilton's situation was overblown and she should've just received a slap on the wrist for such a "minor infraction."
That said, I think a distinction can be made between reporting casualties of war and reporting other regrettable deaths, especially with the political movement afoot to demand accountability and a change of leadership in the Iraq war. Drunk driving wasn't just invented four years ago; there's not a small handful of people we can shake our fist at and say "these deaths shouldn't be happening" the way we can with Bush's war. It's not a problem of lesser importance, by any means. But it's kind of a different problem.
And, as to the news media and its wrongheaded application of probability, I've been meaning to post this link for weeks: "[I]nternational terrorism annually causes the same number of deaths as drowning in bathtubs or bee stings."
AC — Tue, 8/28/07 12:40pm
OMG– I HATE those Operation Smile ads! They are so unimaginably awful. Worse, I'm so disgusted by the pictures that I rip out the page and toss it before I even stop to think about what the ad is soliciting. Lemme tell you– if you think showing me pictures of poor kids mangled is going to get me to open my wallet, think again.