Journalism with a capital "E"

Being here in France, I have two English language TV stations (which is better than zero...) to get my anglicized news from. CNN International and BBC World. BBC hasn't covered this hurricane to the same to degree as CNN has - obviously, most Brits don't live in the affected areas. CNN has decided that 70% of their programming must revolved around this, because hey, the Chinese, Europeans, and Africans need to know about this evolving story. This has actually been good for me. I wanted to know what was happening; the French stations were discussing the back-to-school procedures in the regions of France. BBC was interviewing someone with a thick accent about the affect the hurricane will have on global oil prices; only CNN was covering this with actual reporters on the scene.

This has its positives and negatives. They wasted (and I really mean wasted) 4 minutes of the lives of 100s of millions (or at least millions) of viewers while two local weather people were discussing where they used to live in Biloxi, Miss. This was insane - they just went on and on about the neighborhoods where they used to live...The funny thing was neither knew what the other was talking about.

But, this isn't the actual subject of the post. I want to know, has disaster coverage always revolved around the shameless exploitation of the harmed? Is this a new thing? I have only began to notice it, but I feel it is terrible on CNN lately. Anyone who has watched CNN has seen the middle-aged black man explain how he was holding his wife who was in the water and he had to let her go. He knew she was dead. CNN has made this man the "face" of the hurricane. I find this so disgusting, I can not begin to explain it. This poor man just lost his wife, at least partly because he wasn't strong enough to save her; and this damn station is using this, time and again. I have seen it in print on their site, and seen the video a half-dozen times. Leave this man in peace and mourning.

Then, in another coup, they managed to get video of a woman telling how her husband didn't have time to evacuate and got stuck at home. He called her after the worst had passed to say that he lived; but she hasn't heard from him in something like 24 hours since. As opposed to ending the clip there, they stick the microphone more into her face and wait as she descends into crisis as she thinks about losing her husband! I understand that we need to humanize the situation - I too have a hard time visualizing the people - but be humanitarian at the same time. We all understood the implications of what this woman was saying; we don't need you to force her to live her nightmare on international TV! The heartlessness of this is astonishing.

...oh, and hey, good thing that Bush has been planning on cutting back on FEMA's disaster prepareness, huh?