This is the only newsworthy part of the photos aired yesterday by NBC. It's the little "give us credit for our scoop!" badge appended to each image sent by the Virginia Tech killer.
I honestly don't know what the executives at NBC were thinking when they decided to air photos and videos sent to them from the man who slaughtered 32 people on Monday morning. But I can make a few guesses.
"Our ratings will go through the roof!"
"Why focus on the families of the victims? If it bleeds, it leads at NBC!"
"How else can we possibly compete with American Idol?"
OK, whatever the reasons they have for airing parts of the killer's video yesterday, and then saving some new bits for this morning's Today show, they're not good enough. The videos are the worst kind of tabloid journalism, and they add nothing to the discussion except more grief and outrage.
The search for answers, "Why did this happen?" is important, and the desire to look at the message from this cold-hearted killer is understandable. But NBC did not have to milk their position at the center of this story in such an thoughtless, senseless way. They actually make CNN look classy by comparison.
Labels: News Media
Don't you think there is some news value to the videos? Everyone is looking for answers in this horrendous incident, and allowing insight only helps in the healing process. Keep in mind that they didn't even publish the entire manifesto - the horrible parts were edited. I don't agree that NBC (or anyone else for that matter) has done everything 100% correctly, but I fully believe publishing these images was the right thing to do.
There is no news value in the photos of the killer pointing the gun at the camera -- this is purely tabloid and an obvious, shameless grab for ratings by NBC.
The videos and the killer's message (written and spoken) have some value, as I said in the post, toward answering the question "Why did this happen?"
But that does not excuse NBC's decision to put those videos and that message on the air in exactly the way the killer hoped for. There is no excuse for NBC's actions, which purposefully worked to maximize the ratings value of this sad, sad tragedy.
The content of the killer's message could have been released in transcript form at a later date. Family members of the victims might have been given a chance to express an opinion, or a chance to view (or not view) the videos privately before the whole world was given access.
I stand with the police investigating the motives of the killer and with the families of the victims. I disagree completely with NBC's foolhardy and offensive decision.
perhaps there's no news value but the comic value sure is there. can anyone say halloween costume?
before you judge me, let me quote my good friend alfredo, "comedy = tragedy + time, and comedy = F(being ahead of your time)." see you in hell.
I was actually just getting ready to write about this very topic. My concern at this point is for the families and friends of the victims, and the family of this madman- and, frankly, the airing of these videos and pictures harms them even more than they already have been. It's disgusting.
I think criticizing a news organization for releasing relevant information that they have is a bit of a stretch. Could you imagine if they did the opposite? "We have the killer's manifesto and video tape, but we're not releasing them because it will only add grief and outrage". That seems paternalistic to me. People, not just the victims, are out there looking for explanation or context and this gives them some.
How exactly do you want to handle information in cases like this? Form a "committee of victims" and let them decide what gets shown? Have a public oversight board to determine what adds to discussion and what just makes people angry? Not publish things if they'll hurt someone's feelings? It's a news company's job to share information. Usually they fail pretty miserably at that and just give us blather and mindless commentary, but right now you're attacking them for sharing a primary source.
When the New York Times published the Unabomber manifesto, I don't think anybody was calling it a ploy to sell newspapers.
Hopefully without repeating myself, let me try again.
NBC did not have to air the video or show the photos in order to provide some information about the important journalistic question "why."
A transcript of what the killer said would have been enough (and would have been more analogous to the NY Times publishing statements from the Unabomber). The photos really add very little (if anything) to the discussion -- a verbal description of the photos (he points the gun at the camera, brandishes weapons like a hammer and a knife, etc etc) would have been just as effective at answering the question "why" as showing the photos.
NBC took the lower road, and went for the maximum "hype" effect, by releasing multiple photos, complete with NBC News logo, and multiple videos.
Why did NBC do this? Slate magazine has a good take on it today:
"The Cho affair reveals once again how dependent cable news is on video wallpaper. Whenever a major story arrives, the cable news networks are forced to loop the most arresting images, even if they're days or a week old, to give correspondents and sources an animated backdrop against which to talk. If the story is 9/11, the wallpaper is looped tape of the crash. If the story is the New Orleans catastrophe, it's folks wading in chest-high water or looting stores. If the story is the space shuttle Columbia, it's the death ship streaking its path across the sky like fireworks again and again."
In short, NBC took the road they usually take in any story -- they used the killer's message as video wallpaper to help with ratings.
While NBC was within its rights to do what it did, it doesn't change the fact that they chose to ignore the police, the victims, and common decency by releasing the videos when they did and how they did.
One more reason not to broadcast the killer's videos, from NY Times blogger Alice Mathias:
"Posthumous celebrity must not be promised as an incentive for murder. That’s all I’m saying. I’ve all but given up on gun control."
I think we read that same Slate piece differently. For starters, that paragraph wasn't about NBC, it was about cable news stations, which aired the clips on a continuous loop. The middle of the article agrees - NBC news was right to air the clips. What it questions is the "odd restraint" that NBC showed in not airing all of them. Why exactly is it OK to release a transcript but not the original video? And I still don't understand why victims should have exclusive rights to preview the videos before anyone else. I'm not saying I can't be convinced on this one, but it isn't self-evident to me.
We give celebrity to murderers whether or not they died while committing their crimes. Everyone knows the names of Ted Bundy or Jeffrey Dahmer. It's why we have the word "notorious." And the notion of posthumous incentive is also a little tricky for me to grapple with. I can't imagine there are people at the margins going "well, I'd kill all these people if it made my famous after I died, but since it won't, I'll cancel my shooting spree."
i guess my problem is with your tone erik. as if the decision to air the footage is undefendably wrong. like most of the articles you link to, it seems that there are compelling reasons to air and compelling reasons not to air. the idea that the broadcasting of this will cause future rampages are not even worth discussing. you may as well just blame hip-hop. news is news and i don't think that any of the news outlets, print, internet, tv or otherwise would not have done the same thing.
like dave said, your take is paternalistic because it relies on an agreed definition of "good taste". and you're basically saying that your definition of "good taste" is the correct one and if anyone disagrees they're a-holes. that you are the moral center that should decide what is good for society and what is not.
and after living with you for five plus years, i can assure you, that your definition of good taste is no better than anyone else's.
my point is, not that it was in bad taste, cuz i personally feel it was questionable, but to state unequivocally that nbc should not have aired is kinda douchey. there are people who want information and it's NBC's job to give it to them as completely as possible.
It's been three-plus years, Bob, and you obviously don't know me that well if you haven't realized yet that my taste in music, movies, and all things media is far superior to anyone you've ever met. As far as you're concerned, it's like I'm David effing Bowie in terms of my good taste.
Now that that's out of the way, let me try a different tone on this.
Look, I'm not saying NBC did anything they should be sued or boycotted for. I'm not saying that they broke some moral compact with the nation. I'm saying that what they did was not for any high-minded journalistic principles -- it was a dirty, shameless ratings grab.
If NBC were more interested in being an upstanding journalistic citizen, it could have delayed the release of the photos and video -- photos and video which did very very little to shed light on the subject at hand (specifically, why did this happen?).
If NBC were more interested in good journalism, it could have released only non-flashy elements of the killer's manifesto, like a written transcript of some of his rants.
If NBC were a better news organization, it would have avoided the tabloid temptation of taking credit for the images with its little logo button, and it would have kept the best interests of the victims in mind when deciding how to proceed.
All I'm saying is that it looks like no good journalistic judgment was applied. If you disagree with me, fine, but you'll have to show me just how your understanding of the VT killings was enhanced because of NBC's reporting and specifically I'd like to hear how you feel the public is better off having seen the video and photos sent by the killer to NBC in an obvious attempt to gain immortality and fame for his sick deeds.
I don't see it. I think NBC could have handled its position in the center of this scandal better than it did.
if you mean david bowie circa the tin machine era, then you are right. see you don't even know what i'm talking about...
anyways, flashy vs. non flashy is a completely subjective thing. cho reading incoherent sentences is not exactly flashy either.
my understanding of the VT killing was greatly enhanced because i was able to see first hand how crazy cho was. i get to make that decision. and they should release all of it so i can make a more complete judgement.
since when did watching the news become about making the public feel better?
i really don't see the difference between releasing stuff now or releasing stuff later. will the families of the dead people feel better if it is released later? sure, but does it make me feel better? i don't give an eff. and i'd rather see it now than later. and so would millions of NBC's viewers.
also, your definition of news value is completely subjective. is there news value in seeing what the guy looked like. yes. is there news value in seeing what the guy looked like right before the shooting spree. yes. news is about conveying information, and pictures and video convey information.
the concept of journalistic integrity seems naive to me, as i'm pretty sure that in the history of journalism, it has never really existed. if BBC gets the tape, they air the tape and they claim credit for it. if edward r. murrow gets the tape, he airs it.
it just feels like what you are recommending is someone should make decisions for us on what we see and what we don't see. and that means censorship. and if some people have to get emotionally hurt so that we don't have it, and if that means nbc can be a bunch of sleazeballs so that we don't have it, then that's the price we have to pay.
OK, I think our disagreement boils down pretty well to just one point.
I think journalism involves a degree of responsibility to service to the public, and that this responsibility overrides any other concern. In particular, the quest for higher ratings must never come before the responsibilty to the public good.
I think that the way in which NBC aired the material it got from the VT killer clearly shows that they put a desire for higher ratings before their duty to responsible journalism.
Bob, you think that airing the videos was responsible journalism because it provided valuable information for discussion. I guess reasonable people can disagree on this. To me, it was already very clear that the killer had deep mental and emotional problems -- the videos did nothing but add tabloid-quality "evidence" for confirmation.
But whatever you think about the newsworthiness of the videos, I think it's painfully obvious that NBC brazenly leveraged their position as the recipient of the killer's manifesto for ratings. As a quick example, they decided to air the videos at the height of the crisis, indeed before the bodies of the victims had been buried. They also aired part of the videos on NBC Nightly News, with a promise to air more of the videos the following morning on the Today show. They pulled the "tune in tomorrow for more!" cliffhanger approach to this sensitive story. I hope we can all agree that this is indefensible and that it shows a lack of journalistic integrity at NBC News.
I'm not some straw man calling for censorship or anything else ridiculous like that. I'm just doing what I've always done here, and that is point out when the mainstream media pulls shit that shows how ratings and the quest for more advertising dollars determines what we see (and what we don't see) on the news. That's the real problem I've got with NBC's decision in this instance. Which side are you on?